University of Oregon will monitor students' social media statements | Hacker News Reader

University of Oregon will monitor students' social media statements

jonathanturley.org

104 pointsrsj_hn166 comments

Is there some context missing from the article? How does the quoted policy mandate the school monitor social media? If they wanted to, couldn't they have monitored social media before this policy was added?

I'm not understanding why the author thinks this monitoring is happening, and why he thinks the policy mandates it.

Edit: I've read the article like 5 times now, what am I missing that everyone else here is seeing?

I've read both the policy and the proposed changes to the Student Conduct Code and they aren't lining up for me.

I'm also left wondering what I've missed. It seems there's no language calling for active monitoring, passive monitoring or surveillance. It also seems that off-campus behaviors were previously considered to be within the scope of the Student Conduct Code and the language has been cleaned up. The new Conduct Code actually seems like it (very slightly) narrows what the University considers applicable off-campus behavior in that it introduces a new burden on the University of being able to "demonstrate a clear and distinct interest as an academic institution".

I'm not really familiar with this document, so I'm hoping someone can help me understand how the proposed changes line up with the headline of the linked post

"social media"

For some reason that's in the title but I agree... I'm not seeing any mandate or etc.

>I'm not understanding why the author thinks this monitoring is happening, and why he thinks the policy mandates it.

It all seems rather clickbait-y, but HN doesn't seem to mind.

Universities can now penalize students for what they do in their private lives'? Well that's dystopian. Reading the article, it's pretty clear this can, and will, be used for ideological ends:

"Students whose off-campus behavior has a significant adverse impact on the University community, its members, and/or the pursuit of its mission and educational objectives."

They do specify that violence is one of the two reasons, however in the current ideological climate, violence has been classified in a super broad way that does not match the conventional description of violence. Some institutes have classified some speech acts as violence. Which is alarming.

Also, disrupting the university's "pursuit of its mission" is a very ominous turn of phrase. It's reminiscent of the phrase "anti-revolutionary acts". Imagine being sanctioned for "acts which disrupt the mission of the institution"?

Others have pointed out that I grabbed an old version of the document to quote. Fair, that said however the text when updated includes:

"[that] which causes substantial disruption to the University community or any of its members"

Again, disruption to members can, and has been, classified as "making feel uncomfortable". The language of this, in any revision shown, is dangerous. Someone being upset could easily argue that the "disruption" caused them harm, and prevented them from carrying out the institution's academic goals. Different wording, same impact.

' Updated from initial wording to avoid spreading mistaken information.

Well in the current ideological climate "silence is violence", as they say, damn this 1984ificaton of speech sucks. More specifically I think this is targeted at any views they don't like which really sucks.

It's a public university which means you have to see even the views that you don't like.

Exemplary modern dialogue shut-down tactic. Don't question me, don't debate me, don't ask me questions, don't think. If you don't do exactly what I say is good, you're problematic. If you're not as extreme as me, you're as bad as the enemy. Things like this have made me lose faith in modern civilization; we're watching the beginning of a catastrophic downfall.

Eh.

First of all, "silence" historically has been and continues to be an avoidance tactic for dealing with racism. So there is truth in the saying.

Second, the people taking this idea to extremes are a vocal minority. It's easy to see someone get canceled on Twitter and jump to the conclusion that the Red Army is right around the corner. I'm not that worried in the long run. Be understanding, but push back, and remember that some people will always be jerks no matter what the context or what ideals they find themselves aligned with.

> "silence" historically has been and continues to be an avoidance tactic for dealing with racism. So there is truth in the saying.

Freedom, like freedom of speech and freedom of association, includes the freedom to inaction and silence. Assuming the worst (that someone is racist if they don't tweet about racism every day etc) is toxic behavior

> Second, the people taking this idea to extremes are a vocal minority.

But that's the problem, it's the extreme vocal minority who are calling for (and succeeding in) cancellations of perfectly reasonable individuals who want to speak at universities. See Jordan Peterson, etc.

This statement is exactly true after removing "as extreme" too. These days anyone with a different opinion can be considered an enemy, extreme or not.

Actually, when was it not a problem? I vaguely remember christianity's historical splits were caused by lesser disagreements (at least what was stated to be the cause).

It’s the exact same in-group/out-group tactic that the neo-conservative republicans were using in the early 2000s with terrorism e.g.

“if you’re not with us then you’re with the terrorists” == “if you’re not out protesting/twittering/tumblring then you’re with the white supremacy patriarchy.”

Actually quite interesting how you can use the same tactics in a totally different population and get people all riled up. Most likely just political maneuvering by parties to engage voters.

Looking at it objectively I also didn’t see the media covering the Tusla massacre (as abhorrent as it was) nearly as much as they have been in the last couple days, which does lead to the suspicion that the coverage is politically motivated.

Warning: Off-topic rabbit-hole follows.

I've seen "silence is violence" a number of times, and regarded it (justifiably, I think) as manipulative BS. Then I saw one sign that said "silence = additional deaths". That one I found a bit harder to dismiss.

If (if) you think the statistics indicate that blacks are getting killed at disproportional rates, and if you think that you can put enough political pressure on to change things, then silence is not direct violence, but it is letting things continue to happen the way they've been happening.

It at least made me think, which "silence is violence" didn't.

While that argument is more nuanced than "silence is violence", it has its own share of issues. Death is egalitarian but its judgement isn't based on Rawlsian principles. Rather, it is firmly staked in Darwinian ones. Suggesting one's "silence" or lack thereof has an effect on that is a false correlation.

The problem with these arguments as a whole is that they ascribe a two-dimensional zero-sum game to what is in fact a more complex issue with millions of variables involved. Remember that slogans exist as signaling for likeminded people and a publicity attractor to the rest of the crowd. They don't exist to persuade others of a point or provide a workable method for achieving an aim. The best way to obtain the latter is to present your case in full to a legal society.

Too bad silence and violence almost rhyme, otherwise no one would have thought up this stupid phrase.

Further, willfully damaging or destroying physical buildings and "things" is _not_ violence.

[1] https://nypost.com/2020/06/03/ny-times-reporter-says-destroy...

