The Id of the Internet: Identities in Online Networks
With the widespread use of Internet around the globe, it becomes increasingly important to analyze the effect in which such instantaneous information exchanges within networks affect our reality. The article below outlines a recent metamorphosis in which many corporate web based companies have facilitated in the last several years. In the hopes of a more “tolerant, peaceful, and profitable world,” web based companies such as Facebook and Google have pushed toward the dissolution of the digital identity in which Mark Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook, has famously quoted that “having two identities for yourself is an example of a lack of integrity.” Despite this shift from opacity (anonymity) to transparency that is increasingly found in today’s popular social networking tools, opacity in the Internet still plays an important aspect in the networks that traverse the world wide web. What effects do anonymity confer upon social networks and, in this respect, how does anonymity in the Internet manifest itself in the real world?
An infamous example of opacity at play in online social networks, 4chan is a web forum that has garnered a significant amount of attention since it’s conception. Attracting nearly 11 million monthly users, 4chan is an online forum subdivided in various topics of interest in which any user can anonymously start and reply to ongoing discussion threads. Not only are these comments annonomous, they are short-lived, older posts being deleted on a rolling basis depending on server capacity. While the premise of the site is seemingly innocuous at first, the true implications of such a forum extends beyond what seems to be just a virtual network of diverse ideas and transient thoughts. One of the most problematic products of internet anonymity, cyberbullying has become increasingly widespread. A disconcerting example of such incidences is found in the account of Jessie Slaughter, a 11-year old girl whose inflammatory comments in several video-blogs on YouTube sparked the mobilization of a outraged 4chan community, ultimately leading to the brutal harassment of a naive and vulnerable child. What had started as slander and prank calls had elevated to death threats, an event that highlighted the sheer magnitude of the power of networks that are clouded in virtual anonymity. (more information can be read here: http://gawker.com/5589103/how-the-internet-beat-up-an-11+year+old-girl.)
Considering the methods by which we analyze networks in this class, how does anonymity come into play in social networks? How does anonymity affect the individuals (nodes) in a network and the edges that define them? Most importantly, how does anonymity change the behavior of individuals in a network and in what ways can we maximize the benefit of all users in such a network while preventing repeats of the Jessie Slaughter debacle? To understand how anonymity affects networks, we must first understand how it affects behavior on an individual basis. Although a somewhat intuitive observation, studies have shown that individuals who engage in anonymous behavior are more likely to show greater self-disclosure. Anonymity provides a low-threat environment that dissolves social barriers and the pressures of conformity (McKenna, 1999). As such, these individuals are more likely to develop or create edges in which the information relayed among these edges are generally unrestrained and intimate in detail. What does this mean, exactly, for online anonymous networks such as 4chan?
In order to analyze 4chan in a “network analysis” framework, it is important to define the edges and nodes that constitute the 4chan network. As such, nodes can be defined as any user generated comment, and an edge would tie two comments located within the same thread, or replying to the same comment. Because of anonymous nature and therefore decreased accountability of 4chan users, it is safe to assume that the frequency of posts, and thus the edges created between them, increases. Furthermore, because of the individuals to tend divulge more information in an anonymous thread, these edges are somewhat strengthened – assuming that the strength of a node is the quantity or quality of information shared between nodes. Thus, anonymity would appear to increase the amount of nodes in a network, and the strength of the edges that tie these nodes together (W. Kang et al. 2008). Understanding these effects of anonymity on the network structure, it is unsurprising how powerful such networks can be. Thus, a single comment or post could spark the generation of a rapidly growing, albeit transient, node. These occurrences underlie the power of networking tools such as 4chan. With a single click of button, an entire community of nodes (individual identities, unrestrained and unfiltered) can thus incite massive waves of activity that can quickly become something more than just a single idea. In this regard, 4chan can be seen as a hub for unlimitless potentiation of ideas, innovation, and sentiment. In the case of Jessie Slaughter, this rapid and uncontrolled movement of information evolved into a terrifying monster.
In light of the troublesome products that can arise from anonymous networks in the Internet, what is there to say about the utility of these networks? Christopher Poole, founder of 4chan, has actively advocated the continued use of such networks. Most notably, Poole believes that anonymity promises “the freedom to say anything without the obligation to suffer consequences,” in which removes that fear of failure and thus fosters creativity and innovation in an environment where anyone is “free to be wrong.” While websites like FaceBook encourage transparency and promote a sense of integrity of identity, Poole argues that they “stifle creativity.” In other words, secret identities provide people a means to create and entertain any sort of idea, without the fear of persecution. While Poole does not oppose tranparency of identity in online networks, he sees them as “mutually necessary,” each playing its essential part in the Internet.
Undeniably, all networks are dynamic. They are evolving structures that are created, modified, and sometimes destroyed. The advent of the Internet has vastly expedited this process due to the rapid exchange of information among nodes. By increasing the amount of edges and quantity of information exchange, anonymity has further amplified the rate at which networks are created and modified. By increasing the strength and frequency of inputs relayed by each node, these networks are dramatically changed. As with any tool, the way by which we use it can confer a range of consequences. Mark Zuckerberg and Christopher Toole each have created powerful networking tools, each with their own parameters and properties that change the way by which their networks operate. While transparency roots online networks to the real world and abolishes the obvious dangers of anonymous identities, opacity builds gates for a diversity of ideas that are essential in what makes people dynamic and ultimately human. Ultimately, online networks are dictated by the individual nodes within them and thus the way in which we use online networking tools can have profound effects on the world around us.
Dibbel 2010
McKenna et al. 1999
W. Kang, 2011
http://academic-papers.org/ocs2/session/Papers/D8/806-2069-1-DR.doc