Older blog entries for Skud (starting at number 153)

Rock ‘n’ roll makes you horny

Today was my first day of school: the Certificate IV in Sound Production, leading (next year) to the Advanced Diploma in same, at NMIT. It’s the next step on a journey that started in January last year, when Google decided I wasn’t their kind of nerd, and it started to become clear what their plans were with regard to Google Plus and names (definitely not their kind of nerd, since I believe people have the right to control their own identity). I decided to quit and do something else. I was recently going through my (locked) Dreamwidth posts from that time, and it’s funny how quickly I made the decision to change careers, even though I didn’t announce it publicly til May.

Anyway, today was my first day on campus for classes. I’m studying at the Fairfield campus, which is the old infectious diseases hospital. The heritage listed Federation buildings, well-groomed grounds, and natural light in the classrooms are fantastic, but the isolation and lack of lunch options less so. I caught the tram/bus down there today, but from tomorrow I’m going to be biking along Merri Creek.

The morning was spent in orientation sessions, which were just as boring as you might expect (I took my knitting), then the afternoon in going over the student handbook and assessment criteria, followed by our first class in Occupational Health and Safety. My cohort is approximately 25 students, of whom five are women (a better ratio, I note, than any tech job I’ve had in the last decade or so). Most are recent school leavers; among the “mature” students, I am apparently the most mature (ha!), being the only one who can remember the introduction of CDs in the early 1980s. Only a handful of students were born before 1990.

The course is vocational, which means it focuses on practical applications and only gives you the theory you need to get the job done. I have about 18 hours of classes a week, spread across four days (Fridays are free), and we’ve been told that we generally won’t get homework or assessment tasks that need to be done outside of our scheduled time. I’ve been explaining TAFE to my US friends as “community college crossed with DeVry” but in fact the curriculum is closer to DeVry; there are no general education credits, and no classes outside of our vocational focus. There’s also very little attention paid (as far as I can tell so far) to the sort of cultural analysis or free-ranging ideas-based discussion that I tend to get from the mostly university-educated nerds I hang out with.

For example, one of the instructors today, when describing an instruction unit called “Implement copyright arrangements”, stated outright that “copyright is the only way people in the music industry can make money”.

(Pause for all my copyright reformist friends to pound their heads on their desks.)

Another thing I heard today, from our OHS instructor, is that rock and roll makes you horny. Well, sure, I’ll buy that. But he said it’s because the sacculus (part of the inner ear) responds in a certain way to vibrations over 90dB (the volume at which rock and roll is typically played), provoking an erotic response.

Is this something that’s widely believed? All I found when googling “sacculus erotic response” was a scam trying to sell “Pherotones” (I won’t link), a sort of ring tone for your phone that makes you (the default heterosexual male customer, of course) irresistable to girls, based on magical frequencies that vibrate the sacculus in a certain way. Classy.

Google Scholar, however, turned up the work of Dr Neil Todd of Manchester University, who published papers such as Vestibular responses to loud dance music: A physiological basis of the “rock and roll threshold” (1999) and Evidence for a behavioral significance of saccular acoustic sensitivity in humans (2001). Their research was reported in New Scientist, which summarised it as:

Because the vestibular system has a connection to the hypothalamus, the part of the brain responsible for drives like hunger, sex and hedonistic responses, Todd believes that people might be getting a pleasurable buzz when they listen to music–which could explain why music has developed into such a cultural force. This buzz may mimic the thrills people get from swings and bungee jumping, where motion stimulates the balance centre.

But there is a proviso: the sacculus only appears to be sensitive to loud volumes–above 90 decibels. Despite this, crooners could also love their own singing because sound levels in the larynx have been estimated to be as high as 130 decibels. “It’s bloody loud in there,” Todd says.

[...]

“The distribution of frequencies that are typical in rock concerts and at dance clubs almost seem designed to stimulate the sacculus. They are absolutely smack bang in this range of sensitivity,” Todd says. Large groups of people singing or chanting together, such as a choir or a crowd at a sporting event, could also trigger the mechanism, he adds.

I haven’t read the full papers (ahem, mainstream academic publishing prevents spread of knowledge, blah blah copyright blah blah revolution blah blah first up against the wall), but as far as I can tell, the experiments involved getting a small number of subjects, taping electrodes to their necks, then playing blips of noise at certain volumes and frequencies and watching their neck tension. The neck tension demonstrates that the sounds are affecting the sacculus. What’s the connection between that and pleasure, though? Well, the participants are “required to rate the pleasantness of the stimuli on a nine-point scale”. So there is no connection between the two that’s not mediated via a subjective judgement. Oh… kay.

So I guess if you believe that the sacculus response and the pleasure are connected, that that pleasure is necessarily sexual, and that 10ms single-frequency blips are equivalent to, say, seeing AC/DC play live, then sure, rock and roll makes you horny. I could have told you that, but I probably would have mentioned something about low lights, sexually oriented lyrics, crowds of sweaty people moving against each other, and alcoholic disinhibition. Still, it was a lecture about hearing and hearing loss, not about cultural context, so that’s beside the point.

In passing, while looking for this stuff, I also found (in this article) what is possibly the greatest “no shit, Sherlock!” statement I’ve seen so far in the study of rock and roll: “Studies suggest that there is an increase in alcohol consumption in environments with loud music (van de Goor, 1990).” Apart from muttering “correlation mumble mumble causation” under my breath, it does occur to me that the field research for that one must have been fun.

