One of the more intriguing aspects that makes the Internet so unique is your ability to be anonymous.

For many, that’s a plus. Fun, comfortable and, maybe, freeing.

But when does your anonymity cross the line?

Recently, the co-founder, chairman and ceo of Whole Foods, John Mackey, was discovered to be posting messages on stock bulletin boards anonymously, under an assumed identity. Normally this wouldn’t be worthy of registering a complaint, but Mackey, in this case, was commenting on his own company. Bad boy.

Busted!
So, points for ingenuity, but many, many, many points off for sheer stupidity. Talk about lack of corporate trust.

But the whole experience poses a disturbing question — if Mackey can do it, how many others are posing under false identities? Asking and answering pointed questions? Slyly manipulating?

Paranoid, ain’t we?

Maybe Mackey wasn’t trying to be manipulative, but he was. The act of speaking from a false identity is meant to manipulate someone to do something they might not otherwise do. Right?

Faux Steve Jobs
The antithesis of John Mackey’s indiscretion is the ongoing blog penned by Apple’s Steve Job.

For almost 18 months, a blog that has been routinely updated by a person claiming to be a faux Steve Jobs has been a delight to read (http://fakesteve.blogspot.com/). The brillance was, the writer had such an uncanny ability to write what many of us thought should have been Jobs’ actual opinions that many of us sometimes thought that it was really Steve Jobs posing as a faux Steve Jobs.

In the end, it turns out that the he faux Steve Jobs blogger was actually not the real Steve Jobs (disappointed sigh) and was finally unmasked by a writer from the New York Times.

Think for Yourself
The upshot of both of these instances and the myriad of other alter egos lurking around on the Internet, is that we have to be very careful of trusting what we read, hear and see. Not terribly a news thought, but surprising startling for a generation who’s parents were spoon fed local and national news by giant TV networks and who dolefully and mindlessly accepted what they were told. Maybe that’s why the ’60′s was so shocking. How could we dare to question the almight government and media.

For many years I have harped on in my workshops and seminars about us not taking the time to think. Not looking at the source and carefully analyzing. For letting someone else do the thinking for us and for trusting their guidance without qualm or question.

It insults me when I see network (or political hack), talking head geniuses come on after a speech or debate to tell me what we just heard. I was there! I heard it! I understood it! I don’t need you to tell me what they said! I’ll decide what’s right and what is an illusion (apologies to the Moody Blues — “Cold hearted orb…”).

So, should persons who wish to be trusted lurk online with false identities? No, absolutely not.

But shame on us for not asking “why” far more often. And for not taking a moment to consider the source and maybe using a little more thinking to analyze if this is believable or not.

If we did, maybe we wouldn’t need a web site just to debunk urban myths and we would have spam emails, because we would be answering spam.

One opinion, mine.