Should DGN be taken private?

[Scary Guy]

In the modern age (never mind that it's been going on since well before Snowden) corporations and the government have been mining our data.  Nothing you say is private and bots scrape this all the time.  With the rise of AI and text analysis you can pretty easily figure out who someone is by examining their vocabulary, sentence structure, and any misspellings (much like examining someone's gait to see how they walk, or fingerprinting.) The question I put forth is:  Should DGN be made private (in full or in part) to where you at least need an account to see the content?

 

There are pros and cons of each.  The main pro that I've already mentioned is it helps to protect our data that we vomit onto here.  Also it will force existing users to login more to see what is going on rather than just windowshopping.

 

The only cons I can think of is it may turn off prospective members who want to see what kind of content exists before actually creating an account.  Also that some may create accounts and decide it isn't for them, then there are more zombie accounts floating around doing nothing but clogging up the database.  I think the pros outweighs the cons though.

 

One could also argue that it's always been public so anyone that posts should have known nothing is private anyway.

 

Also the entire forum wouldn't need to be taken private (probably.)  The Hello subforum could be left visible (though it does have a bit of personal information in those new member questionnaires), and technically the Sex & Sexuality subforum already requires a password for access.

 

What say ye all?

Edited September 6, 2023 by Scary Guy

[SlavicGoth]

8 hours ago, Scary Guy said:

In the modern age (never mind that it's been going on since well before Snowden) corporations and the government have been mining our data.  Nothing you say is private and bots scrape this all the time.  With the rise of AI and text analysis you can pretty easily figure out who someone is by examining their vocabulary, sentence structure, and any misspellings (much like examining someone's gait to see how they walk, or fingerprinting.) The question I put forth is:  Should DGN be made private (in full or in part) to where you at least need an account to see the content?

 

There are pros and cons of each.  The main pro that I've already mentioned is it helps to protect our data that we vomit onto here.  Also it will force existing users to login more to see what is going on rather than just windowshopping.

 

The only cons I can think of is it may turn off prospective members who want to see what kind of content exists before actually creating an account.  Also that some may create accounts and decide it isn't for them, then there are more zombie accounts floating around doing nothing but clogging up the database.  I think the pros outweighs the cons though.

 

One could also argue that it's always been public so anyone that posts should have known nothing is private anyway.

 

Also the entire forum wouldn't need to be taken private (probably.)  The Hello subforum could be left visible (though it does have a bit of personal information in those new member questionnaires), and technically the Sex & Sexuality subforum already requires a password for access.

 

What say ye all?

 Maybe add options if we want our accounts to be private or public to people who are not part of the community,  and maybe make some post options if the post is to be public or to the community only

[Scary Guy]

37 minutes ago, SlavicGoth said:

 Maybe add options if we want our accounts to be private or public to people who are not part of the community,  and maybe make some post options if the post is to be public or to the community only

 

That might be possible after a software upgrade in the future, but I'm pretty sure that as it stands now this is out of the scope of the current forum software's capabilities.

[Msterbeau]

On the fence but leaning private for the same reasons as you. (SG) The AI thing is of huge concern. The people running most of those companies clearly don’t give a fuck about privacy, copyright, etc. 

[gwen]

I have nothing to hide

it would make it an all exclusive club

dunno about that 

it's always been public, yes.

but

isn't the goth scene already a bit

all inclusive club?

I know I have been shunned just for

having had too much sun so

 

[Destroit]

To me, I mean, unless you're airing out your SSN and credit card numbers I don't see the issue.  I don't get paranoid about people, bots, companies, or the government knowing about my unexciting life where I get up at 6:20 am and jog my dog for three miles, get my kid to school sometime after 8am, bust ass throughout the day doing random tasks, and then going to bed at like 10:30 after possibly getting railed or not depending on how tired we are.  I figure if you ARE someone paranoid about that, maybe have a social outlet that isn't the internet?  Granted, there's some stuff I'd confide to my close friends to in their living room while we're hanging out that I wouldn't put on the internet, but that's why I don't put it on the internet *shrug*. 

 

If AI ends up making another "me" that would be fucking tits, I'd buy at least 7.

[Scary Guy]

7 hours ago, gwen said:

I have nothing to hide

it would make it an all exclusive club

dunno about that 

it's always been public, yes.

but

isn't the goth scene already a bit

all inclusive club?

I know I have been shunned just for

having had too much sun so

 

 

I mean you wouldn't need to pay for access, nor would there be a password, it's just one more step to see the content.

 

 

3 hours ago, Destroit said:

I'd buy at least 7.

 

CONS00ME

[know_buddy_kares]

Compared to the rest of the web, with most of it's data coming from giant social media like Facebook (meta), Twitter, Instagram, tribel, mastedon,  even truth, we're not on their radar at all. We don't need John Connor quite yet drumming the alarm. Most is benign and wouldn't even put a blip on any bot's radar.

 

A more likely reason to have privacy options would be stalkers. And I think it would best be as an option on our personal profiles. We could pick and choose what is public, board members only, select people, etc. But in all practicality, it isn't worth the effort for all that here except maybe the gallery perhaps. A rule of thumb I go by is don't post something about yourself you wouldn't want ending up on 4chan. The shit those weird fuckers could dig up was frightful. And that applies literally everywhere online. You don't ever know who can see your shit. Like I don't trust any of the large social media to post too much detail about me anyway. They already got us all figured out by algorithms anyway. All that meta data over the past decade at least.

[Scary Guy]

17 minutes ago, know_buddy_kares said:

Compared to the rest of the web, with most of it's data coming from giant social media like Facebook (meta), Twitter, Instagram, tribel, mastedon,  even truth, we're not on their radar at all. We don't need John Connor quite yet drumming the alarm. Most is benign and wouldn't even put a blip on any bot's radar.

 

Oh trust me, they do.  They also don't currently have to even ask permission like they do with other platforms, it's just all hanging out there for the world to see like a stripper's titties, and the worst of society can just ogle all they want.

 

 

19 minutes ago, know_buddy_kares said:

A more likely reason to have privacy options would be stalkers.

 

That is an excellent point.

 

 

20 minutes ago, know_buddy_kares said:

And I think it would best be as an option on our personal profiles. We could pick and choose what is public, board members only, select people, etc.

 

See my above comment.  Although maybe @TronRP has some ideas about this.

 

 

23 minutes ago, know_buddy_kares said:

And that applies literally everywhere online. You don't ever know who can see your shit. Like I don't trust any of the large social media to post too much detail about me anyway. They already got us all figured out by algorithms anyway. All that meta data over the past decade at least.

 

You have no idea:

 

This video is nine years old, and it's only gotten worse.

[Anna Phylaxis]

I don’t really feel like I have anything to hide. However, if somebody tried really hard from where I work, but I could find some of my old posts, and that might get me into a little bit of hot water. Then again, whatever I do outside of work is whatever I do outside of work. I wouldn’t mind the option of them not being able to see anything I post, should they ever come looking.