Opinion Poll
I have had a counter on this blog since its inception. I use it for two purposes. First, to inflate my already humongus ego, and secondly, to see if QoH has found this blog. The second one is actually the primary reason the counter is here. However, this means I have to track IP addresses of visitors. I only scan through my log to look for QoH’s and J’s IPs. I never run “whois” queries on any IP I dont recogonize. So as far as I am concerned I am being ethical about this. People who wish to remain anonymous, remain so.
Recently however I have started reading a few blogs that have trackers on them regularly. To circumvent most of the trackers, I read them through RSS aggregators. I near always resist the temptation to comment on any of the posts for the fear of having my IP logged. This got me thinking as to how many people (if any) have the same concerns about the counter here. Hence this poll.
I have created an anon. poll on a 3rd party website. This way even those who read it using RSS feaders and do not really want to disclose their IPs can have a say. I will keep the poll open till April 30th 2005. I will really appreciate if you could take 30 secs to fill this out.
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By Zelda, April 23, 2005 @ 12:33 am
wow, do you really think QoH will find your blog? hmm … wait, i think i remember something about this. did he find out you had a blog?
By Hulai, April 23, 2005 @ 4:53 am
Hmmm I took it! For influence reasons I shall keep my vote confidential! Wow I wouldnt have ever thought about ethics of a tracker!
By Pseudosanity, April 23, 2005 @ 5:33 am
Oh ya.. he is a pretty cheeky guy… he found my last blog without even me mentioning it to him or anyone in school. The worst part was I was blogging under my real identity, so no escaping it. He had actually been reading it regularly and inadvertantly mentioned something to me that I hadnt discussed with anyone. Luckily for me it was one of those rare moments where I actually paid attention to what he was saying.
Hulai, incase you didnt know, I am a MAJOR privacy freak. You have no clue to how much information about you is already being mined. For example did you know that the frequent buyer cards you use at grocery chains track all your purchase patterns, and people send you direct mail based on that. For example if you bought a whole bunch of comfort food you will notice the advertisements for depression and weight reduction will increase in your junk mail. But not all data mining is bad, just most of it is.
By Zelda, April 23, 2005 @ 1:59 pm
holy crap. i can’t believe your sup would read your blog. that’s too bad. anyway, you have every right to keep an eye on who’s checking out your blog. it’s your blog, it’s your business.
By Pseudosanity, April 23, 2005 @ 7:16 pm
QoH is my advisor, and J is my sup at internship, and both are equally capable of doing it.
While it is true that this is my blog, it is equally valid to say that the identity of the visitors is theirs, and I dont have any right to know it without their permission. How would you feel if you had to show your ID everytime you boarded a public transport? Oh wait, we already do that with flights.
By RageyOne, April 24, 2005 @ 1:25 am
Interesting post. I have a tool on my blog which tracks how many people are visiting my blog. Each week I get an e-mail telling me stuff. I rarely paid attention to it. Then I noticed on some of the blogs I was reading people were commenting about the google search terms that people would input and their blog would turn up.
I didn’t know or couldn’t figure out how they knew that information until I further investigated that weekly e-mail I was receiving. I then realized what sort of information that little tool was gathering.
And the thing is, I discovered that bit of information and I haven’t gone back to it. I guess, it really doesn’t matter to me how someone finds my blog or where they proceed to from my blog. The terms they use or their location is not really of interest to me.
I think I have a fairly anonymous blog. If someone figures me out then so be it. I’m trying my best not to offend anyone or say anything out of turn.
If having the counter on your blog makes you comfortable then so be it. If the people who read your blog want to remain anonymous (or try to) then I think they should take the steps needed (using an aggregator) to do so.
By Kate the Peon, April 24, 2005 @ 2:54 am
I think it all depends on what you do with ‘logging’ the IP addresses. I use mine because I like to know where my readers come from, and whose blogs I read that read mine, and any new blogs that have found mine. I think people should know by now that if they read a blog, they can be identified.
By Hulai, April 24, 2005 @ 4:56 am
Ha I knew there was a reason I didnt have one of those cards! Wow!