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Privacy

4.29.08 by Cypy

Many people assume when they write an opinion on the Internet, it is a private opinion. Looking through vast expanses of blog comments, one can find extremely vulgar language and outlandishly insulting accusations. Many people write comments that come straight out of their mind, whatever they happen happen to be thinking at the moment with no censorship involved. They do so because they can write obscenities and still get away with anonymity. All one needs to do, is type a pen name in the input field, and voilà, no trace of identity is attached. Words flow as if they were being written in a secret journal. People often freely insult others over the web, feeling safe because they are alone, typing at a computer, without face-to-face interaction.

When at a social gathering, people rarely exhibit the type of rudeness that pervades the Internet. They actually see fellow humans and the environment feels much less secluded. The Internet makes everything feel secret and special; one can slip away at any moment to a different page of the Internet, and not be noticed. Every website might feel new, like a freshly discovered hideout.

In fact, the illusion of a secret hideaway is extremely wrong. People don’t ordinarily think about the millions of other visitors that have already seen a website, and they usually ignore the possible thousands that could be concurrently browsing the same webpage. If someone posts a vulgar comment, many others read it, and if an insult is directed at a particular person, chances are, that person will become offended. Information is actually less private than it is off the web, but many people act as if the opposite is true.

Of course, privacy is not always beneficial. If someone decides to publish misinformation, an expert of that information might read it, chose to report the author, or email them with a correction. A perfect example of constant viewing is Wikipedia, in which many experts in different fields monitor their specific articles and insure they are filled with the correct information.

Recently, John McCain’s website published a section titled “McCain Family Recipes.” Contrary to the title, they were not “family recipes” at all, but were actually lifted word-for-word from the Food Network website. Whoever put that section up was not thinking straight. They had deluded themselves into thinking the internet was a secret oasis, and apparently didn’t consider that someone might recognize the plagiarized material. Of course, who would? Only someone who wrote the original recipe perhaps, or maybe it could have been a particularly keen Food Network aficionado, but what is the likelihood of that?

As it turns out, the first noted report of this fancy, food facsimile was by an ordinary citizen of New York, who was simply googling one of the recipes and was surprised to see McCain’s website come up in the search results. She happened to be an attorney. Oops. According to the Huffington Post the McCain website removed the offending material within 12 hours.

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