A Daily Kos User By Any Other Name

I posted the story about Jane Hamsher's PAC expenditures on Daily Kos, where it has attracted more than 1,100 comments in six hours. It also earned me a warning from a site administrator because I referred to the real names of two members who post there as Nyceve and Slickerwink:

The publication of DKos users' real names here -- if they have not revealed them on this site -- is forbidden. Your use of nyceve's and slinkerwink's real names violated that prohibition. Don't do it again.

I wasn't able to comment until I agreed to never ever never do it again.

I can understand why that rule is in place, since there's a rule on the Drudge Retort against posting personally identifiable information about another member of the site. Most of the time that junk is part of an effort to intimidate someone.

In this case, though, it was a surprise to get in trouble for it. Noelle Cigaroa Bell identifies herself by both her real name and Slickerwink in her Huffington Post columns, and Eve "Nyceve" Gittelson does the same on the FDL Action PAC blog and elsewhere. They want people to know their real names and their pen names.

If it ever comes up again that I'm writing about a Kos user, I'll make sure they are OK being identified.

Publishing · Etiquette · Daily Kos · 2010/03/29 · 3 COMMENTS · Link

Comments

The Daily Kos bends over backwards to protect these two even though they have disclosed their real, full names themselves on not only the Huffingtonpost but also on the actual Daily Kos.

Noelle identifies herself as "Noelle Bell" on a video she made and posted on the site. She says, "My name is Noelle Cigarroa Bell."

If you click on any link to the Facebook she promotes, it states her real full name.

I'm less clear if Eve has identified herself on the Daily Kos as Eve Gittelson but believe she has. Certainly I knew her name from that site alone.

This is a problem with having a moderator who will not follow his own rules on the biggest liberal website on the blogosphere; they are arbitary and definitely wind up in such foibles involving public figures. Both Eve and Noelle are listed on their business cards as "media relations" or something to that effect. I believe you can Google this information. Why would two "media relations" people acting as journalists, who identify themselves by name on a website, be skittish about being discussed by name?

Perhaps because they were aware of some of the shakier issues involving Libertarian funding that your article did not address dating back to at least the Fall and yet neither left FDL of their own volition. Now both are paid by Darcy Burner through a deal involving the owner of the Daily Kos, Markos. So perhaps this somehow explains the excessive protectionism. Godspeed.

#1 · Jnn_ee · 2010/03/30

Roger, that's bogus, given nyceve's and slinkerwink's identities are well-known, both on Kos and in the blogosphere, and given they're paid diarists being funded in large part by donations from posters on Daily Kos.

I hope their attempted slapdown of you doesn't deter you from continuing your research. Jane Hamsher's antics have long stunk to high heaven.

#2 · Kosser · 2010/03/30

Thanks.

I don't think it was improper for me to identify Bell and Gittleson, but I can understand why Daily Kos is being a hardass about its rule. If they allow reasonable exceptions, it opens the door to more situations where users find reasons to name names.

#3 · Rogers Cadenhead · 2010/03/30