[strken]

I was thinking this. Why not just lie? Come up with personas, stack them on other personas, and eventually you're pretending to be a 23 year old Asian man from California who is pretending to be a 50 year old New Zealand carpenter and half the bits are muddled.

[fragmede]

What are you writing about? The real person is going to write about what they know, so when the topic of housing comes up, and they pick New York City to discuss zoning restrictions, sure it's possible they're in New Zealand or California, but it makes more sense to assume the user behind the keyboard is in NYC. The question is, for what purposes is the user trying to be unmasked? In the world we live in, the entirely boring purpose is to sell them ads.

[strken]

> The question is, for what purposes is the user trying to be unmasked?

I disagree that ads are the only reason to dox someone. I assume that few pieces of writing would be controversial enough to warrant a fake identity, but those few would be important.

If I wanted to pseudonymously accuse a mayor of corruption, I think it would be safer to generate true stats and interview real people, but do so in an area I don't live, with some anecdotes where the facts don't quite match my life, using language that has been edited by a friend with a different writing style.

[Schlagbohrer]

This is why I follow subreddits for cities I have never been to.