Big Tech Slams Australia's Youth Social Media Ban 128
Major technology companies criticized Australia's new law banning social media access for users under 16, which passed parliament on Thursday with bipartisan support. The legislation threatens fines up to $32 million for platforms failing to block minors. TikTok warned the ban could drive young users to riskier online spaces, while Meta called it a "predetermined process," questioning the rushed parliamentary review that gave stakeholders only 24 hours for submissions. Reuters adds: Snapchat parent Snap said it leaves many questions unanswered. [...] Sunita Bose, managing director of Digital Industry Group, which has most social media companies as members, said no one can confidently explain how the law will work in practice. "The community and platforms are in the dark about what exactly is required of them," she said.
Fox ... (Score:5, Funny)
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What security feature?
Your comment should read; Hens put up tissue paper fence to keep out foxes and close their eyes as chicks walk through and play with foxes, wolves and bears.
Wolves annoyed by farmer's fences (Score:5, Insightful)
They're angry at the reduced opportunity to condition children to accept zero privacy as normal. They're upset at the lost data mining and advertising opportunities.
They absolutely do not give one shit about the mental health of a kid exposed to finely tuned click bait.
If you're pissing off social media giants, you're doing something very, very right.
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They're angry at the reduced opportunity to condition children to accept zero privacy as normal.
Except this law does the opposite: it removes privacy from children (and, in the zeal to verify the age of everybody who connects to the internet, also removes privacy from everybody else).
Re:Wolves annoyed by farmer's fences (Score:5, Insightful)
The only other solutions are:
1. Regulate these platforms, placing limits on content - in other words censorship
2. Do nothing, and just accept the harmful effects
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> 2. Do nothing, and just accept the harmful effects
A perpetually undervalued option!
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Kids are well aware of Real World Shit at an earlier age than many people, and especially parents, like to think, and that includes a LOT of topics that might not be a parent's first choice to talk about, but it's still a much better option than them finding out t
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3.1 require a "driver license" to use the internet, both for parents and kids. Most people are clueless about the dangers of internet and are themselves addicted
3.1 [Re:Wolves annoyed by farmer's fences= (Score:3)
3.1 require a "driver license" to use the internet, both for parents and kids.
this is a subset of option 1: remove privacy from children (and everyone else).
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3. Let parents actually you know, parent their children. The entirety of Australia's underage are not collectively wards of the state, at least I hope that's not what people think.
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Or:
3. Remember what genX and every generation before had drilled into us: "Stick and stones may break my bones, but words can never hurt me.", and pull the sticks out of their asses wrt/ people reading wrongthink online, teach the kids that there are always assholes out there and you can't let their assholery dominate your own psyche, and to develop the thick skin and self-reliance that seem to have fallen out of fashion after the 1990s.
And before you make the obvious retort about the nastiness of some peop
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When I was on Usenet in the early 1990s, I don't think there were many people under the age of 20.
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I dont really see a problem with censoring what kids can see. We already place restriction on other media , ie forbidding showing porn to kids and forbidding certain adult rated conventional movies for kids under 16. It doesn't require we restrict what adults see, just throw some filters on what we show kids.
Regardless, this blunt instrument is going to have bad side effects. A friend of mine has a kid with pretty severe autism .
The kid was borderline nonverbal, until his parents found a minecraft server f
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Please note there's an election here within 6 months.
Albanese sees this as a win in neutralising Rupert Murdoch's media influence by gaining bipartisan support for such legislation.
Now I don't have kids under 16 but I am just cynical of grandstanding politicians who fabricate a solution in search of a problem.
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What happens when (not if) a government requires companies to pass along the account information before the government signs a token?
Re:Wolves annoyed by farmer's fences (Score:4, Insightful)
Worrying about side effects is critical. In medicine as well as in politics.
And the statement "we shouldn't even talk about side effects" is the worst answer of all.
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No one is forcing you to upload your private life to social media. Facebook, Twitter, Reddit etc. can be used in perfect anonymity aside from the background scripts that can appear on any other webpage. The only reason people put private stuff there is due to their own narcissicm.
But you know what erodes my privacy? Having to provide a cellphone number or a government issued id for verification to those very same companies.