Tomorrow I have classes in repairing and maintaining audio equipment (yay electronics) and editing dialogue (boo Pro Tools). I suspect once we pick up the pace and really get to work I’ll enjoy it more than I did today’s administrivia. Still, I suspect I’m going to have a challenging time focusing on the vocational skills that actually form the curriculum, and saving my semantic nitpicking, cultural critique, and plans for the downfall of the RIAA for more appropriate forums. Wish me luck.

Syndicated 2012-02-13 13:06:59 from InfotropismInfotropism | Infotropism

Go to the show (a resolution)

I’m overdue posting about my New Year’s resolution, but better late than never I suppose. (Good thing I didn’t resolve to blog regularly, I guess.)

I’ve had good luck in recent years with vague resolutions that attempt to adjust my attitude. I think it was 2007 or 2008 when I said “never turn down an adventure”, and 2011′s was “be an artist”. Each of them requires a lot of words to explain what they really mean to me (tl;dr: it’s complicated) but they worked well for me at the time. Anyway, in that vein, this year’s resolution, inspired by Pam and especially this post (but also, just everything she’s posted in the last year about the shows she’s been to), is:

The obvious point is to go to more live music shows, but it’s also an attempt to get off my arse and go out and do things rather than sitting around at home, as is all too easy.

To help with the live music part of it, I’ve actually set up a mailing list with some local (Melbourne, Australia) friends to plan what shows I/we want to go to. If you like live music, are local, and want to be on the list, then let me know. I may occasionally post upcoming gigs here, too.

Another thing I wanted to post about was this:

I got it last Thursday, more or less on a whim, and it’s all tangled up with last year’s resolution and this year’s.

A week ago this Saturday — within days of Google’s hiring process screwing me over, and the beginning of what later became known as the #nymwars breaking out inside Google (yeah, that was quite a week) — I decided I was going to quit working at the Big G and study sound engineering. I didn’t announce it til May, but I started working in that direction immediately. Within a couple of weeks, I had rocked up to 924 Gilman Street and introduced myself to the head of sound and asked to be taken on as a trainee. I worked my first show there on February 10th, and worked an average of about one show a week, at first under supervision and eventually solo, til I finished up in August before returning to Australia. My last show there was a Black Fag gig. They’d been the first band I ever saw at Gilman, and they were the last too. A fitting conclusion.

Working at Gilman was without a doubt one of the best experiences of my life. From the first time I saw the rules inside the front door, to the experience of working huge shows and meeting some of the nicest people I’ve known in ages, to — most importantly, I think — the opportunity it gave me to leave the office on a Friday afternoon, get on a trans-bay bus, and do something awesome and in-the-moment and most of all loud. No matter how tired or cranky or outright depressed I was, by the end of a show there my shoulders had come down from up around my ears, and I could always stagger home afterwards and sleep soundly, knowing that I’d done my job as well as I could, and that once the show was over and the equipment powered down, I was free of responsibility til next time.

I miss Gilman a heap. I miss the people (especially my sound booth buddies), and I miss the bands and the kids who worked the front door and the graffiti in the toilets and the moshpits and I even miss that frigging stand for the kick drum mic that always fell apart no matter how much you duct taped it.

So yeah, the ink’s to remember my time there, and to commemorate the year I stopped being an open source geek and started being a professional music wonk, and to remind me (if I’m ever feeling like I don’t want to leave the house) how good it felt to go to shows every week and be a part of that.

Syndicated 2012-01-11 10:17:07 from InfotropismInfotropism | Infotropism

Written? Kitten!

Seems like everyone around me is either doing NaNoWriMo or is in the throes of fannish holiday exchanges. I refuse to make any writing commitments at present, but that doesn’t mean I’m not sympathetic to those that have them. And so…

This afternoon, my housemate Emily and I made Written? Kitten! It’s more or less along the lines of Write Or Die, only without the AUGH AUGH OH NO AAUUUUGHHHH DIEEE!!!!, and with more cuteness and fluff.

It was a quick hack in an afternoon, and we only have the browsers we have at home, so if you find problems with it please let us know.

ETA: source code, if anyone cares.

Syndicated 2011-11-13 08:56:49 from InfotropismInfotropism | Infotropism

Announcement: I’ve changed my name to Alex Bayley

I’m not sure how to post this in a way that’s not awkward, so here it is: as of last week, I have legally changed my name to “Alex Bayley”.

The recent Google+ names debacle was the catalyst, but not the underlying reason, for this change. When Google insisted that I use my previous wallet name, “Kirrily Robert”, on its services, it made me realise how much I didn’t want to. I’m not strongly attached to “Kirrily” as a name. Among other problems, it’s hard to spell, hard to pronounce, and an all-round nuisance when working internationally and in the public sphere as I do. And more importantly, I don’t feel like it’s me — whatever that means.

Throughout my life I’ve chosen and used a variety of other names, of which Skud is the best known and longest lasting. In relation to Google+, a lot of people asked me, “Why don’t you just change your legal name to Skud?” The problem is, Skud isn’t an easy name to use offline. Like Kirrily, it needs to be repeated and spelled and explained each time I use it, and there are many offline circumstances where I simply wouldn’t be comfortable using it. Even online, I’ve come to realise that being legally mononymous can be rather fraught (just ask Sai or Stilgherrian). So, “Skud” is not the solution.