As you read in both the article and the policy, the word violence has been removed and clarified as "behavior which seriously threatens the health or safety of any person".

I wonder if they have the integrity to apply that to cigarette smoking, drinking alcohol, engaging in unprotected sex (while infectious with STD), or having a lifestyle that causes obesity.

"This post makes me feel unsafe"

This isn't a social media policy, so I still don't understand why everyone's focusing on "posts", but sure, if they apply this clause to anything that makes anyone feel unsafe, that would be bad. I guess you win there.

If you're able to come up with a useful set of rules that can't possibly be abused, I'm sure a lot of people would be interested to see them.

Can you help me find in the linked PDF an reference to "monitoring" or "surveillance"? I can't find any reference to anything of the kind. The word "monitor" doesn't appear in the document, and the word "surveil" only appears once, in the definition of "Stalking".

The portion you quoted appears to be a portion of the document that was deleted and rewritten. "pursuit of its mission" is, for example, deleted from the document and replaced with the phrase "in which the University can demonstrate a clear and distinct interest as an academic institution".

Fair, however the text when updated includes:

"which causes substantial disruption to the University community or any of its members"

Okay, fine. I totally understand some people might have complaints with the previous language and the new language.

Can you help me understand how the headline of linked post isn't just...factually wrong, though?

The headline is: "University of Oregon will monitor students' social media statements". Unless I'm missing something that's just factually incorrect. What I'd like to get to is: Did I miss something, or is that headline just wrong?

A sentence from the article is: "Now, the Board of Trustees at the University of Oregon have approved a vague policy that mandates the monitoring of the social media exchanges and other “conduct” of its students"

I can't find "social media" or any form of a "mandate" to "monitor" social media in the document. Again, I'm trying to figure out: did I miss something or fail to understand something, or is that sentence just factually wrong?

> I can't find "social media" or any form of a "mandate" to "monitor" social media in the document.

You're correct. Digging deeper, I find no mention either. The title is factually incorrect. I will make updates to my comment to reflect this so as to avoid providing false information. That said, this sort of action is still deeply concerning given that someone can now bring social media posts and speech to the attention of the university for sanction.

Couldn't they do that before this change? And why is it deeply concerning? I'm pretty sure if someone tweeted "gonna plant a bomb on campus tomorrow" or "planning to burn down my professor's house at 123 Main St, anyone interested DM me, good luck @ProfessorBrown" the school could have done something about it even without this policy. And if not, this new policy is clearly necessary.

If you think the policy is too broad and covers more than just these extreme examples, I'd love to see a rule that only covers such extremes and can't possibly be abused.

The thing is, this sort of activity is already covered under criminal law like you said. The rules from the university form a redundant legal system, and as a result are open to abuses given the lower standards of harm and evidence used.

So, to answer your question, the regulation could sanction people convicted of violent offences when the violent offenses pertain the the university and/or it's members. Therefore:

"The university reserves the right to sanction members of its community who have been convicted of acts of violence, or convicted of making credible threats of violence, against it's members."

Ok, but since getting suspended or kicked out of school is a much lighter penalty than getting put in prison, we can easily imagine behavior that doesn't quite rise to the level of criminal assault or harassment, but does deserve university punishment. It's also common for the legal process to take years, and we can imagine a student continuing to attend the university normally and graduating, and then finally being convicted of something that happened in their junior year.

"lower standards of harm and evidence" are used because the consequences are lower. As the importance of an organization grows, the standards grow. At the lowest end of the spectrum, you don't need any evidence or process to kick someone out of a house party, because the stakes are very low. At the highest end, you need a ton of evidence and process to kick someone out of society by imprisoning them, because the stakes couldn't be higher. There's a big spectrum in between - banning someone from a store/sports stadium/airline, kicking someone out of a professional organization, firing someone from a job, etc.

I don't know the details of UofO's process, but I do think it's appropriate that they have lower standards and faster responses than a criminal prosecution.

If I take on $50,000 of debt to get a degree, and then they kick me out before I get it, that's a lighter penalty than getting put in prison, but it can still mess up my life for the next large number of years.

Not to mention that getting your degree revoked will likely get you blacklisted from nearly as many jobs as having a conviction of some sort on your record. Especially if someone can google your name and find that you were "charged" by your university for "causing disruptions".

I know, that's why I'm talking about a spectrum. They shouldn't kick you out on a whim, or with no evidence, but they also shouldn't weigh it like they're giving you a life sentence in prison.

Yes, but it doesn't say that the school is actively monitoring anything. The title of the article makes it sound like they are requiring passwords to people's social media accounts--like the US government does for visa applicants.

More likely they'll just dig through people's history as needed to get them to bend over and take whatever way the university is mistreating them that minute.

"thank you for contacting us to appeal your parking ticket, we would like to remind you of our policy on off-campus behavior (attached) and what you tweeted on 4/20/2015, if you would like to formally appeal your ticket please fill and return the appeal form (also attached)."

Yeah people freaking out over getting "cancelled" due to political views are missing the more mundane way this could be used to retaliate against students posting shit in general about the university.

I wish some day showing off purchases, vacations, parties, achievements, and any happy moments, will be classified as "producing emotional harm" and "creating hostile environment". And I think it is possible, because statistically some groups have more of those to show off than others, and group disparity indicates systematic discrimination.

So basically everyone on Instagram gets banned?

Not really, you can still post sad moments and words supporting all sorts of equity.

But sadness makes people sadder, so also negative.

Maybe cats and puppies unless some people aren’t allowed pets like some renters...

> "Students whose off-campus behavior has a significant adverse impact on the University community, its members, and/or the pursuit of its mission and educational objectives."

You grabbed the wrong quote. That was from an earlier draft. This is what is in the final draft:

"Student behavior which occurs off-campus in which the University can demonstrate a clear and distinct interest as an academic institution regardless of where the conduct occurs and a) which causes substantial disruption to the University community or any of its members, b) which involves academic work or any University records, documents, or identifications, or c) which seriously threatens the health or safety of any person."

This one is even worse. Now it is not necessary that disruption would have provably adverse impact, it can be any disruption.

