Forcing Commenters to Use Real Names Won’t Root Out the Trolls
They say never to read the comments. But I do. Every day. I read every comment—the good, the bad, the so ugly it needs to be deleted—because it’s my job. I’m a community management consultant. And, believe it or not, my favorite commenters are anonymous.
On Monday, the editors of Jezebel sent an impassioned public plea to Gawker executives for help dealing with a disturbing troll that their commenting platform, Kinja, can’t handle. As WIRED’s Laura Hudson wrote, because Kinja lacks in moderation abilities, both editors and community feel unsafe. These anonymous attacks need immediate addressing, but the solution of making every commenter use their real name is not ideal. Instead of verifying names, we should verify people’s knowledge.
