There are plenty of us in the blogosphere in various states of anonymity. Some are anonymous to protect their jobs. Some to lob potshots with impunity. But some people do it to protect their lives.
Lately, the Zetas, a Mexican drug cartel have been waging a war against bloggers in parts of Mexico. So far four people have been killed for using social media to communicate about the activities of the drug cartel, two by beheading. Each of the dead have had a note attached to their bodies explaining that the reason that they were killed was for their social media activities.
“This happened to me for not understanding that I shouldn’t report on the social networks,” advised a note left before dawn with the man’s body at a key intersection in the city’s wealthier neighborhood.
Luckily, this can’t happen here, right? Wrong. There have been attempts by some to reveal the identities of bloggers here and elsewhere. I was personally called by a crazy commenter from Alabama about a gun thread here a few years ago. There are always risks associated with facts and opinion in an open society and we mitigate those risks as much as we can.
It is this sort of thing that makes outing of contributors and commenters a bannable offense here at DL.