Health includes mental health, so by definition anything you do that might be my “triggering” to somebody or some group is now banned

I'm OK with this, as long as the terms are well-defined and there is some form of recourse or due process for cases of mistaken and/or abusive accusations.

significant adverse impact on the University community

Should the school have the ability censure a student who posts openly hateful things on Twitter? I think they should; in my opinion, it's not different from shouting those hateful things at passersby on the campus lawn.

Should the school have carte blanche power to monitor all social media communication by students? Probably not. But where to draw the line is tricky.

Another problem is that University administrators with this level of power are not necessarily neutral, disinterested regulators. In the current political climate, it is absolutely feasible that the definition of "adverse impact" could change shape and size depending on who is causing the adverse impact. The example in the blog post is telling.

> I'm OK with this, as long as the terms are well-defined and there is some form of recourse or due process for cases of mistaken and/or abusive accusations.

What about mistaken and/or abusive applications of the process? What if you need protection, not from a student, but from an administrator?

> Should the school have the ability censure a student who posts openly hateful things on Twitter? I think they should; in my opinion, it's not different from shouting those hateful things at passersby on the campus lawn.

Twitter isn't the campus lawn. The campus lawn is university property; Twitter isn't.

It's not "absolutely feasible." It's already done.

But, I wouldn't judge too early. The university clearly caters to an audience which is voting with their borrowed/hard earned money to pay their tuitions [1]. It's not like your are forced to study there. If nothing else, other education providers will grow with the influx of new money.

[1] https://tuition.uoregon.edu/

yeah... in india this is the same feeling. you are not supposed to diminish or try to suggest ideas that would incite feelings of diminishing the authority of an institution, usually courts or ruling party or some professional institutions... The "image" of an institution is worth more than the life of an individual. Again, if i write a tweet critical of some public figure, i have somehow brought the wrath of an entire country because of this and this automatically vanishes my rights, usually now a days my right to live.

Agreed. This isn't slippery slope any more either, universities and other institutions have demonstrated a willingness to deliberately conflate "violence" with ideological transgressions even including _not_ speaking out on an issue a la "silence is violence".

Here are a smattering of cases in which universities suspend, fire, or pushed out faculty on the premise that they are creating "unsafe environments" (or similar implications/accusations) with their heterodox ideas (note that these are just professors, but there are certainly many more cases in which student transgressions result in suspensions, expulsions, etc):

* the Christakises were pushed out of Yale for arguing that the university didn't need to dictate to students what Halloween costumes were appropriate for students--that the students were adults who could decide for themselves. They weren't right-wing demagogues (far from it), but they didn't toe the party line. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicholas_Christakis#Free_speec...

* A professor was suspended for saying a Chinese word that sounds vaguely like a racial slur: https://www.insidehighered.com/news/2020/09/08/professor-sus...

* Another professor was suspended for the tone of a letter in which he declined to grade black students differently than white students in the wake of the George Floyd murder. https://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2020/06/10/ucla-professor-on...

* Another couple of university faculty (Bret Weinstein and Heather Heying) were pushed out of an Oregon university for declining to participate in a "no-whites-on-campus" day. When 50+ students assembled outside of classroom angrily chanting, accusing him of racism and white supremacy. Evergreen police were ordered to stand down, and told Weistein they couldn't protect him and that he should stay off campus. The mob also circulated names and photographs of his students and grafitied things like "fire Bret" on campus. https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/01/opinion/when-the-left-tur...

* Another professor was fired for criticizing his university's handling of sexual abuse scandals and anti-semitic behavior by University employees. https://www.thefire.org/tenured-professor-abruptly-fired-aft...

* Northwestern Professor Laura Kipnis's is sanctioned by the university's Title IX tribunal for criticizing Title IX (criticizing Title IX is a violation of Title IX, apparently): https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/laura-kipniss-endle...

* St Johns professor found guilty of violating Bias, Discrimination, and Harassment policies and accused of racism for asking students to weigh the pros and cons of the Columbian Exchange (a standard history question) https://www.thefire.org/teaching-history-not-permitted-st-jo...

* A U Chicago law professor is investigated for a quiz question referencing censored versions of slurs: "n___ and b___" (that's verbatim, the full words were not spelled out on the exam). The question was about legal recourse for a situation in which those words were used. https://reason.com/volokh/2021/01/15/tenured-law-prof-appare...

I'm done with it. I vote Republican now.

I'm certainly not going to tell you how to vote, but as a heads up this particular article seems to be factually incorrect.

As far as I can tell (and I'm asking for clarifications from people, in case I've misunderstood something) the headline is not supported by the linked document, and the key sentences from the article are not supported by the linked document.

The words "monitor", "mandate", "surveillance", and "social media" don't appear anywhere in this policy change. I can't find anything in the linked policy "that mandates the monitoring of the social media exchanges and other 'conduct' of its students".

Oh great, so voting restrictions, abortion bans and tacit support of violent right wing extremists are now comparable to a university enacting a vague policy that doesn't actually seen to imply that they will do any monitoring?

I would prefer if you just abstained from voting, honestly.

Well the tacit support for right wing extremists is kind of bullshit, but I'll give you the rest. This is usually the kind of response I get. "But the Republicans..." and they're right. But I'll take all of that shit over the party that doesn't respect my first or 2nd amendment rights, openly advocates for racial discrimination, and is now asking for an increase in federal police powers over the Jan 6 riot. The Democrats have a real problem handling disagreement and open debate. The right, for all it's problems seems fine with it.

The tacit support for right wing extremists is also entirely a red herring.

If I look at the policy history of Republican vs Democrat governments dating back to Nixon, I see a lot more to dislike in the former than the latter, and I don't see a whole lot of change over time.

The Democrats are having their very limp version of a Tea Party moment right now. Unlike the Republicans they fought it instead of embraced it. But that's not because they're dumber, it's because the extreme conservatism of the Tea Party was politically convenient for both parties, while leftism is politically inconvenient for both parties.

It's all shit, but at least I support the shit that might eventually help people one day, and not the shit that actively promotes "for me but not for thee"-ism.

> I would prefer if you just abstained from voting, honestly.

So it's your way or the highway huh? So much for freedom and all that other stuff in the Constitution.

