Wrong. Tonight the Facebook identity gestapo caught on to my little caper. They won’t let me log in because, geniuses that they are, they suspect I’m not using my real identity on that account. Good job, detectives. I suspect my account got flagged because for some time I’ve been ignoring their demands to add phone numbers and more e-mail addresses to my account to make it “more secure.” Tres amusant. My data becomes more secure when I give more of it away? Uh-huh. I would hazard a guess that people who like their privacy are also more prone to pseudonyms. That’s never jived with Facebook. They want their users to cough up the data, and cough it up now. Many people willingly vomit every last detail about themselves without caring who sees. Me, not so much.

From its soulless, sterile blue and gray color scheme to the monochromatic way it categorizes all human relationships as “friends”, I’ve struggled with Facebook from the beginning. Its users — human beings the mighty Zuck referred to as “dumb fucks” — pump every detail about themselves into a system without giving a second thought to what it means. Pop quiz — did you know that hitting the “Like” button on Facebook constitutes a binding legal agreement? Turns out that South Park episode about our cavalier approach to end user license agreements wasn’t so far off the mark.

I tried putting “Loki Kitteh” back in as his new name. Tron must have stopped fighting for the users because I got another error message from Master Control:

Inauthentic Name – Temporary Block
Unfortunately, the name you entered was not approved by our system. Please wait 10 minutes and then try again.
Make sure you enter your name correctly and that it complies with our formatting guidelines. Please note that if your next attempt is also unsuccessful, your account may be disabled.

Inauthentic name? How about inauthentic service? How about creativity stifling identity police? How about there’s nothing wrong with nicknames, pseudonyms, and playing with authorial personas? If Mark Twain were still alive, would you be breaking his balls because he failed to write “Samuel Clemens” next to his Social Security Number on your signup sheet?

Beyond the problem of requiring real-life identity is the issue of what friendship is supposed to be about — enjoying yourself. Loki is pretty damn funny and interacting with my friends on his behalf is fun. FUN. Do you know what that is, Facebook, or did you miss out on that because you were too busy not being invited to parties in college? Do you even know what the Internet is for? Don’t you KNOW that it’s ruled by cats?

At the end of the day, it’s Facebook’s walled garden and if they want to shake down everyone for ID at the door I guess that’s their own affair. The problem is, I really don’t have an aternative. As sketchy as Facebook’s privacy policies are, Google’s are downright evil. Anything you give to either social network is theirs. Forever. No tap tap takebacks. But if you give it to Google+, it becomes public, able to be used by others for profit, and you lose creative control over your images and words. At least all the stuff you give to Facebook isn’t indexed by search engines. Yet.

It sucks to be sent a message by this company telling me I don’t have a place in online dialogue because having a pseudonym is more fun and comfortable for me. Guess I’m going to have to start bugging my sister for those links to her photo gallery again . . .

I read the privacy policy: let’s see . . . spam, third party spam, and more spam. Sing it with me! Spam, spam spam spam! Spam, spam, spam, spam! Once CostCo has your data, they promise (in very friendly language) to send you a dazzling array of offers from both themselves and their “partners.” Oh, and they also let third-party contractors see your data. That’s a big no thanks. I sent my friend back a message saying I’d love to see his photos of Honduras, but could he please put them in a gallery that didn’t require a login? Loss of control over my name, address, e-mail, and telephone number seemed like a pretty steep admission ticket to see some photos.

It’s a good idea to protect yourself when publishing photos online. As a rule I never upload photos of someone in a public place or tag anyone in an image without their permission. That’s their identity, not mine. I don’t have a right to finger it. But there are plenty of ways for you to add photos in an environment that protects you without asking your friends to expose themselves.

The cameras will not only be on — they will snap a photo of each and every person who sits down at a computer terminal. This part of the news article left me a bit chilled:

At the Mingluo internet café in the Dongcheng district about 60 people were ensconced in front of terminals. Most were chatting online or watching films. The manager affected a lack of concern about the regulation, saying that he had introduced the policy a month ago. “I think most people don’t mind. We explain to them that this will not have any impact on them,” he said.

Yeah. It won’t have any effect. Until the government censors come to take you away because you had the nerve to attempt to access Wikipedia. Why would they bother recording the information if they didn’t intend to use it?

