Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with privacy

Why doesn't my spouse let me see his/her facebook pictures?

Anonymous — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 08:20:37 -0800

Is this normal? Would you be worried if your spouse blocked you from seeing his/her pictures on facebook? My life partner, let's call him/her LP, blocks me from seeing any pictures on facebook tagged with "LP’s name.” LP has photos, albums posted up on facebook, but has not changed LP's privacy settings to let me see these photos.

I know this because LP and I often spend time together when one of us is on facebook. We'll send each other interesting things we've found when we’re apart, or when we're together, we'll say, "Hey, look at this!" We’ll talk about friends in common, and just generally share our facebook lives like we do our meatspace lives.

We've been partnered up for a long time. LP is, I understand, a private person. And I'm pretty sure that LP is not cheating with someone, or putting up pictures that would be explicit or shocking.

I just don't understand why LP would not allow me to see LP's photos. If LP isn’t having an affair, then this doesn't make sense to me. I've asked LP a number of times why this is the case, and LP has said, "I don't know," or "I'll fix it," or "why does it matter?" This makes me kind of sad, because we both work, and spend many hours each week apart from each other. I think it’s nice and reassuring to be able to pull up a picture of LP in the middle of a typical boring work day.

So this is my question: if your spouse did not let you see your spouse’s photos on facebook, would you think it was weird? Are there any circumstances that would make it seem more or less weird? If you asked your spouse to change this, and your spouse refused, what would you do? I guess it may be obvious that our life partnership is pretty much like most others, with good points and bad points. But that’s probably another question.

So, if you’ve read this far, and if you care, you may feel you need to know more. It’s for you that I’ve set up an email account that you can follow up with me on –
anonymailone-askmefi@yahoo.com.

Should I let my housemate know where he stands?

Anonymous — Mon, 14 Dec 2009 20:50:20 -0800

Knowing that two of my housemates plan to leave the third one high and dry, while he has no idea about it, do I tell him? Or is this a breach of trust to them? I've been sharing a house with four friends for about a year and a half this christmas. Three of them already lived together (and had been for some time) and one moved in after me. For the first year or so, we all got on really well, but lately things have started getting really strained. One of the housemates who I get on particularly well with is moving out of the country in the next few months, and two housemates who've been living together for about five years have really soured in their feelings to one another, they argue about stupid things, bitch about one another constantly, and pick at one another for no good reason, but at the same time they're officially best friends.

I've been thinking about moving out when our contract is up for a while, and a few days ago I started making arrangements with other people about somewhere to live next year, having started this, and not wanting to leave my housemates with an empty room, a bump in rent, and no warning, I mentioned to one of the housemates who are always fighting that I was unlikely to renew my contract the next year. It was at this point that he told me he was planning on moving away from his best friend with our other housemate at the same time.

Considering how much their relationship has soured, I think this is a great idea, and I think it'll do them both good to get away from one another. At the same time, however, in talking to him it became obvious to me just how much of this has already been planned, they've looked at houses, debating moving early and sticking my other housemate and I with the remainder of the contract and rent there's no way we'll be able to pay, and honestly the way he was talking about it came across to me as that he just wanted to put our other housemate in a position where he won't have the time to organize something else that he can afford and will be forced to go home and live with his parents, since right now he's only living off housing benefits and a small amount of money he earns singing every week.

Again, I think our other housemate probably should go home to his parents, It's probably the sensible thing for him to do, but I don't think that it's right for him to have his hand forced because someone who's supposed to be his best friend doesn't approve of his lifestyle.

I've mentioned to this housemate that I'm moving away at the end of the year, and hinted that with our other friend going to America, it's possible he should think about his options and what he'll do next year, but he dismissed the question without any doubt at all, he's certain that there'll still be three people in the house because he believes his best friend to be too apathetic to actually move anywhere else.

Despite the fact that recently both of these guys and their issues have really been driving me nuts, we are still friends, and I really don't want to see either of them get fucked over here. On the one hand, I don't want to sell out the one who wants to leave, because he's got a lot of legitimate issues with the other guy, and I DO think they should get away from each other for a bit, but on the other hand? I'm concerned that his existing resentment means that he'll be a real prick about all of this, and will either try to use it as a way of hurting the other guy emotionally, or forcing him to do what he thinks he should do with his life, by leaving it too late to give him a chance to find other housemates or a cheaper place to live. Is it even my place to say anything? I mean, he knows that some people are leaving, I've not been at all secretive about what I want to do next year, and while we are friends, his history with this other guy predates that by a LOT.

