Is there such a thing as a "private citizen" on the internet?

In our department, the first thing we do when we review an application, be it for graduate student, lecturer, faculty, staff etc., is to google the person's name and look up their facebook profile. It is amazing how many are disqualifying themselves by having a less than flattering internet presence.

 

I got a scenario for you. Let's say my bank has increased the bank fees that they charge. Now I go on the internet and say that I am switching banks and further, I encourage everybody to do the same. Is this "doing something wrong"? I have the freedom of speech however here I am clearly hurting their business.

 

I'd love to hear some examples.

 

No, you would be perfectly in your right to do so.

It would only be illegal if you gave a bogus reason for boycotting their business, i.e. saying they participate in money laundering without evidence or proof.

 

anonymity is easy to maintain. Proxy through Russia servers. No one would bother to look deeper. They would just blame the russian trolls.

 

But who gets to determine whether something is permissible while others are not?

 

You would have to cite an example, because in your current scenario, you are perfectly within your rights to boycott a business based on your personal experience with them and to make it public.

 

Facebook for example:

-Disparaging comments about bosses.
-General whining about workplace conditions.
-Evidence of partying lifestyle.

Another positive example:

One faculty candidate was Greek, but erroneously pulled off an airplane because the security thought he was a terrorist from the ME. We invited him for an interview. it was, however, sad that said story dominated his google profile while his accomplishments were pushed to the backburner.

 

Wow, thanks for sharing. Hopefully someone can learn from these examples.

 

Fact-----------------once you are on the internet much, like this forum, you have little privacy. Anyone can find out all about you, probably some things even you dont know about yourself.

 

LOL

nonsense

 

You can laugh if you want to, but you apparently dont understand the information that is on line about you.

 

there is no info about me online that i dont already know about myself

 

Have you checked lately??????????????

 

no need, im not paranoid

 

But if the FBI can establish that if you have violated the VPN's policy by breaching their terms of use then they will give the FBI your contact information that they do have on file.

 

Then the FBI knows who I am anyway, if they can convince PIA that I violated the TOS.

 

As long as you are identifying yourself as a former dissatisfied customer you are entitled to express your opinion of their services. That is perfectly legal and I have posted less than flattering reviews of companies that haven't lived up to their own promises in the past.

But you must be honest about what you post in those reviews. If you make false representations then you can be held liable. Freedom of speech does not cover lying with malicious intent. Deliberate malicious lying is covered under libel and defamation laws.

 

In order for a automatic copyright to be formed, one has to explicitly state that as such on a post. If you do not explicitly prohibit free use of each post, it is not copyrighted. This is why it's not illegal to quote a person's posts online without their permission, unless they explicitly prohibited the use of any of their material. This is the general mindset that courts have in internet privacy cases. For example, I've heard of a few cases where unpublished authors posted exerps of their books online on forums, but failed to state that the materials in the post were their property and could not be reused by anyone. Because of their failure, they had no right to take legal action when other people used the materials.

 

You can actually get on the internet via ham radio with some creatively integrated equipment, and be rendered absolutely anonymous (I understand its slow as fuq). Though, for all intents and purposes, a cash burner phone and public wifi is about as good.

 

A while ago I saw someone write 'for all intensive purposes'.

 

As usual you have no clue what you are talking about. Get a copyright lawyer.

Steve