Wanting secure voting is not restricting it. Fighting for rights of the unborn is not a bad thing when you believe they are alive at a certain point before birth (some people are fighting simply for abortion to be banned after birth). Antifa/BLM has done more damage and death in these past years of riots than anything the "right-wing extreme" has done in terms of body count and property damage. What right wing group and what event are you talking about? Jan 6th, the only person who was killed was shot by a cop. Something tells me you just wanted to lay hyperboles down in an unfair way and scuttle away.

Locally, the border issue matters greatly to me and I feel a strong stance is both the moral, economic, and secure choice. We shouldn't incentivize people to make that terrible trip. The cartels make more money off of trafficking humans than drugs. Letting wall parts rust that are already paid for is a stupid move. Complete the wall, it works. It frees up agents to handle other areas and keep the cartels from smuggling and lets more people come in legally.

All that being said, those issues aren't even on the table. Currently the important issues are the 1A and the 2A and the Democrats seem to HATE them, they vehemently support censorship and gun control for law abiding citizens. If you can't even support the first two amendments, how are you going to get my support?

> Wanting secure voting is not restricting it.

Which make it so weird that “secure” voting activities are targeted at specific types of legal voters, and are almost always accompanied with targeted efforts to remove the ability of those voters to meet requirements. Like restricting acceptable IDs and then closing a third of the locations to get those IDs, and they just happen to be majority areas for the other party [1]. It is also strange these efforts to “secure” voting can’t seem to show evidence of what they are securing against, and only seem to focus on tiny parts of the voting process that also have the effect of voter suppression.

> Fighting for rights of the unborn is not a bad thing when you believe they are alive at a certain point before birth

Which point? Since most abortions happen in the first 8 weeks. Only 1.3% of all abortions happen in the second half of pregnancy and are almost exclusively medically necessary for serious health reasons preformed on women that wanted the pregnancy.

> (some people are fighting simply for abortion to be banned after birth)

Who are they fighting against, since that isn’t legal in any state?

>Antifa/BLM has done more damage and death in these past years of riots than anything the "right-wing extreme" has done in terms of body count and property damage.

“Since 2015, right-wing extremists have been involved in 267 plots or attacks and 91 fatalities, the data shows. At the same time, attacks and plots ascribed to far-left views accounted for 66 incidents leading to 19 deaths.”[2] it is also passing strange that despite countless videotaped examples of police attacking, assaulting peaceful protestors exercising their right to protest, the only criminality you seem to care about the property damage. I think it could be argued that police acting above the rule of law and violently attacking people that criticize them might be a contributing factor to a riot.

> Jan 6th, the only person who was killed was shot by a cop.

Only one person was killed during the JFK assassination. Context is pretty important to what happened. An armed group of individuals breaching the Capitol Building filled with senior politicians, including the vice president, with the express purpose of preventing the transition of power by force is the context that is important. An attempted insurrection is not really on the same level as a burned up Arbys. You also seem to forget the police officer that was beaten to death with the American flag pole on the steps of the Capitol Building.

> Letting wall parts rust that are already paid for is a stupid move. Complete the wall, it works.

Walls at strategically placed locations based on evidence of crossings do actually work, which is why they had already been built. The current building of a wall across the entire border is a massive waste of money with no evidence of efficacy.

> Currently the important issues are the 1A and the 2A and the Democrats seem to HATE them

Weird how 1A protests against the police that were brutally and violently cracked down on by the police don’t seem to bother you, an actual 1A issue. I’d say the right to protest without the cops showing up in military cosplay and teargassing you is a pretty basic right. But what actual 1A issues are the democrats “HATING”?

[1] https://www.governing.com/archive/alabama-demands-voter-id--...

[2] https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/interactive/20...

At this point I feel like we have 2 political parties trying to create different dystopian nightmares and there’s no non-dystopian option.

My vote goes to the candidate that supports free speech. Today that’s mostly republicans and I’ve come to terms with that. Yesterday it was Democrats and it may be Democrats again tomorrow.

I'm pretty sure Republicans are presently trying to pass a bunch of speech restrictions on campus aimed at curbing Critical Race Theory. CRT is hot garbage to be sure, but Republicans--unwilling to cede the moral low ground--are opting to solve the problem by way of speech codes and assaults on academic freedom.

They're not limiting any student from talking about it, just it from being taught, because it's indoctrinating Marxist bullshit. No different than them trying to teach Creationism.

Agreed that they're not banning students from talking about it and that it's BS, but as far as I know state governments don't have laws that forbid teaching creationism in public universities.

They have lawsuits preventing teaching creationism in public universities, based on the Establishment Clause.

This kind of thing is what helped me see that universities really have become institutions for social policing, rather than teaching objectivity and rational thought. It's tragic that people are so comfortable trampling over things like free speech under the facade of safety, and even more tragic that people fall for the deceit.

I’m surprised more people are not using pseudonyms online. First rule of social media: Don’t use your real name.

This is an interesting approach to take. I have taken the opposite approach by using my real name in almost all cases, and my name in unique enough that a google search will directly lead to me.

The benefit of using my real name is how what I say ties into other people that know me through other channels. Someone might read a post I made about a multiprocessor Arduino design, and recognize my name as it related to Subaru stuff. These connections, in the real world, are the primary benefit of social media in the first place.

There is a downside.. if I had something negative to say I have to give it some consideration given the easy linking. I'm not sure that is always a bad thing, but it isn't always a good thing either.

Be weary because what you say may be seem harmless and conventional when you post it, but it could become unacceptable in the future.

Also, think of the things you said 20 years ago, and measure them using today's sensitivity gauge. There is likely something you said long ago that is totally taboo today!

A little off-topic tip, but in case English is your second language, you mean "wary" instead of "weary". For some reason this mistake is getting more and more common:

    weary: feeling or showing tiredness, especially as a result of excessive exertion or lack of sleep.

    wary: feeling or showing caution about possible dangers or problems.

Huh, I learned something new today. For some reason I never registered weary/wary as two different words. I associated both spellings and pronunciations with the same general concept. Kind of like gray/grey. I'm actually a native speaker and your comment is great because now I'm wondering about what other words I'm using incorrectly.

