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by thinkingemote 2151 days ago
Journalists and writers in general aim to make a story appealing to their readers. One way they do this is bring to life their subjects, and some ways they can do that is to name the subject, tell readers what neighborhood the subject lives in, age, what kind of life they lead etc. People are interested in other people.

It has value but it's a mechanism that isn't necessarily needed in all cases.

One could do a thought experiment imagining a group of newspaper readers evaluating an edition where names of subjects were not given and one where they were. Which edition would be more interesting?
1 comments
luckylion 2151 days ago
> some ways they can do that is to name the subject

That is "to give the subject a name", not "to reveal the name of the subject". It's usually "Maria [name changed] is the youngest of three daughters, her parents ...". That gives the subject a name, but there's no need for it to be the full name, or even the actual first name, because the story tend to be about the circumstances or what happened to the subject, not their name.

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adamsea 2151 days ago
Scott Alexander is a public figure. He himself shares his first name, middle name, profession, and city.

Is that true of “Maria” in your example?

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luckylion 2151 days ago
"Public figure" doesn't really go well with "wants to remain pseudonymous". He writes a blog as a personal hobby, he's not a celebrity or politician.

And yes, that's pretty often true about subjects of articles that do not get doxxed, because "Maria, NYC, Nurse" is enough to give you an idea about the person but far away from being enough for individual identification. And, of course, it doesn't matter for the story, just as the name doesn't matter for any profile about SSC.

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adamsea 2148 days ago
He is arguably a minor celebrity because of the number of followers he has and level of influence.

Come on - if the New York Times is writing about your blog then you're obviously, anonymous or not, a "public figure", though perhaps a minor one.

Also until we know what the article is - it's actual contents - how can we know if the name is relevant or not?

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