--- title: "What would you write about if you had an anonymous blog?" url: "https://osherove.com/blog/2006/12/13/what-would-you-write-about-if-you-had-an-anonymous-blog.md" canonical: "https://osherove.com/blog/2006/12/13/what-would-you-write-about-if-you-had-an-anonymous-blog.html" published: "2006-12-13T17:31:23" updated: "2006-12-13T17:31:23" tags: ["Off Topic"] author: "Roy Osherove" description: "What would you write about your job if you knew that no one could trace it back to you? I've toyed with that question myself a few times. Boy, the stuff I'd write if I had no accountability over it - could be quite…" usage: "Licensed under CC BY 4.0 — reuse, quote and adapt with attribution (Roy Osherove, link to the original page)." license: "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/" --- # What would you write about if you had an anonymous blog? By Roy Osherove December 13, 2006 In [Off Topic](https://osherove.com/blog/category/off-topic) **Historical article** · Originally published December 13, 2006; technical details may be outdated. What would you write about your job if you knew that no one could trace it back to you? I've toyed with that question myself a few times. Boy, the stuff I'd write if I had no accountability over it - could be quite interesting, I tell you. Still I try to share at least the politically correct stuff here with you :) (on a brighter note, you can always leave an anonymous comment on this blog post, and write whatever you think you'd have said on that anonymous blog. It'd be an interesting read!) That's exactly the question [this guy is facing](http://blogs.microsoft.co.il/blogs/onemustcode/). He recently opened a blog, anonymously, at [blogs.microsoft.co.il](http://blogs.microsoft.co.il/) - and has been writing there for the past month or so. The idea is great. I'm not sure how he got them to do it, but it seems like he did, and I applaud the idea. The possibilities now are endless. Just take a look at a blog like [mini microsoft](http://minimsft.blogspot.com/) to see just how bold an daring you can be when your identity is hidden. Great things can happen, and great conversations can ensue. But I'm not sure this guy gets it just yet. The past month of his blog has been, to say it mildly, mild. That guy could have written that blog under his own name and still have the same things to say. He takes no chances. What's the point of writing an anonymous blog if you don't write things that **could get you fired** if someone found out? or things that would piss people off, but were absolutely true? Maybe he's planning on coming out with it at some point. Or maybe someone at his job already found out. That would suck. But let's assume neither. Not even writing that you hate your boss in an anonymous blog seems quite unreasonable, and although I realize this does not apply to most people, chances are that this guy does. So, if you were a team lead on a team, and you could write whatever you want, what would you write about? All the stuff you can't talk about in front of people, of course. The bad stuff. Where did you fail lately? what's your biggest hidden fear at work? at real life? if you could say one sentence to your customer, what would it be? What do you think your team says about you behind your back? What are the biggest risks in your project right now? Who would you fire right now if you could? Who would you hire ? Do you think you're a good lead? Really? What pisses you off the most at work? Answer one of these questions, and you're on the right track to exposure and bare bones truth. Right now, you're just another blogger. ## More in Off Topic [All posts in Off Topic](https://osherove.com/blog/category/off-topic) - Dec 24, 2006 ### [Rest in peace, Doug Reilly](https://osherove.com/blog/2006/12/24/rest-in-peace-doug-reilly.html) - Dec 23, 2006 ### [Forget Google Hacks, Try Live Hacks](https://osherove.com/blog/2006/12/23/forget-google-hacks-try-live-hacks.html) - Dec 6, 2006 ### [How bad design can scare your children](https://osherove.com/blog/2006/12/6/how-bad-design-can-scare-your-children.html) - Oct 25, 2006 ### [MomPC - Creating a parent safe PC](https://osherove.com/blog/2006/10/25/mompc-creating-a-parent-safe-pc.html) --- ## About the author **Roy Osherove**: Senior Solutions Architect at AWS working on AI for production and AI-driven development; author of The Art of Unit Testing and Elastic Leadership, with about 20 years of consulting and training on unit testing, TDD, team leadership and continuous delivery. ### Sites - [RobotPaper](https://robotpaper.ai/): This blog: AI patterns and anti-patterns, AI and coding agents, and engineering leadership. - [osherove.com](https://osherove.com): Roy's personal site. Author of The Art of Unit Testing and Elastic Leadership; consulting and training on unit testing, TDD, team leadership and continuous delivery, plus about 20 years of blog posts. - [The Art of Unit Testing](https://www.artofunittesting.com): The Art of Unit Testing, 3rd Edition (Manning): readable, maintainable, trustworthy unit tests, plus TDD workshops in C#, JavaScript, Java and Kotlin. - [5whys.com](https://www.5whys.com): Roy's writing on software team leadership: self-organizing teams, surviving chaos, learning mode and the Elastic Leadership model. - [Pipeline Driven](https://pipelinedriven.org): Continuous delivery and DevOps practices: build patterns, pipeline-friendly testing, DevOps metrics and enterprise DevOps. - [Elastic Leadership](https://www.elasticleadership.com): Elastic Leadership, Roy's framework for software team leaders (survival, learning and self-organizing modes). ### Social - X: https://x.com/royosherove - LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/osherove/ ### Contact - Contact form: https://forms.gle/jQSx5KoXvrVA1JCK7 ### License Licensed under CC BY 4.0 — reuse, quote and adapt with attribution (Roy Osherove, link to the original page). License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/