Any advice on this would be welcome. I'm really pretty stressed out about this.

Maintaining my ability to one day run for City Council

Anonymous — Sat, 12 Dec 2009 16:45:45 -0800

Can some of you amazing Internet security people explain to me how cautious I need to be about what I do online? Is there a way to explore ideas online that are ideas you'd normally keep private? Or -- do I perhaps not need to worry about this, given the way opposition research and government confirmations actually work? I'm at a phase of life where I'm really wanting to figure out my sexual side a bit more, and I wouldn't mind figuring that out -- like anything else -- by reading things online, asking (anonymous) questions on Metafilter, finding specialty chat boards, and so forth.

But, you always hear people advise that you behave on the Internet as though it will one day end up completely public. I don't want this to sink my confirmation in 2024 or end up in my grandmother's inbox. I occasionally do volunteer for minor roles in political campaigns, and if I move to higher-level campaigns in 20 years, I don't want this thrown at me. I don't expect anyone is trying to "watch" me now, just that there's a tiny chance that one day, I'll end up in a sufficiently public or controversial position that someone might try to dig up a little dirt.

Is there a way to explore some of these ideas online without something becoming public? I feel paranoid about even reading HTML on my iPhone or my home computer. Is that worth worrying about? I'm clueless here. Is there anything I can safely do? General guidelines on what I should do and shouldn't do would be appreciated. The Metatalk threads make it pretty clear that anonymous Metafilter questions are pretty risky, yes? (What is a "server log"?) What about creating a totally fake identity connected to an unidentifiable email at some other chat board site -- are some even more anonymous? I'm assuming someone with limitless resources could find out anything, but are there different degrees of safety? Thank you.

I hope this does not come off like a MetaTalk question. I think the MetaTalk issues have already been discussed in the linked thread. The question I'm asking is "what can I do," not "what should Metafilter be doing?" Thanks again. Also, I realize this is a long-shot worry, but I'm inherently cautious.

Even moving 2000 miles away didn't help...

Anonymous — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 19:35:42 -0800

My mom stalked my girlfriend's mailing address. This is not okay, right? I got an IM from my girlfriend asking if I'd given my mom her mailing address. When I responded in the negative, she then asked why she had received a letter from my mom.

I'm totally floored right now. Not that it's unexpected, my mom Googles all of our family members every once in a while to see if their names are popping up in the news, or elsewhere. But, I checked. None of the online yellowpages have a listing for my girlfriend. We figure she either got the address from the luggage tag at Thanksgiving last month, went through her purse, bought a background check, or used some intergovernemntal database since she works for a municipality.

The letter was regarding Christmas gifts. Apparently Mom wants to try to coordinate something with her. But, she also asked for GF's e-mail address, so they could talk in the future.

Despite the trivial and non-threatening content of the letter, we both feel violated in the privacy department. I haven't actually seen the letter yet, and GF asked me not to confront my mom until the two of us talk (she's not mad at me, at least), but I don't know how to deal with this situation.

Part of me wants to come out shooting with both barrels. Not only a chewing out, but playing into her hand, oversaturating her with the precious, private and personal information she so desires, in every. Explicit. Detail.

The other part of me realizes that I should deal with this like an adult, and just keep asking her to stop. Previous conversations regarding the Googling always end with, "But it's public information." Which, while true, doesn't mean you should actively seek said information.

The wild card is my Dad. He's a great guy, and I feel so sorry that he has to put up with this on a daily basis. I don't want to start an all-out war, because I don't want him to get caught up in it.

Suggesting therapy never works, as she has a degree in Counseling, which I am absolutely certain she pursued to deflect her actual need for counseling.

What do I do?

throwaway: interstatecrazy@gmail.com

New facebook privacy

four panels — Thu, 10 Dec 2009 11:04:06 -0800

New facebook privacy settings. How do you hide friends from Google search results? How do you hide fan "pages" from non-facebook friends? Are these now permanently public?

