We've recently had a rash of postings at Batter's Box that have been made under the names of real people. "Donald Trump" was the most recent last night, but we've also had posts written under the names of local baseball-related people, everyone from JP Ricciardi to Richard Griffin -- posts most definitely not written by these folks. This is a statement explaining why these kinds of posts are outlawed at Batter's Box and the publication of an official Box policy on the subject.
There are any number of reasons why we don't allow real people to be impersonated at Batter's Box, even as a joke. Here are three:
1. Misrepresentation of a real person's identity on the Internet has become a serious matter. We're probably all familiar with new privacy laws and rules regarding the protection of identities. This kind of stuff just isn't lightweight anymore: on the Internet, no one knows who you really are, and taking someone else's name as your own, even in jest, is tantamount to damaging their reputation. For reasons of the most basic online courtesy, as well to protect our own interests, Batter's Box can't permit these kinds of impersonations to take place.
2. Impersonation of baseball-related persons is particularly problematic. Batter's Box is fortunate enough that a number of people associated in some way with major-league baseball in Toronto and perhaps elsewhere read our site. None of them would be happy, I'm sure, to see their own name used in a post, or a friend's or colleague's name for that matter. Impersonating an individual from the Blue Jays scene will not only get your comment deleted, it will put you perilously close to banning; yes, it's that serious.
3. If it's not nipped in the bud, celebrity impersonation can overrun a Website like fire ants. I'm sure most of us here are familiar with the fate of Baseball Primer, a great baseball blog that nearly drowned in a flood of Mike Piazzas, Bud Seligs and Jayson Starks, all making the same unfunny jokes made a hundred times before by the last person to use those masks. The noise-to-signal ratio at Primer got so bad that they were forced to go to a registration system, at great expense and inconvenience to the operators. Batter's Box doesn't want to get anywhere near that situation, which is why we're cracking down early and cracking down hard.
Accordingly, as part of a more general Legal and Policy Page to be posted soon, Batter's Box has drafted a strict policy about impersonations.
Impersonating any person or entity or misrepresenting your identity or affiliation with any person or entity, even in fun, is not appreciated. For various reasons, Batter’s Box strongly discourages the impersonation of real individuals. Instances of impersonation may be subject to a warning, a deletion or a ban, depending on the nature of the impersonation, the frequency of instances of impersonation, and the nature of the comments made under the impersonated name. All decisions regarding the appropriate response to impersonation are in the sole discretion of Batter’s Box and the members of the Roster.
A word here about grandfathering. We have some long-time posters with us who've been using names of former Blue Jays as their handles since they arrived (Messrs. Zosky, Acker and Brumfield, for instance). These folks are known and respected at Batter's Box, and the foregoing isn't aimed at them, it's aimed at one-off posters who flit in and out. Nonetheless, for reasons of consistency and fairness, we need to ask these folks to consider changing their handles, even slightly, in order to remove any question of confusion over who's posting. If I might borrow an example from another regular poster: "Jimmy Key" would be disallowed, but "Jimmy Key's Christmas Lights" is just fine.
If you have any questions about this policy, please write to any members of the Cabal (there is no Cabal) or contact me at gideon@battersbox.ca and I'll get back to you in the next day or so. We appreciate your cooperation with this and all other Batter's Box policies that allow this site to continue to grow and benefit from the contributions of its operators and visitors.
https://www.battersbox.ca/article.php?story=20040513102403999