It's not just about you. It's about everybody in your social network. You need to protect all of them and the best way to do that is with anonymity.

The real downside is if you say something that isn't negative, that then gets taken out of context and spun in a way that makes you a target.

It also makes you targetable. If someone or a group of someones decided you needed to be punished they could harass you in the real world, such as by attacking your family or ability to do your job.

My social media identity is completely separate from my "real" online identity like my gaming name I only share with internet friends, and that in turn is completely separate from my meatspace identity.

I have the same approach, and I agree that it helps me reconsider before posting something I would regret.

Regret now or 10 years later when the culture changed?

I would hope that my moral compass doesn't depend on the current culture, so only now.

Current culture probably thinks I'm a terrible person anyway.

It's a delicate balance of not tieing inflammatory statements to your true persona, yet also profiting off of any fame that may arise from your public presence.

For the vast majority of people erring on the side of anonymity is the right choice. You can only go in the other direction once.

Currently, the majority of people seem to vastly overestimate the prospect of fame and act accordingly.

Pseudonyms are ridiculously hard for normal people to keep up and protect sufficiently, even against normal (aka not State) level actors.

The more you write, the more data there is. With enough patterns and idioms - everything from word choice to punctuation to posting times - they can be used to correlate and potentially identify a user.

And realistically, since this isn't a court of law (where there are previously concrete rules in play), they don't need "beyond a reasonable doubt" or even "preponderance of the evidence" but something as simple as "don't these things look the same!?" to fire up a mob to start a campaign to get someone fired or suspended.

At that point, the target has to hope they can either a) prove it's not them or b) the leadership has integrity to hold them to reasonable standards. It's ugly.

That's explicitly against the TOS for most social media platforms, and some (like Facebook) are really cracking down on pseudonym accounts over the last few years.

It's against the ToS for Facebook and LinkedIn, it's perfectly fine on Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, Youtube, Tiktok, Tumblr, Reddit, Pinterest, etc. Definitely not most platforms, just the few that place weight on real identity.

When I was younger, the internet was a tool for discovery and creativity. We used creative names. Today, it is an extension of personality.

It doesn't have to be. There are plenty of (non-troll) Twitter users who use pseudonyms. That can still be an extension of personality, but I'm guessing it's less likely to be the primary focus.

When my daughter started using the internet, my advice was "be a superhero". Don't use your real name, and don't show your face publicly.

I taught her to use a password manager so that she would have a different username for each site, and got here a primary gmail account that was easy to say, but not related to her real name.

Anonymity is an asset.

When I'm dealing with people I actually know - which is nearly all of my social media use - I prefer to use my actual name just as I do when we interact outside of social media. Using as fake name with these people would be bizarre and confusing.

Even if I were to use a pseudonym, I would not pretend it afforded me any guarantee of anonymity anyway.

While I'm clearly not using my real name here, I'm also not hiding it generally. I'd be hard pressed to advocate for hiding as well. I wouldn't say anything with a pseudonym that I wouldn't say with my real name. inb4 "not everyone has that luxury!" Yes, I understand that already. Everyone has to evaluate their own risks, and decide for themselves; thanks... But that's the point I'm attempting explain. If you wont sign your name to it, why are you willing to say it at all? Where's the line between what you believe, and what you're willing to accept responsibility for believing?

Because nobody wants to be punished? Sure it would be awfully noble of me to sacrifice my relationship with half my family to openly support LGBT causes or defunding the police, but I'm not that noble. If I can't do it anonymously I'm not going to do it.

Yeah I was able to get that particular nuance. But the immorality of that is why I can't advocate others do it.

I even mentioned that I have the The luxury of being able to sacrifice my relationship with my family to stand up for what I find to be morally correct. I'm also fortunate enough that I don't have to sacrifice my family relationships to stand on the side of morality. The idea I'm trying to get at is that at some point what's right is more important than what's convenient. And I'd then argue, only children are afraid of being punished for doing what's right.

Why would children be afraid of being punished for doing what's right?

I guess I need to rephrase. It's the mentality of an immature child to elect not to do what they believe they should do, or want to do because of fear of punishment.

You've never had a boss for whom you held your tongue despite knowing they were wrong because the negative consequences of you speaking outweighed the positives? Never had a significant other who was unreasonable about a particular subject and you chose to just go along with them for the good of your relationship? If so I envy you.

No, because what you're describing isn't about hiding an identity from the public. What you're talking about is the ability to speak with tact. I disagree with my boss about a lot of things. I commonly explain why he's wrong or why I'm right. Then in the very rare cases when we still disagree, I do what he asks because he's my boss. If you can't say something you think is true about your work because you fear the repercussions. That's not normal. And a huge red flag.

Ditto for my ex-SO who we've disagreed with about a few things. If you talk to someone with respect, and compassion with the goal of understanding over proving you're right. It's very easy to disagree harmoniously. But again, that's a matter of respect and tact. Not about separating who you appear to be from what you actually believe.

I'm hard pressed to think of a more toxic relationship with someone you'd call your significant other than one where you have to pretend to be or pretend believe something fake just to avoid something that may be uncomfortable. If you're speaking from experience; I don't envy you. That sounds like a horrible way to live your life. Avoiding conversations because of fear of conversations that require tact. If that really is you, you have a lot of learning about how to have conversations to make up for.

Are you aware that people are having their lives ruined for comments they made years ago and in good faith?

Why would a name I chose for myself be worth any less than a name someone else picked?

> Are you aware that people are having their lives ruined for comments they made years ago and in good faith?

Yes.

I'm going to pretend you made the comment I'm assuming you meant to. No that's not ok with me. I'm strongly opposed to taking something someone said out of context and using it as ammo for a different conversation. I'm also strongly opposed to doing anything other than assuming good faith when trying to interpret previous comments. I don't believe the solution to people who act in opposition to those ideal is hiding.

> Why would a name I chose for myself be worth any less than a name someone else picked?

It wouldn't, but that's not the connotation of the OP. The intent was to use a name to hide your real identity. You can choose your real identity, but that's different from hiding behind a pseudonym.