Re:Wolves annoyed by farmer's fences (Score:5, Informative)
Not really. They all demand certain hooks that will give up your identity. For if they allowed truly anonymous behaviour I could visit twitter without an account. Try visiting and seeing content on Facebook or Twitter without an account. Reddit will allow it for the most part, but Instagram nags you. The others just say log in to see this content.
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Re: Wolves annoyed by farmer's fences (Score:2)
If you think you can use social media anonymously, then god dam you're the dumbest person in the history of flagrantly willful dumbasses.
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Millions of people do it everyday. Maybe you can gaslight Aussies into accepting a "papers please" Great Firewall but you won't do it to the rest of us.
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What's "great" is that you are prevented from finding out (through incognito) that your posts are getting ghosted/shadowbanned when you need to log on to even see any content, and account creation needs your real world information.
"Haha, let's just stick this stoop inside a soundproof bubble. He'll never know!")
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other than some government sites, i have no site that require me to give them any government issued IDs
those that require phone, i either give a fake number or i usually simply don't use them (i have some exceptions, but few)
and no, i don't use social networks sites
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No one is forcing you to upload your private life to social media
Wrong. Oh, so wrong.
Facebook has been using other people's willfully submitted data to build shadow profiles of people who refuse to hand it over for years. Other social media companies do this too. It's not just limited to social media companies either. There's entire markets for buying people's info and plenty of info brokers, all looking to get at what you try to keep hidden from them bit by bit, and AIs who's sole job is to try and extrapolate more. You don't get a choice. You can refuse, but they'll
Re:Wolves annoyed by farmer's fences (Score:5, Interesting)
DUDE you nailed it! If social media really cared they would have done this already. But they realize it will lead to less clicks, less addictions.
How less addictions? Because kids will have to find other means to amuse themselves. You know like maybe going outside? Doing sports? Having a hobby? There have been quite a few studies that have indicated social media at such a young age is not good for the development of the mind. Once you are older it is less problematic.
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Yeah, like slashdot. /s
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The social media cartel is a bunch of self serving cunts for sure. But I think this ban made social media even "cooler".
The old forbidden fruit syndrome.
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When I was a kid, it was Penthouse magazines. Sometimes Playboy.
Yes, every year there was a day where some kid would raid his dad's stash and show one off. But you know what? We didn't all have constant unfettered access to porn. I'm not terribly confident that was all positive, but that's not terribly relevant to the point I'm making here.
Throw up barriers, you will reduce access.
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When I was a kid alcohol, cigarettes, porn, drugs were easily available despite laws making such items illegal for children.
These are not barriers since the responsibility falls on others to do the job of the guardians. How are you going to prove that that's not grandma looking at porn and hold social media responsible?
Prove your identity (Score:4, Insightful)
What this means is that pseudoanonymity is dead. In order to be on social media, you will have to prove your identity, which will then be tied to your account. This will be valuable, saleable information for the social media sites. The big tech companies are secretly thanking the Aussies for this gift. Frankly, I'd have a close look at the bank accounts of the politicians who pushed this...
Also, the information will inevitably leak or be stolen - meaning that effectively every social media user will be doxxed.
News at 11 (Score:5, Insightful)
Cigarette companies slam bans on selling cigarettes to minors...
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Smoking makes you look sexy and cool
https://www.facebook.com/YesTo... [facebook.com]
Re:News at 11 (Score:5, Insightful)
Industry condemns limits on its ability to harm...
Maybe there are no good guys here, but at least governments can be given the boot.
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but at least governments can be given the boot.
Can they? Both Russia and China "recently" implemented Ruler for Life in both countries. Do you really think other governments are immune? It looks like USA is next.
Re:News at 11 (Score:5, Insightful)
Children manage to get their hands on booze and cigarettes, and yet we don't just throw up our hands and go "welp, might as well just legalize the sale of vodka and beer to 12 year olds..."
No system is perfect, but penalties such as fines, act as a disincentive.
The dark web doesn't have age restrictions (Score:2)
Re: The dark web doesn't have age restrictions (Score:4, Insightful)
By that reasoning we should just do away with laws and let people do as they will.
Re: The dark web doesn't have age restrictions (Score:2)
By that reasoning drug dealers should be allowed to offer their goods to kids and the results should be blamed on parents.