Unless he's keylogging me, in which case he gets what he deserves, the Grinch. ;)

kathrineg — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 13:51:45 -0800

I need a way to keep a browser state with tabs, cookies, passwords, forms all saved but password-protected and inaccessible. I have Mac OS 10.5.7 and I usually use Firefox, kinda hate Safari. This would be somewhat like Firefox's "Private Browsing" but instead of erasing my settings when I go out of the password-protected browser, it would keep everything ready and waiting.

So it would be like when you go from "private browsing" back to regular browsing, and Firefox restores everything automatically. Except that all the data associated with it would need to be password protected/hidden. No one should be able to access anything by clicking through folders, searching the drives, etc.

Switching logins is too onerous. I have some password protected documents but it's getting really old to move stuff from my browser to there, remember to close the document, etc.

I don't need anything with a force password, or anything completely invisible. It's okay if you can see the program/plugin and tell that I'm keeping something secret. It just needs a password so I can foil a certain Santa-hating member of my household who is adept with computer stuff, without going nuts trying to erase my tracks.

I never planned on anyone but me looking at my files

EatTheWeak — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 10:42:36 -0800

My computer requires professional attention, but there's stuff I'd rather keep private sitting on my hard drive right now. How concerned should I be about what a technician might see/go looking for while working on my machine? So, for awhile now, my computer has had some manner of undiagnosed hardware trouble that led to frequent freeze-ups. A couple weeks ago, whatever was failing has finally failed and now when I flip the switch on my power source, the lights on the case come on for a split second before going dark, the fans spin for about as long before stopping and the power button on front does absolutely nothing. This is beyond my power to diagnose, let alone fix, so I need to take this machine into the shop and let a professional do it properly. I'm due for a graphics card upgrade at this point any way, so I'm not too fussed about paying a technician to make this thing work right again.

The trouble is that there's a few things on my hard drive that I would prefer not to explain to a stranger. Much of my music collection is on there, for instance, much of it (ahem) "borrowed" from sources I'd rather not name. My browser history has not been cleared and I might even have an embarrassing website or two bookmarked. A Word file I was using as a personal journal is on there as well, and maybe a few other things I can't remember for sure. I'm pretty confident I don't actually have any porno saved on there right now, though, so that's a plus, at least.

I'm not taking it to Best Buy, as I've read much of Geek Squad's reputation for trawling customers' hard drives, but a locally owned shop instead. I'm a bit prone to paranoia, and I'm aware that my perceptions of risk here might be a bit skewed, so I'd really like to hear from folks who have intimate knowledge of the computer repair business on this topic. None of my computer's issues are software related (I've reinstalled windows too many times without solving the freeze-up problem for that to be the case) so I know that anyone working on my machine wouldn't really have much of a reason to spend too much time looking around my drive, but that doesn't account for the voyeuristic impulse. Also, there's a chance that new hardware might be installed, which would call for the installation of new drivers.

Have you worked in a computer repair shop? Was poking around in a customer's files commonplace or verboten? Would someone working on my power source, motherboard or graphics card have a reason to open up my web browser? One counter-measure I've considered is to simply buy a blank hard drive and slap that in there, and say that I noticed this problem after installing the new one. However, I'd rather avoid this expense as I still don't know how drastic my repair costs are gonna be. Also, I don't know if a machine with a blank, unformatted drive is gonna be tougher to diagnose and repair.

So, what do you think, AskMe? Is this a legitimate concern or am I making a lot out of nothing? (it wouldn't be the first time) How much risk is the average customer's privacy at in the average computer repair shop? How would you proceed?

My roommate has been watching what I do online- help!

Anonymous — Fri, 27 Nov 2009 19:17:43 -0800

My roommate has been watching what I do online- help! We are (were?) pretty good friends despite only knowing each other about a year.

As part of an argument, he made an angry reference to my blog, and quoted it. I have never told ANYONE about my blog, NO identifying details are connected to it, and until he said that I didn't know anyone but me had ever looked at it (I mostly just write gibberish there, sometimes I rant about things but again, with NO identifying details).

I asked him how he knew about it and he said "I know everything that goes through my network."