As I worked through this problem, I realised that my return to Australia, going back to school, and picking up a new career would mean introducing myself to hundreds of new people. I didn’t want to introduce myself as “Kirrily”, nor as “Skud”. The whole situation started to get me down, until I realised that I could choose something else to appear on my legal paperwork, school enrolment, and so forth, while keeping “Skud” as my name online and in the tech community.

To cut a long story short, for a range of reasons I chose the name “Alex” as my new given name. As there are already a range of Alex or Alec Robert or Roberts in the music and technology industries, I switched my surname to Bayley, a name belonging to an uncle, aunt, and cousins to whom I’m quite close. And, just for good measure, “Skud” is now my legal middle name. I figured it might come in handy.

I expect that most of my friends will continue to call me “Skud”, so it should be business as usual for many/most of you. Almost all my online contact details remain the same, however if for some reason you have my old gmail address you should know that I’m retiring it; please use skud@infotrope.net instead (should work fine for sharing docs, chat, etc). When meeting me face to face, please feel free to call me either Skud or Alex, not Kirrily.

Addendum for those who are interested: to change your name legally in the state of Victoria, Australia, where I was born and now reside, you simply submit a form and payment to the Registry of Births, Deaths, and Marriages. You are issued with an amended birth certificate showing your name change within 20 working days, or 5 working days if you pay the priority processing fee (which I did).

Syndicated 2011-09-20 10:10:05 from InfotropismInfotropism | Infotropism

Status update

Just spamming this to a few places, apologies if you see it multiple times in your feeds.

I’ve landed in Melbourne and I’m staying with a friend and starting to settle in. There’s lots of paperwork to re-establish myself (phone, bank, other bank, Medicare… ugh, so much.) And then there’s been the beginning of househunting and meeting up with friends I haven’t seen in years. Even after recovering from the jetlag, I’ve been pretty busy and stressed and I’ve got some writing deadlines this week as well, so I’m a bit fried. I’m expecting this state of friedness to continue for at least a week, and most likely for the rest of the month.

So, this is just a post to say, yes, I’m in Melbourne now, and I’m sorry if I don’t have time to chat and hang out online. I really appreciate everyone’s thoughtfulness in pinging me to ask if I’m here and if I’m settled, but I’m getting a little flooded, so hopefully this will serve as an answer to many of you.

Syndicated 2011-09-08 09:29:00 from InfotropismInfotropism | Infotropism

Skud vs. Google+, round two

Today, two weeks since I was first suspended from Google+ and just over a week since I was blackholed in their so-called customer support system, I submitted a fresh request for review via the form linked on my suspended profile page.

The name I was using: Kirrily “Skud” Robert

Evidence I provided: links to about a dozen websites calling me by that name, or simply by “Skud”, including GitHub, Wikipedia, Ohloh, the Geek Feminism blog, and LinkedIn (which has the Kirrily “Skud” Robert variant). I also linked a news article in Wired that referred to me as Skud.

Just a few minutes after I submitted the form, I got this from Neil @ Google Profiles Support, along with a shiny new ticket number:

Hi,
Thank you for contacting us with regard to our review of the name you are trying to use in your Google Profile. After review of your appeal, we have determined that the name you want to use violates our Community Standards. Please avoid the use of any unusual characters. For example, numbers, symbols, or obscure punctuation might not be allowed.

You can review our name guidelines at http://www.google.com/support/+/bin/answer.py?answer=1228271

If you edit your name to comply with our policies in the future, please respond to this email so that we can re-review your profile.

Sincerely,
Neil
The Google Profiles Support Team

I replied with:

I have removed the quotation marks. Could you please re-review?

Again, very soon, I received:

Hi,
Most users choose to use their First and Last names in the common name field in order to avoid any future name violation issues. All pseudonyms or nick names can be placed in the other names field below the common name field.

Sincerely,
Neil
The Google Profiles Support Team

“Most users” do, do they? Could it be because, as senji pointed out on Twitter, they get their accounts suspended if they don’t?

(In passing: how annoying is it that they can’t tell you if there are multiple problems in their first contact? Instead you have to go back and forth, as they keep disclosing additional rules and requirements one by one.)

In any case, I wrote:

“Most users” may choose to do that, but for me, it won’t help, because I am not commonly known by my first and last legal names.

“Skud” is the name by which I am primarily known. I am compromising here, and trying to come up with something you’ll accept, by including my birth name at all. Few people on Google+, or indeed anywhere, know me by my birth name. I am known as Skud by professional colleagues, friends, lovers, people I live with, almost everyone. Many of them do not recognise me if I use “Kirrily Robert”.

Google previously denied my request to use the name that I’m commonly known by (i.e. Skud), which I thought conformed to your policy of “use the name that your friends, family, and colleagues know you by”, so I am trying to come up with something that still makes me identifiable to my social network, but meets your requirements.

I beg you to reconsider your decision. My social network as “Kirrily Robert” is weak and irrelevant, but as Skud I am well known. Perhaps not as well known as Lady Gaga or 50 Cent, but still moderately famous. I need Google+ to recognise that Skud *is* my common name and allow me to use it in a way that is visible on my posts and comments, not just on my profile (which people won’t generally see).

Yours, respectfully,

Skud

That was at 3:52pm, US west coast time. I know that Google has TGIF from 4-ish onwards, and that I shouldn’t expect a response after that time. From what I hear, though, if Neil went to TGIF he would have seen a question about my case appear on the Google Moderator system that’s used for Q&A, and would have seen Larry Page skip right past it, refusing to respond. Stay classy, Google management.