Second rule of social media: never use the same pseudonym twice.

The article mentions the Tinker case, but recently there has been another case argued with the Supreme Court: Mahanoy Area School Districts vs BL: https://www.scotusblog.com/2021/04/justices-ponder-narrow-ru...

This is the infamous "cheerleader" case you may have heard on the news. I'm optimistic that the Court will rule against the school district and guarantee more free speech rights for students; I think it's ridiculous how schools are increasingly intruding more and more into the lives of children.

University students are not children which means no one should be monitoring their activity without the normal legal proceedings. I'm also hopeful the supreme court makes the right call but just wanted to make sure we are not confusing uni students with minors.

>which means no one should be monitoring their activity

On a public site? Like ... their friends who might monitor it?

But neither is faculty, whom they are supposedly monitoring already. - so perhaps this is just a way to to get all of the monitoring removed

That case the justices seem to be trying to figure out where the line is where a school might have legitimate concern about speech off campus, and what kind of speech is ok to take action on.

It seemed to be less about monitoring in general and about where to draw the line.

They did not seem interested in wholesale blocking any monitoring or requiring the school ignore public internet posts.

SCOTUS seemed to be more interested where to draw the line on what actions schools could take on what types of speech, not so much about monitoring overall.

It's a good lesson in privacy controls at a young age.

I taught my daughter to never use her real name or post her face publicly. ...and to use different usernames on different sites.

Carleton University in Ottawa got in touch with me about comments I made on its subreddit last year.

That did not sit right with me.

Can you elaborate without giving away too much?

What did they ask about?

It was really surreal. They called me on my personal cellphone and accused me of not giving Carleton quote "a fair shake" with my criticism. I was venting on the subreddit, like many others. The teaching staff was not prepared for a sudden shift to online learning more than half way through the term. This was in late March 2020.

That's really weird. Was this an individual or some sort of organized thing?

I believe a file was built up on me by the “Student Conduct” department and an individual from there reached out.

I agree it was extremely odd.

Did they threaten any consequences to you?

No.

Whoa. Can you elaborate? Is your reddit username identifying or had you posted any identifying information (like a photo) from your account? I guess what I’m getting at is how much legwork did they have to do to track you down?

Same username as here. I criticized their Covid-19 response right at the beginning. I have a rather unique first name so I suppose that’s how they tracked me down.

I'm a Carleton grad myself. Really interested in hearing what happened, if you can disclose.

"social media" - do they include the fediverse? retroshare? secure scuttlebutt? Otherwise it's "we'll monitor you on fb & co and twitter", because even reddit allows pseudonyms.

So it boils down to this: stop using facebook, instagram, and twitter, and find a nerd friend to run a mastodon/pixelfed/etc circle for you & your circles.

The code doesn't mention social media or monitoring at all, so it's up to your imagination. If you think they're monitoring the fediverse, why not, I guess they could be. It is publicly accessible.

> It is publicly accessible

That depends on the instance.

>"social media"

As far as I can tell those words only appear in the title of the article so I'm not entirely sure if that's the case.

What else can they monitor? Local newspaper op-eds?

If it's public, you can, I can, anyone can read the newspaper.

Will be interesting to see the outcome.

Not sure I'm a fan of active monitoring.

At the same time I have little sympathy for "I made a public post on the internet under my own name for all to see, and other people saw it!" type situations.

> At the same time I have little sympathy for "I made a public post on the internet under my own name for all to see, and other people saw it!" type situations.

Fully agree.

At this point, it is valuable to ask yourself: Is this a public forum? If yes, would I be okay for my comment to appear on NYT's front page?

If not, consider posting to a private group instead.

How many resources does the university have to do so effectively? Anyway, i am confident that their teenaged student body will prove far more savvy than any moderator. I predict circles will be run around them until they quietly retreat in defeat. That's my cynical take on this.

Genuine question:

Where in the original policy is there any reference to active monitoring? The quoted section of the policies say that the University "may apply the Student Conduct Code" to off-campus behavior.

But I don't see anything in the policy document that discusses any kind of active monitoring or active searching of social media accounts. The word "monitor", for example, doesn't appear in the linked PDF at all.

It seems like they have updated their policy to clarify the language of how off-campus behavior impacts the Student Conduct Code, but I think the headline is extremely misleading, unless I've missed something from the linked policy. Can you clarify what I've missed?

The title is mostly red-meat for the "anti-SJW" base of HN. Off-campus actions have ALWAYS been of interest to universities whenever it affected the image of the university.

My own cynical take is that this will be a lot less about trying to monitor the social media postings of students as it is a way for the university to have a way to respond when, inevitably, a student posts something that gets whipped up into a media storm. In other words, they won’t go looking for students saying the ‘wrong’ thing, they’ll wait for someone to kick up a stink and then point to the policy as their reason for excluding/suspending/punishing the student.

They won't, they will outsource to some company running "machine learning" and then students will start getting suspended for other people with the same name doing things deemed inappropriate.

On balance, sure, but there will be a few students who don't follow proper opsec and end up being severely hurt by these policies. The idea that students need to follow opsec to prevent their school from causing immense damage to them is itself an indictment of the present age.

I'm certain the University can rely on activist students to report any problematic statements to the proper authorities. If that sounds improbable, there are already organizations in many universities called "Bias Education Response Teams".

That's not cynical, that's overly hopefully to think the students will defeat this. The most likely scenario: and disciplinary decisions that arise from this will be arbitrary and capricious (like anything school administrations do, from university down to kindergarten), and won't have anything remotely resembling consistent enforcement.

The thought police strike again! More realistically the university is running brand protection...

well most employers can fire people at will. for any cause. and do. including for your twitter posts. its been state-sanctioned capitalist thought police for a while now..

Students aren't employees, though. They're customers.

Students aren't customers either.

If you took an apprenticeship, you wouldn't think you're a customer. If you took an internship, even if you had to pay for it, you wouldn't be a customer. Students are customers. They're students.

In what sense are they not? They're paying money to the university, in order to receive services that the university offers.

In almost every sense that matters.

