A recent story in the Guardian confirms once again that there is no such thing as anonymity on the Internet. This is a shame, because the Web is much richer for the candid commentary that sometimes only exists under a nom de plume. In this case, blogger Abby Lee was a major figure in the blogosphere, and not only because she wrote mostly about sex. The Guardian comments:
The blog tootled along for about six months, and then suddenly went crazy. People were Googling for it at a rate that was measurable by the minute. Girlwithaonetrackmind.blogspot.com has had more than 2 million visitors, gets 100,000 readers a month, won Best British or Irish Blog at the 2006 Bloggies, and was published as a book last week (for which she got "six figures"). The book is already in the bestseller lists. So far, so successful, but so still anonymous; all anybody knew about Abby Lee was that she worked in the film industry, lived in London and got laid a hell of a lot. Oh, and we knew that she had size eight feet - much has been made of this, in the press, as if she were deliberately trying to out herself, whereas, in fact, I can personally vouch for the fact that big feet are not all that rare.
In her candid depiction of an active woman's sex life, Lee counted on anonymity to protect her job and her relationships — with co-workers, friends, family, and lovers. After being "outed" by the Sunday Times, Lee recounts on her blog that she has lost her job and faced the humiliation of having her friends and family know the intimate details of her sex life. The Guardian, meanwhile, recounts that she has been hit with a wave of sexual prudery that would have been unthinkable a couple of decades ago. But it is not necessary to approve of frequent sex with more than one partner to believe that a culture that will not tolerate anonymous writing will be poorer for it. (For example, perhaps the most famous anonymous author was Sir Walter Scott, who did not wish to reveal that he had abandoned poetry for a less reputable art form — the novel.)
While I try not to put anything on the web to which I am not willing to sign my name and which I am not willing to have my mother read, I do not pretend that my writing is necessarily richer for it.