Syndicated 2011-08-06 01:04:01 from InfotropismInfotropism | Infotropism

Google+ names policy, explained

I’ve been talking to anyone and everyone about what’s going on with Google+’s names policy, and thought it was well past time to write up my best understanding of what’s going on. I was going to say “I’m no expert”, but actually, I probably know more about this than just about anyone outside of Google (and perhaps more than them), and the Googlers aren’t speaking. So, here’s what I know.

The following information is gathered from user reports, public statements by Google+ staff, and a variety of unofficial/backchannel discussions I’ve been involved in. I’m not going to cite every assertion here, because many of them were given to me privately (eg. by affected users who forwarded their communications with support), so you’re just going to have to take it on trust that I’m not pulling this out of my arse.

In any case, I hope this provides some clarity as to what’s happening, and helps with our ongoing discussions around the G+ “nymwars”.

Table of contents

• The policy as written
• The policy as implemented
  • What triggers suspension
  • Stage 1 review
  • How you know your account is suspended
  • What services are affected
  • Are people losing access to all Google services?
  • Submitting your profile for Stage 2review
  • What it takes to get your profile restored
  • What won’t get you restored
  • They really want government ID
  • Profile reinstatement
  • The black hole
  • Re-suspension
  • Other mis-communications
• Updates etc.

The policy as written

Google+’s Content policy, aka “Community standards”, says:

13. Display Name

To help fight spam and prevent fake profiles, use the name your friends, family or co-workers usually call you. For example, if your full legal name is Charles Jones Jr. but you normally use Chuck Jones or Junior Jones, either of those would be acceptable.

Additionally, on the page Your name and Google Profiles they say:

Use your full first and last name in a single language.
If you use your full name, you’ll help people find you online and connect with the right person. Note that professional titles such as “Dr.” or “Prof.” aren’t allowed in the first or last name fields. If you’re referred to by more than one name, just choose one, and place the others in the “Other names” section of your profile.

Avoid unusual characters in your name.
When you create your profile, our system will check the name you submitted for unusual characteristics. For example, numbers, symbols, or obscure punctuation might not be allowed.

Your profile and name must represent one person.
Google Profiles doesn’t support profiles for couples or groups of people. Additionally, you can’t create a profile for a non-person entity such as a pet or business. Google may continue to allow existing profiles that don’t meet these criteria, as long as the profile names are unchanged.

Don’t use the name of another individual.
Impersonation is a serious issue. Pretending to be someone else could cause your profile to be deleted.

The difference between the two statements (one: “use the name you are commonly known by”; two: “… as long as it has exactly two parts in a single language, etc.”), and the problems with assuming that people are known only by one identifier to everyone they communicate with, are subjects for another post. I’ll just note that the language as written is not non-problematic, but I’ve included it here for reference.

The policy as implemented

What triggers suspension

Profile are flagged for review when one of the following triggers occurs:

1. Another user flags a profile for any form of abuse, including but not limited to “fake profile”.
2. A user changes the name in their profile, and the name they change to contains something that trips the automatic flagging system.

Note that “legacy” names — those carried across from profiles that predate Google+, or which were created very early in Google+’s public availability, seem to be “grandfathered” into the system, and don’t seem to be checked unless reported.

If you change your profile name, the following things seem to trigger the automatic flagging system:

• Mononymity, i.e. having only one name (and having just a dot, or similar, in the “last name” field).
• “Unusual characters”
  • Actually unusual characters, like a heart symbol (&heart;).
  • Punctuation marks, including quotation marks, parentheses, and possibly even hyphens and apostrophes.
• Unusual capitalisation (including capitals appearing within a name, as in McWhatever)
• Spaces in either part of your name, for instance “Marie Claire” as a first name.
• Name using more than one character set, such as a Hong Kong user who includes an English-style first name in the Latin character set and a Chinese-style surname in the Chinese character set.
• Certain words, possibly including profanity, names of famous figures or deities, etc.
• Professional titles such as Dr., Prof., etc.
• Suffixes such as III or Jr.

The above is an incomplete list.

Stage 1 review

Once a profile is flagged as possibly violating the standards, it goes through a very basic review by a human (which I will call Stage 1 review — note this is not an official term, just what I’m calling it for convenience. The people involved in this are dealing with high volumes, are not well trained, and appear to have been instructed to err on the side of suspension of there is any doubt. They look briefly at a name, and if they think it is in violation, they will suspend the account.

In addition to the aforementioned things that can trigger an automatic flag, we’ve also seen the following types of names suspended presumably based on other users’ reports of abuse leading to Stage 1 review:

• Names where both parts look like a given name, eg. “Blake Ross”
• Names from other non-Western/non-WASP/etc cultures, eg. “Mohammed —” and Native American names
• Names belonging to celebrities (Ariana Huffington, William Shatner) presumably thought to be impersonating the celebrities

In short, anything that “looks weird” to the poorly-trained operators working through thousands of flagged profiles may be suspended.

How you know your account is suspended

You will receive no notification by email or otherwise. Your Google+ homepage (i.e. your “stream”) will appear as normal. The symptoms of a suspended account are:

• You can’t post anything, or comment. (Error message: “There was a problem saving your post. Please try again.”)
• Your profile page has a message on it saying that you are suspended (see image below).

Your profile is suspended. After reviewing your profile, we determined that the name you provided violates our Community Standards. If you believe this profile has been suspended in error, please provide us with additional information via this form, and we will review your profile again.

