Okay, I was left with a question after today which I considered in relation
to some past situations that were far, far worse than anything seen
recently when people seriously wanted to cause damage.  Would it be
possible for a rule to go into place in which the moderator ( Hi, Bill!)
would HAVE to be supplied with a VERIFIABLE and TRUE identity of the
primary account holder (then kept secret when desired -- though a person
could still have an account which was primarily in someone else's name
with the payments to the ISP from that name so that those who need to have
secrecy for a personal reason could have an employee hold the ISP account)
complete with an okay to verify the information given with the ISP should
that need arise, and with a phone number/snail mail address which can also
be verified with ISP should a need arise?  That would mean that if a person
wanted to come on over and over again with new names and make the FML
painful then the moderator would be able to check.  Make sense?
 
Bill knows our phone number, where Steve works, our address, even some
other account addresses, I think, and he has NEVER even come close to in
any fashion misusing that information or not providing secrecy for even
those pieces that we wouldn't particularly care about him mentioning to
others or certain others.  Something ( of many) Bill's great at is fully
respecting FML members, and their privacy is part of that, but perhaps it
would be useful for him to have some "red flag" info for everyone's sake.
 
Does this seem logical?  Workable?  What am I missing (aspects of the idea,
please, not cerebral aspects...)?  Others will know better than I what is
feasible.
 
[Moderator's note: Feasible?  Well, probably, though not by counting on any
help from ISPs.  We do have a list here which is run that way -- it's a
closed list for law enforcement personnel so potential subscribers need to
produce credentials in order to join.  An amazing amount of work for the
moderator AND for the university which has been sued a couple of times by
people asserting they have the "right" to join the list even though they
don't qualify.  (Of course, the cases had no merit.)
 
Anyhow, aside from the work involved, I'm against it.  I think anonymity
is a pro here, not a con.  (I do ask a subscriber's name though one could
make it up, I wouldn't know, nor much care.)  The way I see it, the MESSAGE
is important, not the author.  True, some small fraction of the messages
do some damage, though I don't know that we would get any fewer strange
messages if identities were known.  But, I do think we would get a lot
fewer messages: some people resent the invasion of privacy, others would
be less likely to talk about potentially embarrassing situations if they
fear it can be traced back so easily, other's are concerned about the
law (e.g. California)... I'm probably only scratching the surface.  Hey,
we're talking about fun ferrets here, not secret government spy rings!
 
By the way, when a post arrives from a non-subscriber an acknowledgement
is automatically sent.  If the acknowledgement is not deliverable then
the message doesn't get posted.  Likewise, the posts of new subscribers
are given special handling.  If posts get through which should not, it's
a question of my judgement not the protective mechanisms in place.  BIG]
[Posted in FML issue 3152]