Re: The dark web doesn't have age restrictions (Score:2)
I don't believe banning youth from social media is punishment. After checking TikTok for 10 minutes I'll say it's a blessing. Asking them to read a book is punishment.
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unregulated like it was until now!! it makes no difference for the other sites, but yes, this will affect big techs...so sad </s>
Murderers slam death penalty (Score:4, Insightful)
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I'm glad that we managed to shutdown thepiratebay with such effective laws. /s
Pretending to fix something does not solve the problem. I believe this is theatre. There is more money to be made from identifying users than protecting children. If we pretend that something is being done to appease the masses then we can get laws passed indirectly. I'm pretty sure that some time in the future we will find that this was initiated by social media the same way as recycling plastic was by the oil industry.
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I'm evidently missing the joke. What part was funny?
Self-interest strikes again! (Score:3, Insightful)
"Major technology companies criticized Australia's new law ..."
Because of course they did.
They're only trying to appeal to stakeholders... (Score:5, Interesting)
Maybe if "major technology companies" didn't consistently and obviously act in bad faith, anyone else would give a shit.
Them: Social media isn't harmful [apa.org].
Also Them: Using every addictive design tactic they can get away with to improve engagement [harvard.edu].
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No, it is parents that act in bad faith. They force themselves upon children to, kind of, get meaning and purpose in life. At the same time they don't give a flying fuck if the child wants to grow up with them or in the social context the parents force the child to grow up in.
A child's faith ... (Score:5, Insightful)
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someone mod this up!!
Was anybody asking them? Why? (Score:4, Insightful)
What ID? (Score:2)
It's a good thing my social contacts involve restaurants and pubs, no need for identification there, and good food has always been good for my mental health.
Kids should try engaging in ways that don't involve electronics, preferably by following good examples from adults.
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It's a good thing my social contacts involve restaurants and pubs, no need for identification there.
Well, you are there in person. They can see whether you're underage by looking at you.
Here in the US a bar will ask for ID if you look young.
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"Kids should try engaging in ways that don't involve electronics, preferably by following *good examples from adults.*"
Incidentally, I want a unicorn and I hope Santa Claus finally brings me all of those presents I had on my wish lists of Christmases past that he failed to deliver.
(Assuming you are talking about the US)
Worst Hypocrites Ever. (Score:5, Insightful)
TikTok warned the ban could drive young users to riskier online spaces
..says the asshat of asshats creating the worst of online spaces for kids.
I’d suggest the owners of Tik Tok look in the mirror, but that’s reserved for creatures that have a reflection.
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TikTok warned the ban could drive young users to riskier online spaces
But they're not wrong... *shrug*
The latest moral panic (Score:2)
The latest in a long list of things that are corrupting our youth (rap music, video games, rock music, pinball games, horror movies, comic books, sock hops) yet somehow they survive and become functioning adults and no one worries about those things any more.
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The fact that these guys are against it... (Score:3)
puts me in favour of this law.
Big tech (Score:4, Insightful)
I've been noticing lately that when "Big Tech slams $THING", I find myself approving of $THING. Funny how that is.
Because banning always works (Score:2)
Yes we know, you like 'em young (Score:2)
Protecting Property vs Protecting Kids (Score:5, Insightful)
There seem to be an awful lot of effort put into preventing people from listening to music or reading material or using software without a proper "license". Of course, not entirely successfully and you can make the argument that intellectual property is an oxymoron. But none of the companies providng these things for a fee seem to find people's need to identify themselves as a barrier to collecting their fee.
If you accept that kids use of social media is damaging then we can figure out a way to reduce their access to it. That will necessarily entail people who use social media to "prove" they are adults. Much as someone trying to buy alcohol needs an ID. Or someone who logs into a streaming service needs to provide an ID.
There are lots of options for accomplishing that. But opponents are using that reality to try to oppose the regulation and get it repealed. They are looking for problems with solutions because they don't want the problem solved.
Sooo, they want to exploit children? (Score:2)
Figures.
This supports good parenting (Score:2)
Mandy Rice-Davies and Sybil Fawlty (Score:2)
Who would have thought that these companies would object to any curtailment of their parasitic behaviour?