What services are affected

When your account is suspended, the following are affected:

• Your Google Profile page will return a 404
• You will not be able to post or comment on G+
• You will not be able to post or comment on Buzz
• You will not be able to share posts in Google Reader
• You won’t be able to +1 anything on third-party websites
• Many/most features of Picasa will be unavailable
• Google Groups will not show your profile information and you will receive a warning to that effect

Additionally, by not having access go Google+, you will be at a relative disadvantage with respect to Google Search results.

Are people losing access to all Google services?

Some people have reported losing access to all logged-in Google services including email, calendar, docs, even Android phone features. This seems to occur when an account is suspended for supposedly-more-serious Terms of Service violations, however, people like GrrlScientist have experienced this and have no reason to believe they violated anything other than the names policy.

This was claimed to be a “bug” and we were told that they would fix it. Here’s what Google’s VP of Product, Bradley Horowitz, said on July 25th:

MYTH: Not abiding by the Google+ common name policy can lead to wholesale suspension of one’s entire Google account.

When an account is suspended for violating the Google+ common name standards, access to Gmail or other products that don’t require a Google+ profile are not removed. Please help get the word out: if your Google+ Profile is suspended for not using a common name, you won’t be able to use Google services that require a Google+ Profile, but you’ll still be able to use Gmail, Docs, Calendar, Blogger, and so on. (Of course there are other Google-wide policies (e.g. egregious spamming, illegal activity, etc) that do apply to all Google products, and violations of these policies could in fact lead to a Google-wide suspension.)

The frequency of these incidents seems to have slowed in the last week, but some accounts in this situation have not been restored, so this is still an issue.

Submitting your profile for Stage 2 review

Once you’ve realised that your account has been suspended, you can submit a request for review, which I will call Stage 2 review to distinguish it from the earlier, non-interactive review of flagged profiles.

Our Community Standards play an important role in insuring a positive experience for everyone using Google Profiles. As part of our standards to help fight spam and prevent fake profiles, please use the name that your friends, family, or co-workers usually call you. [...] If you believe that we have mistakenly suspended your profile for having an unauthentic name, please fill out the form below.

The form asks for:

• Name (required)
• Email (required)
• Profile URL (required)
• Photo ID (optional): “Attach a copy of your ID with your name and photo clearly visible. You can block out other personal information. Your ID will only be used to verify your name and will be deleted after review.”
• Links on the web (optional): “Please provide us with a link to a reputable website where you are referred to by this name. Examples include Facebook, LinkedIn, a school or university student directory, or a news article.”

What it takes to get your profile restored

As far as I am aware, the following will result in having your profile restored fairly promptly:

1. Your name is a simple, Western-style two part name, eg. Jane Smith and,
2. You submit your government ID that shows exactly the same name, or a close approximation of it, or,
3. You submit a link to a Facebook or LinkedIn profile that shows exactly the same name as you use on Google+, or a close approximation of it.

No other combination of factors is guaranteed (or even likely) to get your profile restored promptly.

(Note: I have not yet heard of any successful cases of people using a school directory or news article to challenge suspension, so cannot say that it will necessarily work.)

What won’t get you restored

The following situations will not get your profile promptly restored, but rather, will most likely lead to (at best) back-and-forth with support and (at worst) refusal to reinstate your account:

• You have a name which is not a simple, Western-style two-part name. For instance, the legally mononymous Sai and the unusually named 3ric Johanson, both of whose names appear on their ID, had trouble getting it accepted by support.
• You have a nickname, pen name, or other “aka” which you use more commonly than your legal name, but which doesn’t appear on your government ID, nor on Facebook or LinkedIn. No amount of documentation of the fact that you use the name in daily life and are known by it by the majority of your acquaintance will suffice.
  • Exception: major celebrities such as Lady Gaga, 50 Cent, T-Pain, and Soulja Boy seem to be exempted from this.
  • Exception: a small handful of non-famous people seem to have managed to get exceptions through direct contact through friends at Google, but this route has dried up since the mass suspensions of July 20-somethingth.
• A Facebook or LinkedIn profile that does not match closely based on the first/last name. For instance if you are “Skud .” on Google+, and “Kirrily Robert (Skud)” on Facebook, that is not considered sufficient match.
  • Match is based on only on first/last name, not “aka” or other names shown.
  • The URL of your Facebook profile page doesn’t count for anything either.

The following types of evidence are documented as having been refused by Google Profiles Support:

• Accounts on social networking or blogging sites other than Facebook or LinkedIn (eg. Twitter, LiveJournal).
• Publications under the name you use (eg. links to a book on Amazon or to major/mainstream websites that have published you under that name).
• Public appearances under the name you use (eg. conference speakers who appear under that name in conference proceedings).
• Credits under that name for musical works, film and television, etc.
• Testimonials from employers, parents, cohabitants, or anyone else who knows you by that name, regardless of the number or sincerity of them.

They really want government ID

Attempts to prove that you are using “the name you are known by” by any means other than those listed (as “optional” and “examples”) on the review form will be met with a response insisting that you send government ID:

Thank you for contacting us with regard to the name used in your Google Profile. We have reviewed your appeal and need more information in order to verify that the name entered [whatever] is your common name.

Please reply to this email with a copy of your government issued ID, which we will dispose of after review. Once we receive this information we can review your appeal and come to a final decision.

(emphasis mine)

So in short, although government ID is listed as “optional”, attempts to use anything other than a limited handful of types of evidence will result in them insisting on government ID.