I know he was telling the truth because I had made some of my posts from school, and he pointed out which ones I had made from home.

I know absolutely nothing about computers. I know how to turn it on and use Firefox, and that's it. As far as what kind of network we have, all I know is that it's wireless and he has his own server.

Now I'm completely freaked out. I have no idea as to exactly what he can see. Can he read every email I send? Can he see every website that I go to?

Is there any way to block him from seeing what I do? Is there any way *I* can see what *he* does?

Moving out is not an option for several months.

I'm not afraid of him and he's not usually this weird, I just hate the idea that someone can completely spy on me like this.

should i care that my full name is in my flickr url?

hagelslaag — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 22:31:01 -0800

i made a big gaffe three years ago while creating my flickr account and set my URL (which you absolutely cannot change) to include my full name. setting up a new account just to be free of my name would be a huge hassle to say the least. is it worth it? notes:
- my three years with my current account now encompasses thousands of photos, countless memories, notes, comments, favorites, etc.
- i've already decided that, if i am to set up a new account, i would maintain a paid subscription for my current one so i won't lose all that history (even though i really don't have the budget for it)
- i'm uploading increasingly personal images of both myself and friends (nudes) as i get more involved in photography
- for various reasons that i won't get into here, i have made the decision to leave almost all of my photos public

thanks for the thoughts!

Privacy in Public

bobertdude — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 13:24:52 -0800

Where are some good spots in public where I can get privacy? I have to get a lot of homework done, but lately I've been falling behind in my studies because I find it very difficult to concentrate on anything when there are others around or near me. What I do now is drive to the park at night when there's nobody around to get my work done, but that only works at dark. Are there any public places where I can expect no people to be bothering me?

Once on youtube, always on youtube?

bumpkin — Tue, 03 Nov 2009 20:53:31 -0800

How to remove a video featuring myself from Youtube or Myspace. Put otherwise: do I have any rights to this? I emailed Myspace to remove a video that profiles me and that was used for marketing for a college I used to work for. Their bot promptly responded with requests for information re: copyright. I did not create this video, but as far as I know, I did not sign away any rights to it (at the time, I cooperated with the making of this rather cheesy, now embarrasing work). Am I just going to have to live with this? I would link to the video in question, but I rather far too google-able as it is right now....

Private, self-hosted alternative to Brightkite?

merlinmann — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 14:39:48 -0800

Looking for a self-hosted, private alternative to Brightkite for sharing family stuff. My wife and I (mis)-use Brightkite as a two-person, location-aware version of Twitter. All our posts are private (we two are one another's only "friends"), and it's turned out to be a really handy way to let each other know where we are, indicate when we're on our way home, and even to post little snapshots of our daughter to each other through the day. Really fun and useful.

Although, we admittedly use the app "anti-socially," always trying make sure everything stays as private as it can, obviously it's an uphill battle with an app that's designed to broadcast lots of personal information to large groups of people.

Any suggestions for a more private alternative to Brightkite? Preferably something Open Source and self-hosted where we own and control as much of the data as possible. Not against API stuff interacting with Fire Eagle or what have you; as long as we maintain control over keeping everything as private as you'd want a note on your own fridge to be. Do-able?

Looking for the right hedge for privacy.

TheDude — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 14:46:26 -0800

Botany Filter: Looking for a a 6-8 ft tall hedge to give my yard some privacy. Examples of what I like and don't like inside. My yard is at a higher level than the street so passing cars have a pretty clear view of my back porch and yard.

From the sidewalk side there is a 6ft wall, measured from the inside it is more like 5ft, which slopes up to the house level. I'd like to plant some hedges along the inside of the wall to give me some privacy from passing motorists and pedestrians.

Some caveats:
- The area is under partial shade and only gets direct sun for 1-2 hours a day
- Has to survive the Los Angeles climate
- Drought tolerant plants would probably be best
- I prefer 'casual' hedges to rigid square ones
- Something that flowers and looks/smells nice is a bonus
- It can't be poisonous (I have a dog)
- Evergreen is preferred

Here are a few examples of what I don't like:
- Google Map Pic 1
- Google Map Pic 2

Here are a few examples of what I do like:
- Google Map Pic 3
- Google Map Pic 4

Bonus points if you can also recommend a good vine that will cover and hang over a block wall, similar to this.