Yet another case where two of the greatest quotes apply:
Basil's comment on Sybil ("Can't we get you on Mastermind, Sybil? Next contestant - Sybil Fawlty from Torquay. Special subject - the bleedin' obvious.")
and Mandy ** "Well he would say that, wouldn't he?"
** this is actually a slight misquote - but often used.
Well if the fox can't be trusted to guard the hen (Score:2)
In other news (Score:2)
Big tobacco slams lung cancer research.
Film at 11.
messaging platforms are ok (Score:2)
Re: Australia (Score:4, Insightful)
How is are age restrictions on addictive/vice things an attack on free speech? This is a really bizarre take. Do you feel the same way about pornography? Should kids be allowed to participate in pornography in the name of free speech, like how it worked in Denmark for a while?
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How is are age restrictions on addictive/vice things an attack on free speech?
They are not. The methods used to enforce those age limits are a direct attack on Free Speech.
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How is are age restrictions on addictive/vice things an attack on free speech? This is a really bizarre take. Do you feel the same way about pornography? Should kids be allowed to participate in pornography in the name of free speech, like how it worked in Denmark for a while?
Not the op, but people have been well and truly brainwashed into believing there are *NO* ways to communicate outside of the giant online social media companies. Taking someone off the tech-bro teat is akin to complete isolation, with no other avenues for communication available. And soon? If we're cut off from AI, we will be pariahs, hermits, living in the woods without electricity or running water.
I'm not sure why we've allowed this militantly anti-information culture to take over our basic humanity, but
Re: Australia (Score:5, Insightful)
No this is not a government issued license to allow you to speak. Children can continue to speak. They can continue to interact on the Internet. However... people drive at either 16 or 18. People are considered adults at 18. People can legally drink from 16 to 21 depending on the country. The list goes on there are plenty of restrictions and they make sense. Free speech is not absolute. Otherwise if you really believe it you would not be a paranoid anonymous coward. You would put your money where your mouth is.
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In Australia, kids just need to go on xhamster.com to hold their conversations unimpeded.
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They need to say they are lower than 18 years old... they can also lie in the age question and use facebook... what is your point?
you are still free to do what you want, but now at least social network will not target young people and will require login to use.
probably roblox is more dangerous than many social media, but one problem at time... one of the main problems is parents also having no clue what is the internet, are then self addicted to social networks and think it is fine to share personal data
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Re: Australia (Score:5, Insightful)
I think you'll find that that isn't as much of a problem as it was twenty years ago. With more and more people working all day on computers the percentage of parents who are clueless about the Internet is getting smaller every year.
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are you talking about the parents that create accounts in facebook, twitter, instagram, post all their life online and give 4 years old kids phones and allow they to use them mostly unsupervised?
using computers is different of knowing how to use the internet and their dangers
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No, they don't make sense. Parents and the government forces themselves upon children. There is no consent involved. Therefore, they have no right to limit the freedom of children.
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Have you, by chance, missed the studies that show social media, doomscrolling etc. as being just as addictive as alcohol, tobacco, gambling, etc.?
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But are social ills of social media "addiction" the same as someone who is chronically drunk or a chain smoker? If I "drink" social media every day 10x a day for several years and quit, do I have permanent damage? Probably not.
The comparison isn't there. It seems to me the solution is educating parents and letting parents exercise their discretion on the use of social media in their household.
Re: Australia (Score:3)
If you indulge at work 10x a day. Then yea, many will say " you are not being productive" and will take action. As far as educating parents? Where has that ever worked? Mass media has a rating system federally mandated that corporate opposed until they did so whatever parents thought.
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do I have permanent damage? Probably not. How would you know? And how many addicts claim they aren't addicted? Its the famous quip, "Quitting smoking is easy. I have done it many times."
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I want to make it clear that you and others are using weasel language like "maybe", "we don't really know", and etc. to justify barriers to freedom of speech and anonymity and have not considered lesser impactful means of achieving harm reduction (and have totally ignored probable harms that such laws could cause) before pulling out this big hammer.
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to justify barriers to freedom of speech and anonymity
I don't think kids are or should be "free". They need adult guidance and that is particularly true when they are using the internet.