On July 29th, Google+ community manager, Natalie Villalobos, wrote in comments here:

In this case, +aestetix aestetix is correct: providing a government ID is an optional part of the Common Names process and our reviewer is incorrect when he says that he needs a government issued ID to confirm the name. We are adjusting our process to prevent confusion about this in the future.

However, many accounts are still suspended and people are still being asked to provide government ID.

Profile reinstatement

If your profile is reinstated, you will receive an email that says:

Thank you for contacting us with regard to the name you want to use with your Google Profile. After further review, we have determined that your name is within our Community Standards policy. Thank you for your patience while we reviewed your profile name.

(emphasis mine)

Your profile and access to all Google+ and related features should be immediately restored.

The black hole

Certain questions or behaviours can land you in the “black hole”, where support refuses to communicate with you in any way. These include:

• Refusing to give Government ID when prompted, or asking why your other evidence was not accepted.
• Refusing to rename your account to what they think it should be. If they think your “common” name is Foo Bar, but you continue to insist that you are primarily known as Baz.
• Any repeated contact, after about three back-and-forth iterations.
• Any request to escalate to a support supervisor.
• Any rudeness or incivility whatsoever, including frustrated snarkiness.

Due to the nature of the black hole, it’s hard to tell exactly what gets you put there, but the above seem to be common factors.

Re-suspension

If your name is finally approved and your profile reinstated, you are not out of the woods. No flag is set saying “this name is approved”, and you may be re-suspended at any moment.

Other mis-communications

Support may claim that you have:

• Changed the name on your profile since they last looked at it
• Deleted your profile

… when you have done no such thing.

Updates etc.

I’m hoping to keep this updated with the my understanding of what’s going on. If you know of anything I’ve missed, or have other examples, please get in touch.

Syndicated 2011-08-04 23:53:30 from InfotropismInfotropism | Infotropism

An update on my Google Plus suspension

I’ve been updating this post as I hear anything from Google Profiles Support, most recently three days ago (Thursday 28th July). However, that post’s getting long, and I keep having people ask me what’s going on, or why I don’t do X or haven’t I considered Y, so I thought I’d post a summary/update.

The current status is:

• My account is still suspended — nine days and counting.
• They won’t accept my evidence that I am called “Skud” in daily life, and have asked to see my government ID instead.
• As far as I can tell, they want me to change my name on their service to “Kirrily Robert”, with “Skud” in the nickname field on my “about” page. This is not acceptable to me, as “Skud” — the common name by which most people know me — would not show anywhere on my posts.
• I don’t want to change to just “Kirrily Robert” as that would confuse many of my friends. However, I am willing to change to a hybrid (eg. Kirrily “Skud” Robert) as long as “Skud” shows somewhere on my posts and comments. (My name is not a true pseudonym, but a long-standing and widely-used nickname, so unlike many, I don’t have privacy concerns about disclosing the name on my government ID.)
• In fact, a few days ago I actually edited my profile to show Kirrily “Skud” Robert and enquired whether this is acceptable. They have not responded, and do not appear to have reviewed it.
• In my email to them, I said that if the formatting on “Skud” (with quote marks) bothered them, I would like to hear their suggestions on more acceptable formatting. They aren’t answering.
• After a week of no resolution, I attempted to escalate by Cc’ing my support emails to relevant staff within Google. There was no response whatsoever, and pointed silence from a good friend who works as a user advocate on G+ identity issues, which leads me to believe that staff have been instructed not to speak on the issue, or not to respond to me, or both.

Here’s what I want from Google, in order of immediacy:

• A meaningful, non-form-letter response to my support request.
• A solution which allows me to show my commonly-used name, “Skud”, on my posts and comments. As far as my own case is concerned, I’m quite willing to compromise (for instance with Kirrily “Skud” Robert), but I’m not willing to use a name that doesn’t include “Skud” in any way, or that consists of only the name on my government ID, as most of my social circle would not recognise me under those conditions.
• A clear, unequivocal statement from Google+ management that they understand that many people have names that differ from their government ID, and that those names, if commonly used in daily life, are explicitly permitted on Google+.
• A consistent, well-documented way for people whose commonly used names don’t match their government ID to provide evidence that those are the names they really are known by (note that this should not be limited to Facebook or other services which implicitly or explicitly require a match with government ID.)
• Google to develop better ways to handle spam and personal reputation on social networks. They have the smarts and the data for this, and could make a much more meaningful and positive change to the Internet if they were to take it on.

And here are some responses to things a number of people have asked me, just to conveniently put them all in one place:

