I loved Lele\’s idea of posting a phone number. It was more of an experiment than an actual call-me plea. Of course, what\’s surprising is that nobody…calls. Nobody would unless given the okay either through a blog comment or an instant message.

But what interests me the most is this so-called polite boundary that people are reluctant to cross. It\’s almost the exact thing I am doing research on at GUIR (informal research if anything). This year I got involved with the privacy stuff…how people really are worried about releasing their location, their address, their phone number, etc. We imagine all these worse-case scenarios, yet how often do they really happen? Our phone number is widely available in the white pages, but the only annoyance we get is marketing phone calls. By posting a phone number on the web, who really cares? Not to mention my street address, who would really come? There is nobody (except myself) that is a good stalker. Nobody has the patience to pursue something that may or may not have a plausible relationship. Why are we so worried about our privacy when there is no real risk?

It\’s sad, but people just…don\’t…care.