Mike D’s Blog

CAUTION! This one is a bit of a rant.

As a lot of people may or may not know I really hate anonymous comments. I do allow them on this blog as do most other blogs but about every month I revisit that decision. On the one hand I don’t want to have to make people register in order to get their opinion posted. On the other hand I really find anonymous comments cowardice. I mean if you really feel strongly about your point then why not just put your name there with it? I always make a point of putting my full, real name on every one of my comments. If that means registering then I take the extra time to do that.

What really got me thinking about this again is the Dilbert cartoon below. Several months ago I had touched a button with some of the guys over at Marathon after calling them out on a few things. Stratus came into the conversation to throw more mud on the situation under the name of “Top Gun”. A little detective work and it was easy to see who was behind the comments.

More recently there was some back and forth on someone defending Citrix’s abysmal performance with their virtualization platform. The commenter? Man-Guy. What a stupid name.

So here’s a plea to all who post comments on the web. Let’s start using some real names. If you don’t want your full name out there because you’re falsely scared that someone might steal your identity just from that then just post your real first name. If you want to go one better then try even letting people know who you work for. Believe me, it helps the conversation and then people won’t just write you off.

I’ll probably revisit anonymous comments on my blog again soon. In the mean time , you’re still free to comment at any time you want and I never delete or moderate any comments other than obvious spam.

- Mike DiPetrillo

Here’s the Dilbert cartoon that got this whole rant started.