• Your blog says Kirrily “Skud” Robert, why don’t you just use that? I’ve tried, they haven’t responded to my email requesting review.
• You have a Facebook account under Kirrily Robert. Why aren’t you complaining about Facebook? If you’ll look at my Facebook account, you’ll see it’s just a placeholder, which I hardly ever use, in large part because it’s strange to do so under a name that few people know me by. Though I’ve spoken in the past about Facebook’s name policy, I was less insistent about it because they were just one website (albeit a large one) and because their policy was at least clearly stated and apparently consistent.
• If you don’t like the policy, don’t use G+. If only it were that easy. That’s more or less what I’ve done on Facebook — as I said, I mostly just use it as a placeholder — but I don’t feel like that’ll work so well on Google+. Google+ has tentacles that extend into other services. Even though Google have said that the name policy doesn’t affect anything outside G+ and Profiles (which in itself is a bit disingenuous, as related policies, equally poorly communicated and enforced, do), I’ve seen some effects start to show up in other products. For instance yesterday I got a warning on Google Groups, saying that I had limited functionality because my G+ profile was suspended. Similarly, Jon Pincus points out that use of G+ is already affecting search results, disadvantaging those not using the service. If “everything is social” and Google starts to connect other products with G+, then a wide range of services start to be affected. This is not just “don’t use one website”, it’s “limit your use of a significant number of services”.
• It’s a field trial, they’ve said they’re working on it, hang in there and it will get better. I have to say I mistrust this. Google has a poor history when it comes to promising “we’ll get to that later”. Furthermore, they’ve already had months and months to figure this out before launch, and chosen not to. If the pressure and advocacy that have been applied so far haven’t been enough to make them prioritise the issue, then I don’t think quietly sitting around and waiting for them to do it is going to get results.
• Blah blah anonymity blah. Just to be clear, I am not speaking at all about anonymity online, which is a different issue (an interesting one, but one I’m not dealing with right now). I’m talking about long-standing, widely-used, persistent names that have accrued reputation and social capital, but which just happen not to match government ID.
• Don’t you have anything better to do? Not really, I’m unemployed, and I think this is important.

Syndicated 2011-07-31 21:51:38 from InfotropismInfotropism | Infotropism

Google is gagging user advocates

So, I’ve mentioned that while I was at Google (until July 15th) I disagreed strongly with the Google+ names policy. I wasn’t the only one, but of course those who still work for Google need to be careful not to criticise their employer, so they’re being fairly careful about what they say online.

Take Liz Fong, a friend of mine who is — among other things — a transgender and disability rights activist, and often tweets and posts about social justice issues. She’s also interested in BitCoin and online anonymity.

In comments on this post she stated that she works on G+ identity stuff in her 20% time:

Saul Tannenbaum – You were posting interesting things about names and gender, from a perspective that needed to be heard. And, you were dissenting from your employer’s policy on their own system and doing it with professionalism. From all that, I thought you were a voice worth my attention.

Liz Fong – Yup, I’m an Official Professional Dissident and Devil’s Advocate in my 20% time :) – even though I’m personally not happy with the decision, I’m glad that I’m being allowed to play devil’s advocate :)

When G+ launched, she regularly reshared articles about names and identity on the service. Of course she was very professional and tried to be neutral and balanced in what she posted, but she did post and reshare a lot on the subject. Here is a history of her relevant posts:

Jun 28: You’re safest using your full name
Jun 30: [Policy] may be helpful for people using pseudonyms to reread
Jul 6: Official word on business profiles (reshare)
Jul 7: Abbreviate your name for privacy
Jul 7: File feedback if you feel strongly about gender privacy
Jul 7: Yet another reminder about policy
Jul 8: Reshare of Siderea’s post about names (without comment)
Jul 8: Reshare of Geek Feminism pseudonymity bingo (without comment)
Jul 10: Reshare of link to Geek Feminism post about social networking and women (without comment)
Jul 11: Well, it looks like Google PR has officially commented
Jul 11: I’ve been going by Liz since I was 15 / link to Rowan Thunder’s story of G+ suspension
Jul 11: Michael Hermeston comments on Rowan Thunder’s case
Jul 12: Reshare of Rowan Thunder’s account of the appeal process
Jul 12: Surprised that I hadn’t seen this yet in my stream (links to posts from Second Lifers)
Jul 12: Google starts wrestling with identity issues on G+ (reshare without comment)
Jul 12: More press coverage on the identity issue
Jul 12: Link to “level-headed” article by Lauren Weinstein (with comment, not speaking for employer)
Jul 12: Yes, people at Google care
Jul 12: Link to Geek Feminism roundup, asking for a similar anti-pseudonymity resource
Jul 12: Petition seems like a tool for anti-pseudonymity griefers, please send feedback
Jul 12: A personal story: I’m alive today because I was able to pseudonymously network with other transgender people online
Jul 13: TLDR summary of author’s viewpoint: verifying ‘proof’ of identity is hard, forgery is easy.
Jul 13: Playing the other half of the coin for a moment (on dress codes)
Jul 14: When I speak, I speak only for myself and not for Google
Jul 16: No safe place (reshare without comment)
Jul 16: Potential pseudonym options, “very well-written and cogent”
Jul 16: Once again, Lauren is persuasive, levelheaded, and takes the big picture into account.
Jul 18: I’ve been noticing an increase in incivility in conversations about naming issues.
Jul 19: Here’s the official word on the SMS issue and on the abuse flagging issue.
Jul 19: If you want to chat about Google+ privacy, Jonathan’s your person :)
Jul 19: An insightful post on untangling psuedonymity and anonymity
Jul 19: Some uses cases for pseudonyms are addressed by abbreviating first or last name / competition is just a click away (not speaking for employer)
Jul 21: The pants theory of Google+ (reshare)
Jul 21: You can’t have a corporate profile
Jul 21: Use individual employees to represent your business
Jul 22: This is the appeals process for suspensions
Jul 22: Welcome back Kryptyk Fish and CZ Unit
Jul 23: Here’s what Skud has to say about her suspension
Jul 23: I’m interested in seeing data from users about how the naming policy is being applied
Jul 24: Google, the pseudonym banstick, etc; “+1 insightful”
Jul 24: Matt Cutts has responded publicly on the Thomas Monopoly issue (reshare)
Jul 24: I’m trying to enjoy a quiet weekend… better start reading from the firehose
Jul 24: Reshare of Sai’s post, “one of the most thorough examinations”
Jul 24: Signal-boosting Michael Hermeston’s comments
Jul 25: I’ve been trying to solicit discussion on how to tell pseuds from obscure nicknames
Jul 25: Reshare of Bradley Horowitz’s statement

So here we have a clear history of Liz posting frequently, seldom missing a day, and often posting multiple things about Google+ identity each day.

