The Curse of Internet Anonymity

To reveal oneself or not. That’s the unenviable moral choice all parents and teachers now face: how to educate kids about Internet anonymity? Should we teach our children that it’s OK to invent fake online personas, or should we insist that they tell the truth and broadcast their real identities? The moral dilemma is actually a lot more complicated than it first appears.

Today’s generation of kids under the age of sixteen –- let’s call them Generation Facebook –- are the first to literally grow up on the Internet. Teaching these kids that it’s OK to lie about one’s identity has profoundly dangerous long-term consequences. It is legitimizing the idea of anonymity, thereby transforming the Internet from a community of real people into an atomized chaos of fictional characters. Generation Facebook have the potential to be the first real Internet citizens –- yet genuine online citizenship is the first and most tragic casualty of an Internet inhabited by anonymous characters.

Written by Andrew Keen

Full Story: http://www.internetevolution.com/author.asp?section_id=556&doc_id=146514&cid=nl_IWK_daily