Much thanks in advance!

If it was private, why was it in our account?

Anonymous — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 15:17:50 -0800

What is good shared email account etiquette? I just got chewed out by my spouse for reading an email to her from a friend that was sent to our shared email account. She said as soon as I opened it and realized it was meant for her, I should have closed it up and not read it. The problem was that the email was from a friend who uses a shared account with her husband and the email wasn't a Dear So-and-so letter, it was a forwarded poem whose topic was essentially--"Men Suck and You Can Only Count On Women" Heck, I even responded to the forwarder saying, "Ahem, this is a shared account." The poem really wasn't tongue-in-cheek either. I simply called out my spouse on the content and had the whole enchilada turned right back around on me that I violated her trust.

Obviously the solution to this is to have a private email account for private things; in fact, this account was set up over a decade ago for communal use for bill notification etc.. My wife just happened to make it her primary email account for herself over time. I feel it is abundantly clear that there is nothing private in this account. Many of the salutations (even from her family) are, "Hey guys" Not Dear Her....

Did I miss some sort of boundary here?

More about doctors and privacy

Anonymous — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 05:57:02 -0800

What exactly can a doctor's office tell anyone who happens to pick up your phone? I've recently come across couple of issues with doctor's offices and privacy. The first one was my mental health clinic, who dialed my home phone number. My boyfriend picked up and told them I wasn't home (I wasn't), and my mental health clinic said "well X therapist would like to make an appointment to see her." My bf doesn't live with me and they didn't even ask who he was when they left that message. I called them and said WTF, but they said that by providing them my home number, I authorized them to leave non-specific (i.e. no details about my care) messages there. I had no idea they were allowed to speak to anyone who answered the phone! Are they? (Note, I've since told them they are only allowed to call my cell phone number and they agreed.)

The other issue: My mom went to a specialist and specifically gave them only her cell phone number because she did not want them to give her test results to my dad. Specialist's office requested my mom to get her records from the general practitioner, which she provided. They pulled her home number off the GP's records and called the house. She went in to Specialist's office and explained that she was preparing to separate from my father and she did NOT want them calling him, they said, "well that will be a problem." Two days later they called when she wasn't home and told my dad the test results, when she explicitly told them not to. To me this is even worse than the first case because they did not leave a general message - they gave him test results! After she did not give them permission to and even specifically told them not to! Isn't that illegal?

When you go to a doctor's office, you usually have to fill out a form with the names of the people they may release information to. Why are the doctors' offices, then, not checking these forms and asking who they are speaking to when calling a phone number?

Privacy implications of 23andme

wireless — Sat, 17 Oct 2009 19:04:25 -0800

What are the privacy implications of ordering the 23andme DNA test? I am quite interested in ordering a 23andme test. The only thing that is holding me back is a concern that I might be crossing a privacy boundary I will later regret. I've heard a lot of ominous things about 23andme's connection to Google, how it isn't covered by HIPAA, etc.

But on the other hand, as several people pointed out in a previous post of mine, my medical information is already all over the place. Also, given that anyone who can get me to produce a hair/saliva sample can access all my genetic information, it seems futile for me to try to keep this private. Does anyone have a differing assessment of this?

How to resist data mining offline?

finnb — Thu, 15 Oct 2009 08:13:17 -0800

PrivacyFilter: Can you think of examples of offline anti-data mining behavior? We can encrypt our activities, use Tor, etc., online, but how do people try to stymie data mining in daily life? I'm thinking of groups sharing a "loyalty card" (like these guys) to break up the patterns of their shopping habits, and putting incorrect information into surveys and forms to make things harder to correlate (in theory), tack-in-the-shoe style. Other examples? (And, if you know more about data mining, do these methods actually accomplish anything?)

Why Should You Use Social Networking at Work?

Jaybo — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 19:06:47 -0800

Many workplaces ban social networking sites such as Facebook, YouTube, Twitter and so on. What are some of the reasons workplaces should allow (and even encourage) staff to use social networking sites? I'm particularly interested in the case you would make to someone in the healthcare field but examples that are applicable to other areas, especially those that may ban social networking site for privacy or productivity reasons, are welcome as well.

