[catacombs]

> what does knowing his real name add or let a journalist verify? Does it somehow let you verify that he does in fact blog at SSC...?

Correct. Anyone, whether it's an individual or group of people, can be "Scott Alexander."

What does it add? It makes the story more credible under scrutiny.

[pdonis]

> Anyone, whether it's an individual or group of people, can be "Scott Alexander."

So what? The story isn't about who Scott Alexander is. The story is about the blog. Anyone can go to the website and read the blog (or at least they could before the NYT pulled this screwup). If the NYT wants their story about the blog to be credible, they just need to tell the truth about what the blog says.

[catacombs]

> So what? The story isn't about who Scott Alexander is. The story is about the blog.

It's about the blog and its author. It's like writing about a controversial book without any mention of the author. That's not possible.

[zestyping]

Is it necessary to reveal J. K. Rowling's real name in order to write an article about her controversial views? I think not.

[philwelch]

Funny you should mention that:

> A Warning is a 2019 book-length exposé of the Trump administration, anonymously authored by someone described as a "senior Trump administration official". It is a follow-up to an anonymous op-ed published by the New York Times in September 2018.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Warning_(book)

[pdonis]

> It's about the blog and its author.

The author's persona on the blog, yes. That doesn't mean the author's real name needs to be revealed.

[kelnos]

The author's name is irrelevant to that story, because the story is about the author only insofar is that relates to the blog, which is written under a pseudonym. In fact, it's actively confusing to bring anything but the pseudonym into this.

[viridian]

I don't follow your logic, maybe I'm missing something. Let's say I publicly claim to be Scott Alexander. The owner of slatestarcodex with the email address [e-mail] also claims to be scott alexander? Doesn't the latter claim carry far more weight? If so, why is the personage relevant?

[coldsnap427]

> Let's say I publicly claim to be Scott Alexander. The owner of slatestarcodex with the email address [e-mail] also claims to be scott alexander? Doesn't the latter claim carry far more weight?

It's just an email address. It could be Scott or it could be someone else. Yes, common sense would say it's Scott, but the reporter would have to still prove it's him. If you claim to be Scott, too, that will also need to be checked out.

Many people will take that information and run, but if you're writing for a national outlet, where accurate reporting is everything, your editor will say, "Yes, that might be Scott, but how do you know? What proof can you provide? If we get called out for a fact error, can you refute that claim?

[kyle-rb]

How does providing a last name make his authorship of the blog more credible though? And how does publishing it help? I don't see how the reporter or the readers have any way of verifying that the blogger of SSC has a last name matching the one from the article.

[viridian]

Forgive me for the repetition you are about to see, I'm attempting to apply a bit of formality to the reasoning in question:

The Scott who posts at slatestarcodex.com is the Scott who is [e-mail].

Therefore, the material Scott when attempting to pin down Scott in the context of slatestarcodex is [e-mail].

Human X out in meat space could or could not be Scott, but that much is immaterial, as [e-mail] has been shown to be directly linked to Scott Alexander the blogger as a means of contacting him.

Thus I ask: what better proof could one have that [e-mail] is Scott Alexander, author of slatestarcodex?

[coldsnap427]

> Thus I ask: what better proof could one have that [e-mail] is Scott Alexander, author of slatestarcodex?

From an editor's point of view, that's not enough, assuming the reporter has not done any form of reporting through interviews, public records and other methods.

[Smaug123]

I think you've missed the point. The point is that even if Scott were in fact a conglomerate of twenty people, Scott's writing is still the same, and is what draws people to the blog, and is ultimately why there's any story to be written at all. Nobody, but nobody, cares about the actual human originator(s) of the posts; it's the persona who matters.

[catacombs]

I have not missed the point.

The story is about the blog, yes, but a portion deals with the _person_ or _people_ behind it. And that's important.