I don't see any real value in anonymity. It simply creates a lack of accountability. That results in large of amounts of unreliable and unverifiable information that people have to wade through. The information provided by anonymous sources ought to be considered to have no value anyway. But many people don't treat it that way and are making decisions based on it.
Re: Australia (Score:5, Informative)
Because you need a government issued license allowing you to speak.
No you don't. This law has literally changed nothing about your ability or rights to speak in Australia. Nothing at all. It affects a few services not being offered to minors. At no point will the government come and arrest a minor for what they say. This law hasn't affected the liability of anyone speaking.
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This law hasn't affected the liability of anyone speaking.
Of course this law hasn't done that. The methods that will be used to actually enforce the law are the attack on free speech that everyone but you seems to understand.
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I didn't say the law will work, I said nothing will change from a free speech point of view. By the way Australia already has experience with an 18+ credential system. We have ID cards which have the sole purpose of identifying you as 18+ (on top of drivers license) and in several states these have a digital component.
It will still fail mind you. The system just isn't possible to implement.
So no, no one will be arrested for what they say, they won't have access to online services to say it in the first place, let alone be arrested.
Which is far better for silencing speech.
No one has been silenced in any way. The world does not owe you a megaphone and a platform. It owes you the freedom fro
Re: Australia (Score:3)
I'm taking about child porn, not children consuming porn. Denmark allowed child porn in the name of free speech.
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You sound like you don't think kids know how to access porn today.
Laws don't control anything. The fact that someone can break a law doesn't make a law pointless. Yes kids can access porn today, yes they'll figure out how to access social media. That is also completely and utterly missing the point.
In other news I drove too fast today. So we really shouldn't have any speeding laws or road rules - is that what you're saying?
Re:Australia (Score:5, Insightful)
The key question is, how do they expect companies to verify the ages of everybody who uses their services?
From the summary: "no one can confidently explain how the law will work in practice. 'The community and platforms are in the dark about what exactly is required of them'."
There's an essential contradiction here; some people are saying that corporations collect too much data about people, and yet here Australians are stating that corporations should collect even more data about people. Ultimately, this would most likely mean that every social media site would compile, or have access to, a database of the name, age, and IP address of every person that uses the internet (and probably more information, since they need to distinguish between different people with the same name.)
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"this would most likely mean that every social media site would compile, or have access to, a database of the name, age, and IP address of every person that uses the internet"
They don't already have that?
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Just use your driver's license? [Re:Australia] (Score:2)
The same way liquor store verifies the ages of everyone who buys booze.
Good lord, you want everybody to show a government ID every single time they log into a website, and have an employee of the company look at them and verify that they're the same person whose picture is on the ID?
You've moved from "violating privacy" to "violating privacy and also major pain in the ass."
And, how are you going to prevent fake IDs exactly?
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Obviously you know nothing about ID.me.
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Age verification upon account creation does not imply that the age needs to be stored.
Yes it does. Because children grow up, and the companies will need to know when they stop having the internet censored.
Re: Australia (Score:3)
Or youngers could go an ask for validation when coming at age ...
Re:Australia (Score:5, Interesting)
Here's a guy who drank all of Elon's kool-aid.
"Free Speech" is abused as a pretext to mean "don't regulate us, at all". Social media platforms like X thrive on engagement, so the more controversial assholes like Alex Jones, Andrew Tate, racists, bigots and other lunatics you have on the platform, the better. They post sensationalist nonsense, fake news, literal Russian propaganda, anything that will get the double whammy of enagement: words of approval from their fans, as well as the outrage from their detractors.
Social media has become a cancer of disinformation, addiction, and unhappiness. Elon Musks' X is the worst of all.
Re:Australia (Score:4, Insightful)
Kids aren't free and don't have free speech. When parents decide kids can do whatever they want, we intervene both for the welfare of the child and the welfare of society in general.
The real question we should be asking is why we allow personal anonymity on the internet at all? It has become a public space and perhaps people should have to identify themselves when adding content to it. Free speech <> anonymous speech.
Slashdot allows anonymous posts but only be using a universal pseudonym. The effect is to allow people to filter out the anonymous content and makes it a lot less valuable for the poster choosing to use it. But it doesn't eliminate the use of other pseudonyms to remain anonymous.