U.S. Rep. Katherine Clark, a Democrat from Massachusetts, is no friend of an open Internet. In fact, she’s made her mark in Congress trying to waste federal funds going after anonymous Internet trolls.
Her Cybercrime Enforcement Training Assistance Act would cost the government $20 million a year to go on wild goose chases after the masses of terrible people on the Internet acting terribly.
“The FBI… clearly told us this was not a priority for them, and that was a sentiment we have found to be a theme,” Clark told The Verge.
She also wrote an open letter to the FBI in 2015 asking them to intervene in Gamergate specifically. No surprise considering Brianna Wu, an anti-Gamergate activist, is one of her advisors on that campaign.
Clark’s latest letter blast was against Genius Web Annotator, a web extension that allows users to highlight a piece of text in an article and make a comment about it. The comments are only visible by people with the extension downloaded, but Clark believes it’s just another tool for cyberbullies.
Here’s an example of an annotation I made on Clark’s official website.
It’s actually pretty fun.
She involved herself in the debate after blogger Ella Dawson cried foul when critical annotations appeared on her blog entry entitled “I Am Not ‘Suffering’ From Herpes.” Dawson called the comments “graffiti,” on what I can only assume was an immaculate work of art.
In reality, the web annotator is like a bunch of invisible fairies floating around you, talking trash, and the only way to notice them is to put on some magic goggles or something. If you don’t want to listen to it, just don’t put on the goggles!
But Clark, who apparently doesn’t see the world in such metaphor, sent a letter to Genius calling on them to put more restrictions on the extension and increase moderation.
But Genius already had a content monitoring system. They have community moderators, similar to Reddit, and one paid staffer looking into harassment. There is also a report button on each comment. Most people actually use the annotator responsibly. (I’m in the minority, apparently*). Almost all the annotations I’ve seen on the web simply add more information about a topic.
This isn’t even the first tech company Clark disrupted with a letter. Early this year the viral sensation Twitter game Stolen was shut down after Clark complained.
Stolen was a game where players could use a virtual currency to buy and trade Twitter profiles like trading cards. Sounds like fun. It’s a shame some busybody congresswoman had to come and ruin it.
Clark is like that one teacher you had in grade school who wouldn’t let the small things slide. Like you’re having fun on the playground and .. BAM! The teacher comes out of nowhere and confiscates your Pokemon cards.
The best thing about the web is that it’s an open playground with very few chaperones. Yeah, there are the bullies you have to avoid, but you and your friends can have more fun this way.
Federal legislation and top-down pressure won’t stop people from acting like dicks on the Internet, and neither will Clark and her constant meddling in issues she does not fully understand.
*Annotate the hell out of this piece, I don’t care. I’m not Slate. And if I don’t like what you say, duh, I don’t know, I can just turn the damn extension off!