why everyone should get an anon social account
anonymity as an adversarial game against social pressure
I’ve anon-pilled multiple friends in getting an anonymous account and spending a significant (read: > 50% of their IRL posting volume on the account). Many of these friends happen to have very highly watched accounts on Twitter or other platforms.
Anyone who isn’t a privacy LARPer will have spent some time thinking about the spectrum of preserving anonymity online. Here’s my grug brained take on what people want from anonymity (and can do with anonymity).
Some simple defns:
Anonymous = an account where nobody who you’re interacting with on your account has an idea of real-life context (what you look like, where you work, your friends, your life story, your real name).
Pseudo-anon = an account where you’ve revealed at least one real attribute to at least one person (e.g. what you look like, where you work, your real name).
There are many benefits to having an anon account, no matter who you are:
No filter mode (for yourself). An anon account can be used to post thoughts without any filter. One of the most liberating types of freedom is freedom from social repercussions. We chase this freedom in some small ways (e.g. revealing sensitive information over the phone and in person than on paper to exploit the fallibility of human memory, desire to fit in with the crowd in an unfamiliar environment).
People in every moment filter their thoughts (either they are signalled by the crowd when interacting on how to act, or these social norms are engineered enough tell they start telling themselves something is a “bad” thought to have). The more filters you have with yourself, the slower you think. An anon account is a way to remove any speed bumps you have about the reception of ideas, and to go back to your natural clocking speed.
The smartest people I know are people who don’t impose filters on themselves. Keep in mind that I’m not making any value judgements on social filters (e.g. I’m not saying that norms are bad for society and people). Without social norms and pressuring (people don’t pressure other people into being “good” people), our society would descend into anarchy. [Blah blah go read some sociology canon about how we should feel about norms blah blah.]I’m specifically saying that imposing social norms on your own thoughts at all times, is very bad for your mental acuity.
The below are some types of social filters1 that are harmful to thought
Assuming you shouldn’t bother asking about X topic because it’s “common sense” or you might look stupid.
Assuming something is “bad” to discuss because you don’t know how to“read the room”
Any sort of need to refer to other people (authority, someone who said it) before you say something. you don’t need to cite other people before you say something. Very few thoughts are “original” (read: the first one of its form to occur). Most of my thoughts have been likely already exist in the super collection of thoughts in the world. It can still be valuable to say it.
Any need to construct a narrative and brand for yourself. It’s important to divorce thoughts from consequences, good and bad. Once you’re beholden to follower count, or perception, it’s over. Once you ask yourself “does this fit within the realm of something my audience might want to see”, it’s over. To be free from social pressures, your thought doesn’t please anyone (even yourself). To be truly free you have to be willing to lose all your followers tomorrow and start from 0 again for a single thought.
Need to produce thoughts without “errors” or obvious flaws
Social A/B Testing (for others) - Morty’s Reset Button
Anon account are social reset buttons. You can A/B test social reception to ideas without as many repercussions to your real persona. You can post half-baked thoughts in the space you spend the most time in with very little consequences. Online people with real-life names live in a panopticon with butterfly effects. Being anonymous is one of the few ways to remove yourself from the structure while giving yourself the ability to observe.
It’s easy to play out the counterfactuals of your life with very few consequences (how would I be treated if everyone were brain in a jar, if I interacted with X and said Y what would their approximate reaction be, if I posted two things with slightly tweaked ideas).
Presumed ignorance. It’s in fact a good thing to have presumed ignorance (people assume you know nothing about something).
Freedom from other people’s presumptions about you give you the most direct observations in how they would act if they know nothing about you. This is especially interesting once people you know in real life start interacting with your anonymous account.
Rage against the (collaborative filtering) machine. There are very few ways to step outside your constructed social contexts (where you grew up, went to school, the people you enjoy associating with). Multiple anon accounts is a good way to be outside the bubble.
There are obviously well-crafted, adversarial, often malicious ways of using anon accounts (beyond just being an asshat) that I don’t endorse. 2 obvious ones
Social engineering trading : many markets are affected by sentiment on social media. Most people are NPCs in decision-making (myself included) and watch for social signals, and delude themselves in thinking they decided to do something. If you make enough accounts and know how to use them to influence sentiment, you can pull a socially engineered Soros day effectively with enough volume of an asset controlled by your IR account. I have seen very clever executions of these trades (esp. if you execute an opposite trade), especially in anonymous markets with unknown counter-parties.
Seeking out people you know irl : specifically seeking out people you know irl via an anon account.
There are some benefits to having a well-recognized pseudo-anon account (it’s well-known by > 30 people who you are on anon), but none of them are for improving your speed of thought.
3 steps to the lazy person’s pseudo-anon / anon account:
Don’t follow anyone you already know on your main. Start from 0 followers and go up from there. Block people if you need to to prevent crossover followers.
Have fun. You can make IRL friends via your anon / show your close friends (people who don’t mind you being horny on main).
Be careful. If you accidentally show someone who would reveal your identity to others, delete it and stop posting. Because this is an account where you’re pseudo-anonymous, you probably should delete posts that may be poorly received after some time in case a larger group of people find your account.
3 Steps to a truly anon account:
Get a burner phone and/ or email.
Never meet anyone irl. Set up avatarify-ed videos if you need to.
Salt the earth if anyone finds your real ID (stop posting, immediately delete, unarchive yourself in wayback from day 0)
When I refer to filters, I don’t only mean in the sense of “political correctness” or “Overton windows”. I mean generalized social pressures which prevent you from thinking out loud on your first pass.