Reading YouTube comments is a hell of an adventure. The delightful mix of misspelled insults and expletive laden vitriol probably wouldn’t be possible if the site weren’t so liberal with its anonymity policy. For whatever reason, though, YouTube now wants to know your real name if you’re going to comment on a video. And if you don’t want to give it, you’d better explain yourself.The new commenting workflow at YouTube seems pretty mundane at first. When you go to post a comment, a box pops up showing your YouTube username on one side, and your real identity (via Google+) on the other. You have two choices: proceed with using your real identity instead of your anonymous YouTube account or click another button that says “I don’t want to use my real name.” That one takes you to a new screen with a bunch of different options to justify why your choice, options like “My channel is for a show or character” and “My channel is for personal use but I cannot use my real name.” Then, finally, you can post your thoughts on the new Azealia Banks video or the latest Supercats episode or whatever.This little change of workflow is presumably part of YouTube’s secret weapon against the Internet’s worst commenters, first announced at the Google I/O conference back in June. There, YouTube’s head of product Dror Shimshowitz said that “comments are kind of the Wild West of video” and said that the team was “working on some improvements to the comment system.” So far, however, it seems like the improvements have only served to piss off that army of folks who hold anonymity as one of their most essential rights on the Internet, otherwise known as Reddit. A link to coverage of the new attempt to eliminate pseudonyms vaulted up to the top of Reddit’s home page, garnering over a thousand comments. Among them: “I feel like the internet is heading in this direction and it makes me feel sad and scared.”In many ways, YouTube’s move towards real identities isn’t that surprising. Last year, the site’s parent company Google practically started a war with online privacy advocates like the Electronic Frontier Foundation over the ban on pseudonyms at Google+. The policy helped keep the discourse on Google+ a little bit more civil by keeping trolls at bay, but it also prevented activist types, dissidents and the like from speaking freely about controversial issues, conversations that might get them in trouble with the authorities. Inevitably, enabling people to speak freely and safely has always been one of the Internet’s greatest appeals. After months of protest, Google eventually reversed its policy, allowing pseudonyms on Google+, but as the recent moves on YouTube shows, the company isn’t completely committed to keeping anonymity the status quo.As more and more sites attempt to come to terms with trolls and bullies, real name policies are becoming more common. In New York, lawmakers even introduced a bill earlier this year that would put an end to anonymous Internet posting altogether. This fight is undoubtedly far from over, so privacy advocates better dig in their heels. They should also take solace in the fact that the Supreme Court is on their side. From the much cited 1995 ruling in McIntyre v. Ohio Elections Commission:Protections for anonymous speech are vital to democratic discourse. Allowing dissenters to shield their identities frees them to express critical minority views . . . Anonymity is a shield from the tyranny of the majority. . . . It thus exemplifies the purpose behind the Bill of Rights and of the First Amendment in particular: to protect unpopular individuals from retaliation . . . at the hand of an intolerant society.Ultimately, YouTube’s new approach is not the end of the world. You can still leave anonymous comments, vitriolic or otherwise. However, as that sad Redditor mentioned, it is part of a greater push towards the next version of the ‘net. Will Web 3.0 (or would it be 4.0?) spell doom for anonymity online? Well, unless the troll problem is solved in some other fashion, it’s begging to look that way.
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