China’s disgusting policies against its own people have been condoned for too long. It’s very disheartening that — still — big companies like Google are willing to compromise the values of openness and freedom that are at the very heart of what the Internet is. Online life is a difficult thing to contain, but China’s devoted enough energy to manage it — for now. My only hope is that a certain segment of the Chinese population becomes affluent and educated, open source developers can create tools that allow them to sneak past censorship and surveillance and break some of the psychological and intellectual imprisonment of the inhabitants of Eastasia.

Not all sites track data, but most do in some form. Measuring web traffic is critical from the bandwidth and billing side of the Web, and it’s also important for people running sites to know who’s visiting and why. Before this creeps the lay Web user out too much, think of it this way: when you walk into a department store, you hear a “ding dong” as an electronic counter logs your presence. Shopkeepers want to know which are the busy days, or if changing a window display encouraged more purchases. That’s helpful data that helps the show owner and the customer get what they want.

Likewise, when your IP address is logged and tracked, it’s usually not because anybody cares at all about who you are on a personal level. But Amazon wants to know which page layout sells you things more efficiently, and the DMV wants to know the best ways to make useful information inaccessible. Bloggers want to know how to ban spammers peddling fake Viagra and Xanax.

So there’s no cause for paranoia, but be aware when you surf. I can see you. Yes, you. Luckily for you, I don’t pay any attention to metrics unless I find something unusual, malicious, or inappropriate going on. This is a tiny little site on the geeky outer rim of the blogosphere. But that don’t mean there ain’t riff-raff who ain’t welcome here, and I’m not above banning IP addresses if it’s warranted. Most web users are responsible and conscientious, so you’re just another ding-dong as far as I’m concerned. Wait, that came out wrong.

The point is that there’s still a long way to go for the general public in understanding that the Web is a dynamic, two-way, interactive portal, not some kind of static source of pages that are simply read and not responded to. Some people want to exist in the online realm with utter privacy, but this just can’t be. Not only is it technically impossible, but it’s not desirable. Total anonymity also means total lack of responsibility.

The price of entering a public realm such as a city sidewalk is that people can see what you do. The Internet is no different. But before that creeps you out or ruffles your feathers, realize that nobody is going to care as long as you’re behaving yourself. In a public shop, you don’t bother paying attention to the person next to you, unless they happen to be buying a particularly egregious blouse, carrying a screaming brat, or shoplifting. The Internet is no different; it’s merely another realm of the public sphere. So mind your manners, and don’t be surprised when you leave footprints along the path you walk.

The mainstream media is constantly reporting on the negative aspects of the Internet– that it is filled with pedophiles after you children, that it is lurking with identity theives after your social security number, and that it will fry your hard drive with a million Trojan horses. But luckily the Internet is also the perfect way to reach out and find people who share your passions and interests. When you plug into your clan of people, it’s amazing the lengths they’ll go to to help you.

It didn’t help that he was the dumbest car thief in Canada, but the arrest of Jamie Jacobsen is proof that most folks out there are law abiding people who want a decent world for all of us to live in. Within 72 hours, a rare tricked out sports car was stolen, spotted, and recovered, and the thief arrested, all thanks to bloggers and forum friends. The police can only do so much. They’re shackled by procedure and don’t have a high degree of expertise for spotting a specific kind of car, or even enough time to do it. A detective is just one person, and they can only do so much. So when the car’s owner, Shaun Ironside, turned to the Canadian sports car community, he suddenly found a posse of friends at his side in the hunt. Within a day of posting a plea for help, a friendly Netizen snapped a photo of the thief in the car. A day after that, his Facebook profile and Google maps to his house were plastered all over the Internet.

Like the case of evil mom Lori Drew who tortured Megan Meier to death using MySpace, this proves that the Internet is a powerful tool to expose the bad guys in our society and help bring them to justice. Luckily this kind of overwhelming reaction generally only occurs when there’s a compelling case– like death or grand theft auto. There are detractors who complain that this is a violation of privacy or even vigilante justice. My response is that it may be vigilante, but it’s justice.

So I say saddle up. Let’s round up some outlaws. Our camera phones and blogs can be the virtual eyes and ears that protect our real lives.