Are there privacy-respecting Facebook quiz apps?

ausernamenooneelsehas — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 11:43:08 -0800

Are there application platforms for building quizzes on Facebook that are not EVIL? I want to build a quiz as part of a marketing campaign, but I know that many of the applications are pretty nasty in their data mining. Any advice?

Long-term suicide watch or invasion of privacy?

Anonymous — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 20:12:06 -0800

My wife struggles with depression and, occasionally, suicidal ideation. But she doesn't communicate well (or nearly at all), so I have no real way of knowing when she's having a crisis rather than just another string of bad days / weeks. Is it ethical to monitor her internet activity without her knowledge so I have some idea of when I need to get serious about intervening? She has struggled with depression and other issues for years, and has mentioned suicidal thoughts on several occasions (though has never made an attempt). She's also a very closed person, generally unable or unwilling to communicate the majority of her thoughts and feelings to anybody including myself. I make constant efforts to draw her out, but it's particularly vital that I confront her when she's deep enough to be considering suicide; I owe it to her, I owe it to myself, and most significantly I owe it to our children to do everything within my power to keep her from falling over that precipice. But I have no way to know if and when these thoughts are coming to the fore again (which they do, inevitable, even if there's six months between them sometimes), and asking her every few days "so, thinking of killing yourself today?" is not really productive.

But one thing I do know is that she researches anything she ever does compulsively on the internet. If she was seriously contemplating suicide, she would look it up first.

So here's the question. Is it ethical to monitor her internet activity (e.g. check her browser history) without her knowledge with the sole purpose of checking for such research, so that I can be aware and take extraordinary steps to communicate with her or even involve professionals?

Please no suggestions about therapy, or meds, or improving communication in general, or other ways to deal with the depression problem between actual crises; I'm aware of the value of these, that's not the point of my question. She is not in therapy, so I am the only one who can really keep track of her state of mind. And asking her if I can monitor her activity would, in the absolute best case scenario, simply result in her using different resources to perform any such research.

"You should get that looked at" -- yea or nay?

greatgefilte — Fri, 18 Sep 2009 15:13:19 -0800

How far does -- or should -- a medical professional's ethical responsibility go when it comes to the health and well-being of strangers (i.e. people one might see on the street, or in line at the supermarket)? As a purely theoretical example, let's say I'm paying for my groceries and I notice that the cashier behind the till has some pretty characteristic signs of a disease that may be potentially serious, but that they may not realize they have. (For argument's sake, let's say Cushing's syndrome or melanoma.) Should I assume it's (a) none of my business, (b) something that is my business, but perhaps is not a good idea to address because I could be wrong and cause unnecessary anxiety, or they could already be seeing their doctor about it, (c) something I should definitely mention, or (d) something else?

If it's not venturing too much into the realm of ChatFilter, how would you feel if someone came up to you and said, "Excuse me, I'm a doctor/nurse/dentist, and I think you should get [x] looked at."?

Why yes, I am especially anxious today, how did you know?

desjardins — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 05:58:38 -0800

When I clicked on this article from this FPP, I got 3 Google text ads, 2 of which are directed at personal information about me. So I signed out of Google, cleared my cache, history, cookies, etc., and clicked on the link again. Same ads. How? These are the text ads I got.

Naperville Behavioral
Health counseling for anxiety, fear dpression, and other struggles
www.BehavioralHealthwhatever.com
Prepare to be Shocked
Millions have already taken this amazing test. What's your RealAge?
blah.com
No More Panic Attacks
Quick & Effective Cure To Anxiety & Panic Attack. Easy Steps To Follow!
example.com

I work near Naperville, no big shock there since I assume they pull my location from my IP. The other two must be targeted at me; I have panic disorder, which I've written about at length. However, it's rare that I search for information about it, especially on my work computer, and my searches for that would be dwarfed by work-related stuff. (My work isn't at all related to the mental health field.) My gmails rarely contain the actual words panic, stress, anxiety, or depression, although if you read some of them it'd be easy to come to that conclusion. Googling my real name brings up absolutely nothing about panic or anxiety. I don't really care if Google knows, but sometimes I have to view web sites with coworkers present, and I'd rather not have MENTAL HEALTH ads all over the place. So what gives? Why am I getting such targeted ads for something that's a minor part of my Google life?