The model that seems to underlay this idea is that in a financial transaction, one person is a customer, and other is the provider (of a service, or product, etc.). But not all financial transactions fit this mental model of what is a kind of social relationship.

Suppose you go to Craigslist, and find that someone is selling their old bike. You give them a call, give them cash, and you get a bike. Were you their customer? Something doesn't fit. This is a one-off transaction, on each side. There is no "custom". But I don't want to argue the point, because there are other examples.

Suppose you get the opportunity to pay for an internship at a prestigious lawfirm. You pay your $1000 bucks, and then you work for free for a few weeks. Are you their customer? Sure, there was a financial transaction, but the relationship isn't one of being a customer. Is it?

Ok, suppose you are a plumber. Every few years you pay a fee to a certification board to keep your license. You also pay membership money to the Better Business Bureau. Are you customers to the certification board, or to the BBB? Doesn't seem like it to me.

Students are students. That is the relationship they hold to schools. That there is also a financial transaction happening is incidental to the primary relationship. Indeed, for students who pay no money because everything is funded by grants, then the idea that students are customers breaks down further.

I understand the temptation. It is a lot of money most people pay for an education. But students are not customers, and university degrees aren't products.

There is no mention of monitoring social media statements anywhere beyond this headline.

This entire blog is just outrage fodder. They take a shred of truth from a news story, warp it beyond all recognition, add a headline about “cancelled” or “silence” or “triggered”, and then watch the angry people stir to action for their cause. This blog post is not interesting because it’s composed almost entirely of misinformation and false insinuation.

This seems like it's merely codifying a practice that already existed de facto. I doubt Harvard had a specific social media monitoring policy in place when it rescinded admissions from the admits posting offensive memes, but that didn't really mean anything to the kids who got un-admitted.(1)

Not sure what to think of how big a step this is.

[1] (https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2017/6/5/2021-offers-resc...)

Look, actively monitoring social media is weird but the general policy that what you say outside of work or school can affect you in work or school is a good thing. This kind of policy is necessary any time people don't have a choice of who they interact with.

The example from my lived experience is bullying at school. I mean it was literally assault but since we were kids it's considered less of a problem for some reason. But my bullies weren't stupid, they would never do it in view of a teacher or they would just wait just outside of school grounds. So despite the fact that I lived less than a mile from my home I had wait three hours every day at the office for my parents to get off work and pick me up. The school had zero power to punish them for anything they did off school grounds while every. single. day. I had to be in class with them. Does that sound like a healthy environment for learning?

Alright, so assuming that you believe that words can be just as harmful and create just as much a toxic environment surely the same policy should apply. It's not about workplaces or schools supplanting the police (not that they would care or do anything anyway) but that creating a healthy environment in a school and workplace means being aware of what happens outside of them. Pretending that I could be comfortable being in school with my bullies because "technically they couldn't hurt me here" misses the point entirely that I still lived in fear.

> Look, actively monitoring social media is weird but the general policy that what you say outside of work or school can affect you in work or school is a good thing. This kind of policy is necessary any time people don't have a choice of who they interact with.

As far as I can tell, there's no active monitoring of social media mentioned anywhere in the linked document that is used as a source.

I think the point is not monitoring social media. Rather the university want to hold you accountable for public statements, where social media without using an anonymous ID is essentially a public statement.

I kind of empathise with GP. Bulling can and does happen off-campus and online, and has a detrimental effect on education.

Unfortunately, I can also see how this can and will be used as a silencing tool. No clue where to draw the line. We will likely see the pendulum swing every decade between more free speech and more responsible speech. Currently the fear of detrimental effects due to fake news makes the pendulum swing towards more responsible speach.

The title of the article is click-bait or red-meat for the anti-SJWs of the world. Doesn't accurately reflect the actual policy or content of the article. Flagging.

I have only one social media account under my given name. I only interact with a few people I know using the social media account using my given name. I tell everyone else I don't do social media when asked and I won't go through social media for anything important. And I get that certain large organizations know who I really am, I'm not naive. But the entire world doesn't need to know what I am doing on social media. It is none of their business. None. At all. Ever.

Where in the policy mandate anything to do with monitoring social media? I get how it could be twisted into that by the university if they wished, but that is unproven.

That's the issue though. Opportunity for abuse exists within ambiguity. Both the chilling effect this will have on other speech. And the risk that administrators Will apply this policy exclusively to speech they find distasteful especially in a biased manner.

Young people don’t use Facebook and every other social media platform does not require your real name. If you post something stupid under your real name then you have no one to blame but yourself.

Puritanism never ceased to be the primary underlying intellectual current in the United States. It just changed causes.

Seems that the first seven paragraphs were ideologically fodder for the last three paragraphs.

Isn't this just the other side of bowing to pressure when a student says something controversial on social media (or said it long before being admitted)?

Hive mind: "What? You have a student that used the n-word on social media? Rabblerabblerabble."

University: <Monitors social media>

Hive mind: "Why would totalitarian oppressors do this?"

Except...the University in this case hasn't said that they are going to actively monitor social media. As far as I can tell from the linked policy document, there's no mention of monitoring of social media anywhere in the document.

Maybe that belongs as a top level reply rather than to one of the thirty comments addressing the ethics of doing it at all? I’m not sure the point of singling me out as someone assuming there is some potential truth and relevance to the practice.

Well, your response appeared to assume that the contents of the article were true and the contents of the article weren't true.

In general, when I receive incorrect information and respond to it assuming its true, I appreciate when people inform me that its not true. I assume other people on HN share that desire.

>Well, your response appeared to assume that the contents of the article were true

I guess it might seem that way if you were going out of the way to read it uncharitably so you could be correct about something, I suppose.

A more charitable reading would be, "monitoring social media is a natural response to the demands of the hive mind, and outrage at it would reveal a double standard."

If you're "refuting" that -- if you're negating the relevance of the entire argument -- then you're effectively claiming my point will never be relevant on this topic at all: that, because this one university isn't actually doing it (probably because their trial balloon went badly), then no one will ever do it, and we never have to deal with the implications of universities (or large orgs) monitoring social media, or think about the pressure they're put under when they're associated with someone who said something bad on social media.

That would be the wrong lesson to take.

