cd_ernst Posted January 15, 2006 Report Share Posted January 15, 2006 Hello All, After Glamdrings posting I googled my name and found several entries, including some of my postings on the RTG forum. I'm not happy with this kind of intrusion in my personal life, if it can be stopped it should be stopped. But I think that using the internet in a more or less 'loose' fashion will always give organisations like Google the oppertunity to collect their information. The freedom internet gives us works both ways. If it would be legaly possible to block organisations from obtaining information through newsgroups or open forums by all means use them. But if it would require actions that inthemselves would limit those same freedoms we would like to protect I will vote against them. In most countries the constitution has an entry about freedom of speech, religion and opinion. There are occasions when one might think that one has the right or even the obligation to wafer certain constitutional rights in order to protect the many. But those rights were made to protect the few, and the many. This forum is an open forum. It should stay that way. Abuse is expected and should be dealt with but never with restrictions. Open internet is not a safe way of communicating and it will never be. That's my opinion anyway... Having said all this I'm still irritated that some of my 'opinions' have reached the general internet public and I would like to thank Glamdring for his insight in this matter. Greetings, Don Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spartacus Posted January 15, 2006 Report Share Posted January 15, 2006 I have never had any unwanted stuff directed at my character because of my use on this forum so i dont see it as a problem however i can understand some people may have a problem. What i mean to say is i am neutral about it so whatever is decided is fine by me. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Meaty_Bites Posted January 15, 2006 Report Share Posted January 15, 2006 I dont know what exactly it is that you are concerned about here. Surely if you chose to use your real name as your alias, then you are responsible for what information you release. As far as I understand, you chose to use that alias, it wasnt a requirement of RTG (correct me if I'm wrong). However if it was, then it should be a private forum. Google in my opinion is a fantastic service. People just need to realise that you should always be discrete in the information you disclose to anyone or anywhere in the world. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Glamdring Posted January 15, 2006 Report Share Posted January 15, 2006 This thread started out from previous conversations from a core group of players who dislike alias's and wanted more openess and transparency in all player identities. The use of real names in handles and e-mail adress was advocated A worthy goal but my point is that Google makes such use of things as Real names unwise. Google presence virtually requires we use alias's and then that opens the ability for people using multiple handles and that then breeds distrust and annoynace. As Meaty Bites points out the defense against google is to use an alias. No big deal, I agree. Google is a great company and as an investor I applaud their efforts. The bigger question is: Does the rest of the world need to Index and log into multiple servers copies of our conversations? Outside of this tiny universe we have all choosen to abide in duiring our free hours it is NO ONE elses business nor could they ever profit from our idle speculations about imaginary wars and galactic conquests. I think Google should be blocked if possible. Another question for debate is should multiple handles/alias's be allowed. RTG could assign a login name and password for every player/galactic position. One alias per person. You live and die with the character you present to the world over several years. The flaw with this agrument is that RTG has far better things to do with their valuable time than to police our behavior and misbehavior in this forum. I have a long list of things I wish they had time and resources to accomplish and for Russ and Pete to be a forum policeman is near the bottom of that list. Simple answer for all parties is to block Google.com and the other bots like them Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Beltira Posted January 15, 2006 Report Share Posted January 15, 2006 All 'reputable' search engines look for a robots file and only index what they are told to index, Google is one of them. IPB, as do many other forum packages, additionally support configurations for the major search engine bots. This can be seen here when on occasion you will see google.com listed as a user logged into the forum. This is how search engines can index and make available in their indexes content that would otherwise be restricted to logged in users. This, IMHO, represents both good and bad. As to freedom of speech, remember that with freedom of speech, is the freedom for what is said to be recorded. I personally have no issues with this, however it is something I am and have been fully aware of having been an active user of the 'Internet' long before there was a WWW, and long before Al Gore even invented the Internet. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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