Maintaining Server Privacy

dacoit — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 16:27:15 -0800

If you do a search for my company’s website on Google, one of the top hits is a page at Quantcast.com that purports to display “visitor statistics” for our domain. These statistics are wildly inaccurate by orders of magnitude and make it look as though our site gets only a tiny percentage as many visitors as it actually does. What’s more, there are all kinds of demographic charts and info, purportedly about our site, that don’t seem to have any connection to reality whatsoever. How do I get them to stop misrepresenting us? In their FAQs, Quantcast answers the question “how do I remove my site from Quantcast’s listing?” with “We do not remove sites from our listing.” They propose that one join their Quantcast Publisher program, but this program forces you to give them your actual server stats, which they will use and publish whether you like it or not.

I’m galled that there seem to be only two choices:

a.) putting up with a page of highly visible misinformation about my company that causes us actual financial harm; and

b.) signing up for some company’s service and giving them access to our server stats.

Surely there's a third choice? My question is this:
Do you think there’s any way to word a letter to a company like this to get them to remove our site from their listing?

(BTW, I know there are a couple of other companies, like Alexa, that do this kind of thing, but they don’t bother me because their stats are vague and don't pretend to be accurate. It's the false "accurate" picture that I can't get over.)

How to become a non-drinker?

Anonymous — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 16:46:35 -0800

I just started a long-term medication (bupropion, for ADD) that interacts very, very badly with alcohol. I don't miss the booze itself, but not being able to drink throws all sorts of monkey wrenches into my social life. I need advice on how to be a non-drinker in the drinkingest town in the United States, New York City... where the default activity for any occaision is going out for a drink.

What do I tell people? I've tried being vague ("I'm taking some medication... it's a long story.") but people always ask what I'm taking. You might say that's rude, but telling every new friend or date that they're rude isn't a viable option. How can I handle the question while hopefully communicating these points:
- I'm not judging you for drinking. I wish I could drink, too!
- It's not because I have a terrible secret. It's not because I'm "crazy". It's not because I'm uptight.
- I don't want to get into too many details.

What are some non-alcoholic drinks that won't draw undue attention to themselves?

I often hear things like, "I must seem so drunk to you!" or, "You must think we're all so drunk and sloppy!" How can I put people at ease?

Bonus question: I'm on the fence about attending Burning Man for the first time this year. If you've been, how much would being stone-cold sober affect my experience?

How can I ditch my online identity?

Anonymous — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 20:59:26 -0800

I've been trying to "disappear" on the internet for a while now, but every now and then I realize I've linked myself back to something I regret saying online or even online profiles which are benign but still don't want linked to me. What can I do to "lose my identity" online to the point of being completely disjoint from my past? For about a year now I've been systematically cutting out as much of my online identity as possible. I had one main handle which was also my e-mail address. Slowly, over the year, I went through every Google result that came up for my handle and removed all my posts and deleted my accounts (where possible... some still remain). I am reasonably happy about that, because now I just need to finally ditch the e-mail address and I can't be linked back to it.

However, I occasionally slip up. I recently discovered that a hosting site (think imageshack) I've been using links me back to some stupid comments I made on a website, which further links me back to my old handle! Obviously I need to ditch that hosting account, but it's these kind of slip-ups that I want to avoid.

Call me crazy, but I also feel like an enthusiastic individual could link me to posts that I've made on sites relevant to my interests just by my grammar patterns. I know I'm going to get a "see a therapist" for that one, but I feel like my writing style is pretty clunky and easy to notice. I would like to change my writing style (and I try to when I know I don't want to be linked to something, like this post) but I'm not particularly talented that way.

Long question short: If you've ever been very involved in the internet, and found you needed to lose every association with your online handle, what steps did you take? My objective is to have no links to anything from my name or e-mail address, and I don't want my past to bubble up when I think it's all gone.

In case you're wondering, I've done nothing illegal. I just really want to clear out the online personality I've accumulated over the years and start from zero again. It's... refreshing.