#i make a lot of graphics but i don't post them because they're incomplete concepts

[ahsokatanoe]

Do you have a full image for your Syd/Richie header? It’s gorgeous!

hi thank you so much!! 🥹

my uploaded header is the full image 🧡 it's just a one-off edit.

oh and i just want to thank everyone who left nice comments in the tags of my posted sydrichie graphic!!! it means a lot to me <3

[darkshrimpemotions]

Some unfortunate truths about online privacy

Recently, a popular HP roleplayer was approached by a Buzzfeed employee about doing an article on their work.

After discussing with, and even polling, the larger HP roleplaying community, they decided not to go ahead with it for the sake of a large segment of the community's discomfort and concern about the potential negatives of such exposure.

Among those concerns were the privacy and safety of those in the roleplaying community. And the discourse around that revealed some deeply disturbing misconceptions about online activity that I can't stop thinking about. So, though they've already been addressed in the discourse somewhat, I'm going to address them in a little more detail.

Now, full disclosure: I am not a member of the HP roleplaying community. But I do follow a lot of them, and I greatly respect and admire their creativity, dedication, and the welcoming and supportive community they've built.

I actually wanted to stay quiet about this until the decision was made precisely because I didn't want to appear to disrespect or derail a conversation in a community of creators that I don't belong to.

But as the decision is now made, and as I AM a fandom creator (fic, meta, very occasional graphics, art, and vids), I felt now was a good time to address some things about privacy on the internet that apply far beyond any one community, site, fandom, or type of fannish activity.

The first thing you need to know about privacy on the internet: There is no privacy on the internet.

I know that sounds extreme, but I'm serious. And I will elaborate. Because it's so worrying to see how many people--younger folks especially--don't realize that any concept of online privacy is tenuous at BEST, and depends greatly on most people just...deciding not to breach the unspoken social contract.

This idea is something I grew up with, because the internet was new when I was a kid and people were more wary. But the weight of that idea seems to be far less now.

It often seems as though--despite jokes about our personal NSA agents and overwhelming real-world evidence to the contrary--the false dichotomy of "online vs. IRL" has created this dangerous idea that online spaces are isolated from meatspace and safe in a way they're really, really not.

So to be clear: Anything publicly posted online can be seen by anyone, copied or saved, modified, and reposted anywhere. Are there laws that limit acceptable uses of others' photos, information, or intellectual property? Sure.

But they're woefully incomplete and under-enforced, so unless you can afford to retain a fantastic lawyer, good luck with that. I'm sure many artists, doxxing and catfish victims, and victims of revenge porn could attest to this.

Furthermore, no site HAS to ask your permission before writing an article about whatever online thing you're involved in. Regarding the recent discourse, it is SO LUCKY that the Buzzfeed employee in question was an ethical person who loves the roleplaying community.

Because they could not have been. God knows plenty of news outlets much bigger, older, and more supposedly more "credible" than Buzzfeed have written at length about fandom before, in less than complimentary ways, without consulting us at all.

Someone could decide tomorrow to write a shallow, derogatory article about HP roleplayers (or any fannish creative community) and ask NO ONE.

They could also link to any publicly available roleplay content they wanted, and there would be precious little anyone could do about it, beyond taking their content down, making it private, and/or asking that the link be removed (which isn't a guarantee).

But here's the second thing about privacy on the internet: The internet really is forever.

Anything can be saved or screenshot, and there are whole sites solely dedicated to trolling popular social media platforms and copying their content. There's a reason it can take up to six months to do an online identity scrub: it takes that long for all the copycat/aggregate sites to remove the content, assuming they ever do.

There is also metadata to consider. Timestamps, geotags, software info, IP addresses, usernames, emails...it's all over your photos and videos. Adobe Photoshop in particular adds a ton of metadata to anything you create with it. Lots of social media sites add their own metadata as well, whenever you upload. And it's impossible to 100% stop this or guarantee you've scrubbed it all.

As if that wasn't enough...everything you put online is being archived. Not might be or could be. IS. If by no one else, by the host sites themselves, as part of their backup/failover processes. How long are those archives saved, where do they go after that period, and who has access to them? You really don't know.

We hope old backups are stored securely and disposed of promptly and carefully. But we have no way of guaranteeing that.

Finally, the third thing to know about privacy and the internet: Privacy settings are not foolproof.

Anything marked private can be hacked. Site programmers can accidentally or intentionally change privacy settings at any time, without notifying their users. They have been doing this since the inception of social media.

Legacy social media sites like Xanga and MySpace had epic privacy snafus. Facebook has fucked up their privacy settings--and thus their users--multiple times over the years. AOL once created a public profile page for its users that was opt-out instead of opt-in...meaning their previously "private" info and statuses became public without the users' consent. And Tumblr recently did this with their attempted group chat feature, which didn't take user block lists properly into account.

Even leaving programmer incompetence/indifference aside, there is no such thing as a perfectly secure system...just one whose weak points haven't been found and exploited yet. Maybe you or your favorite social media site aren't likely targets...but that is far from any kind of guarantee. All it takes is one unscrupulous jerk (or self-righteous moral crusader) with a bug up their ass about you and basic googling skills.

None of this is meant to scare anyone. It's just fact. Privacy is one of the big trade-offs we all make for access to all the good things the internet has to offer. It gives us connectedness. Information. A way to share our creative efforts, new kinds of art, and even tools to increase our ability to create. Those are all great things, but they do come at a price.

To be fair, all forms of connectedness entail some sacrifice of privacy and the inherent risk that goes with it. But on the internet it's exponentially bigger, forever, and far less in your individual control than most people think.

It's important to know that, and make a conscious, informed decision about your online activity based on it. I know in today's world it seems like we don't have a choice sometimes, but we should still know the risks, protect ourselves as much as we can, and try to be prepared for any possible fallout. Trust me, it's far better than thinking you're perfectly safe and then being blindsided.