Some people might think it’s really stupid that I put any personal information of any kind in a blog post visible to the entire world. Well, it might seem stupid but I am aware of the risks of divulging personal information. For instance, I would never post my Social Security number, 123-45-6789 or my home phone number, 666-555-1234 or my home address 5555 N. Nowhere Lane, Bauxite, AX. You get the drift, the important stuff, like mother’s maiden name (Elizabeth Holmes) would be very bad to put in public place. Now most grabbing of personal information is done by programs, looking for certain patterns at certain places, which I doubt applies to these posts.
So that just leaves an actual thinking human being instead of a bot. And that’s what I don’t worry. What little I can extract from the web stats wordpress.com provides indicate: a) non-zero but still very small readership, and, b) only a very small handful of regular readers. From the information I do post it would require piecing together tidbits of information from many posts, over multiple years, to even begin to get some clues useful for identify theft.
In fact even if I had any close friends reading these posts (all the people with whom I had close relationships are now dead, or the few living ones, completely unaware of the existence of this blog) it would take them a lot of work, already knowing some things about me, to piece together a variety of clues. And I believe those, which might reveal a little more information, nonetheless would end in a dead end about obtaining critical personal information.
So it feels safe.
But, fine, so I can say things I probably shouldn’t (if I were a known person with a large audience) why do it anyway?
Well, probably most typically I do it to blow of steam. I think all of us get into frustrating situations where being able to rant about it a bit helps dissipate the aggravation. Normally most people use friends or family for that, but I really don’t have any (or at least any who aren’t tired of listening) I just fire my rants out in the wind. I suppose I could stand on a street corner with a sign and megaphone and yell it all, but I’d probably get hauled to jail or looney bin for that.
And, it turns out, I bet unlike most bloggers I actually go back, sometimes with deliberate search, sometimes randomly, to read my own posts. It’s amusing to see myself ranting about something a decade ago that ended up with unexpected and sometimes ironical turns a decade later. IOW, strangely blogging makes for a pretty good journal.
And, to that point, strangely this blog is actually more hidden than other places I could write. Long ago I wrote a journal in spiral notebook and merely had these in a close dresser under some clothes, so guess what, somewhat in the household just doing some laundry found them and thought reading them was just fine. At another time I used to do some of this kind of writing on my computer, and then one time I walked away, with the file open and someone in my household went to my computer for some routine task and just happened to notice the file and take a long look.
So, in terms of disclosure of personal information, at least that could be embarrassing, this blog is pretty good (assuming, as I do, I access it through an incognito window and, CRITICALLY, remember to close the post and log out (have forgotten that a time or two but AFAIK with no disclosure to anyone). Of course it also means I need to do posts like this at times when I know I am alone, like now, but there I have the risk that with my declining hearing and the fact my back is to the doorway to enter the room I’m in, every now at least the fact I’m typing away gets disclosed requiring, a couple of times, little white lies about what I’m doing (I should have an expectation of privacy, so therefore any deception I do to maintain privacy seems morally OK to me).
So there you have it. Sometimes I spill my guts, maybe sometimes some stranger actually reads any of it and really I think this disclosure is effectively completely anonymous.
dailydouq 