>In general, when I receive incorrect information and respond to it assuming its true, I appreciate when people inform me that its not true. I assume other people on HN share that desire.

I absolutely do! That's why I insist that you do post it, in the place where it's the most relevant, with the appropriate caveats: "Hey, even though this might be an issue some day, it looks like this specific university isn't doing it." -- as a top level comment, directly on the story.

Were you planning to respond to everyone who discussed the merit of "universities monitoring social media" by saying "well akshually this whole issue is irrelevant because this one university halted its plan to do it and insists there never was one"? Then what do you think you were accomplishing by raising the point one time (well, two times it looks like) in a subthread about an orthogonal issue?

It's great if you want to take the tack of "hey, I'm just trying to be super-rigorous and care about the Truth, man". But the other side of that is making an effort to post it where the opposite claim is actually asserted, not as "late hit" in a subthread where it isn't relevant. And not in a way that implies no one should care about the general issue.

> That's why I insist that you do post it, in the place where it's the most relevant, with the appropriate caveats

Sure! There was already someone else who made a post similar to that (which is the top-post on the thread). I also replied to that one, to reinforce the point.

So...done.

> But the other side of that is making an effort to post it where the opposite claim is actually asserted

Yep, I did that too! In fact, my first posts were mostly questions, and those formed into more concrete posts once I felt I understood the mistake of the article well enough.

After I had done those two things you suggested, I also responded to a handful of posts from people who looked like they had interpreted the article as being accurate when it wasn't.

I'm not trying to disagree with your point! I just wanted to let you, and people reading your comment know that it wasn't accurate (as was described in the headline of the post and the article) in this case.

Fair enough that it would be unfair to only comment on your post as my only comment in the thread! I didn't do that, though.

> And not in a way that implies no one should care about the general issue.

I can see how my initial comment came across that way, but that wasn't my intent and I apologize that it reads that way. I'll try and be less dismissive of the meta-point in the future.

>I'm not trying to disagree with your point! I just wanted to let you, and people reading your comment know that it wasn't accurate (as was described in the headline of the post and the article) in this case.

Then you did it incorrectly, because you worded it as:

>>>Except...the University in this case hasn't said ...

That is, my point is wrong, because this one case isn't actually happen. But my comment doesn't depend on this incident having actually happened! (It simply points out that this would be the natural outgrowth of the incentives, and that the hive mind would be inconsistent to object.)

If you were actually trying to do what you claimed, the appropriate way is to indicate it's a nitpick or that it doesn't affect the general point, or that you're just saying that to avoid a misconception that someone might get from the article (and not my comment) -- not to write it as a point of refutation, as you did.

Sure, totally granted and fair enough that my writing didn't convey my intent correctly.

My intent was for "Except" to apply specifically to "University: <Monitors social media>", which was the part I was trying to indicate wasn't factual in this instance. Again, I can totally understand how it reads as I'm disagreeing with the meta-point, and I'm sorry again that my writing failed to be precise enough to match my intent.

It is curious. Because no where in Turley's article, or in the policy he links to, can I find it saying the school is to actively monitor social media statements of its students. In fact, the word "social media" doesn't come up once in the policy document. Maybe it says something in less explicit terms? If someone can find it, let me know.

So I'm left with the impression that the title of the article is click-bait. It doesn't sound like the school is going to require access to social media accounts and actively monitor those. All it seems to be saying is that conduct outside of school can be punished? Is that even new?

I have this vague feeling that Turley wouldn't have a problem with private employers that are not schools firing people for things they say. But I could be wrong.

btw, this is Jonathan Turley of defend-Trump-in-impeachment-trial fame.

Yeah, that is not going to hold up in any kind of court.

In the court of public opinion, there is no defense counsel.

There are plenty, on both sides of the aisle, often being paid tens of millions of dollars a year to do so. They're often quite effective at it, too.

Say nothing bad of UO and you’re good. /sarcasm

Is this why college prices are increasing faster than inflation? How many $100k+/year administrators are required to manage this project? How large of an IT organization?

Why is this flagged?

Well this is what we all wanted right?

We're taking this stuff too far.

Vote differently or it will continue.

Maybe Harvard could get away with this but the fact remains that there is no Oregon university, let alone UO, requiring more than a 3.25 GPA to get in and that’s already being extremely generous.

UO simply isn’t prestigious enough to pull this kind of stunt.

While I'm not a fan of the idea, I suppose this is a predictable outcome in a world of social media shitstorms.

Post anonymously or be prepared to have any statement you have ever written on the internet be interpreted in the least generous way possible as a weapon against you by an irrational mob. That's how the internet works in the 21st century.

I don't even see how this could scale to a whole University's worth of students.

The current population of U of Oregon is 23,600. If you have say, 10 administrators dedicated to monitoring social media, that means each have to sift through ~2000 students posts each and every day. Yes, some students don't have any social media, but a lot of them are on multiple social networks.

> I don't even see how this could scale to a whole > University's worth of students.

That's not the point.

> The current population of U of Oregon is 23,600. If you > have say, 10 administrators dedicated to monitoring social > media, that means each have to sift through ~2000 students > posts each and every day. Yes, some students don't have any > social media, but a lot of them are on multiple social > networks.

They aren't going to do fair enforcement - like all code of conducts, they are only going to mine your accounts for ammunition if you show up on their radar.

It's for selective enforcement. If you don't sign their petition/join their party/support their protests, then they will look at your social media posts.

This is why CoC are written; I've yet to find an example of an in-group person being subjected to the code of CoC. The targets are always people with different politics.

It doesn't need to scale. Surveillance methods have a habit of only being exercised on people the controlling party deems "undesirable" or "disruptive".

Selective prosecution is a hallmark of oppression.

I’ve started shopping explicitly for conservative colleges for my kids.

I don’t understand why anyone would go into debt for institutions that want to crucify youthful stupidity. Oregon in particular seems to struggle with this topic.

I didn't go as far, but the conservative-liberal false dichotomy made me increasing watch conservative YouTubers, so that my brain experiences a more moderate world view.

I'm totally not conservative, but I also feel alienated by some liberal ideas. Would be great to hear a healthier mixture someday.

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