On July 25th (four days ago) she stopped posting on the subject altogether. Looking at her stream, though, I see that she did post, without any comment, a link to a Wikipedia article talking about gag orders.

Today I was bugging Googlers to try and get a response on my suspension (I tried to escalate my case yesterday, and didn’t hear anything for more than a day), so I reached out to Liz on Twitter, where we’ve been friends for some time.

It went like this:

@Skud: hey @lizthegrey since you care about identity and g+ can you prod them about my case/help me get a response? ticket #839791762

@Skud: @lizthegrey btw i forget, do you know @sparkymonster? if not you definitely should, she is made of awesome.

@lizthegrey: @Skud I know @sparkymonster but don’t think I’ve met her face to face yet (which reminds me, I should get an ‘I know Skud’ button from her)

@lizthegrey you definitely [should]! btw did you see my previous tweet? can you prod them to respond to me?

@lizthegrey: Annoyingly long/tiring week. I plan to keep twitter for short things, and use G+ for longer essays. I doubt 3000+ people care that I’m tired

@Skud: @lizthegrey *hugs* if you want ‘em… this must be rough for you :( i’m worried that you don’t seem to be responding to my qs about g+ tho

@Skud: @lizthegrey sorry to bug you but… you haven’t posted anything about identity lately, are you not allowed to any more?

@Skud: ok, unless someone tells me otherwise, it looks like google employees who don’t support the names policy have been gagged. #nymwars

@Skud: @lizthegrey this is your chance to tell me i’m wrong, btw.

@lizthegrey: CSA veggie fetching time, then one or two more code reviews, and then home, thank goodness. *thud*

So here we have a Googler who is working on identity stuff part-time as a “Devil’s Advocate” (I guess the users are the “devil” from Google’s perspective, ugh), who has repeatedly helped disseminate information about Google+ identity policy, and who has always taken a balanced view in her public posts, asking for anti-pseudonym resources or suggestions from the community, all while being very clear that she doesn’t speak for Google officially… silenced, and forced not to speak.

(Additional irony: Google are also saying that companies/brands should have their staff use Google+, to show a human face, and are now shutting down the very employees who are doing this for Google itself.)

To be clear, this is far worse than the prior restrictions Googlers had wrt confidentiality. Of course Googler’s can’t speak about forthcoming projects or other confidential matters, and they’d be silly to post anything too critical of the company if they wanted to keep their jobs. But now Google is preventing its staff from commenting at all on existing products/features/policies, or engaging with the user community in any way, even to quell FUD or share information. That’s scary.

I know Liz as an activist and I know it must be hard for her to be silenced in this way. Her tweets and G+ posts read, to me, like someone who’s exhausted and frustrated by the whole situation. I hope she gets the weekend of rest that she so badly needs.

Meanwhile, Google are refusing to respond in any way to the questions I asked their support staff, and eventually escalated by Cc’ing to Google+ management. To summarise, they were:

1. What evidence will you accept that “Skud” is the name I commonly use, and in what way does this page fail to satisfy you?
2. How would you suggest I edit my name on G+ to meet your standards, while still showing my commonly-used name on posts and comments?
3. Since some users seem to get exemptions for special reasons, what is the process for getting such an exemption?

Google are choosing not to respond, and my account is still suspended. It’s Friday afternoon, and one week since my account was first blocked. What the hell is going on in there, and why are they so scared of saying anything?

To all my friends at Google, I’m thinking of you. Stay strong, look after yourselves and each other. And give my love to everyone at TGIF this afternoon!

ETA: A couple of Googlers have told me that this gag isn’t universal, so it looks like it might apply only to those advocating on behalf of G+ users. In which case, I think that’s even worse.

Syndicated 2011-07-29 21:57:48 from InfotropismInfotropism | Infotropism

Wanna buy my shit?

So this is the first of what will probably be many relocation logistics posts. Right now, I’m looking for people to take some furniture and other items off my hands. The following are available for pickup in San Francisco. With regard to price, just make me an offer. Anything halfway reasonable will probably be fine. If you need details, ask.

Furniture

(Google for pics of all these, most of them are discontinued by Ikea.)

• 2 x Ikea Lillberg rocking chairs (black cushions)
• 2 x Ikea Leksvig bookcases (tall, open-backed)
• Ikea Leksvig dresser (tall, 4 big drawers + 2 small drawers)
• Ikea Leksvig side table (I use it as a TV stand)
• Ikea Leksvig coffee table (large, with storage underneath)

Tech

• OLPC XO computer
• 750GB external hard drive (LaCie, about the size of a mac mini)
• Grace internet radio device (streams everything, including Pandora)

Kitchen and other appliances

• Food processor
• Stick mixer
• Rice cooker
• Iron

Misc

• artificial Christmas tree, about 5′ tall, quite a nice one

Interested? Drop a comment here and I’ll get back to you.

Syndicated 2011-07-28 04:34:20 from InfotropismInfotropism | Infotropism