It's about fear of being the exposed as opposed to being the ones who control the exposure of others.  

They're going on the offensive, in apparent unawareness that after their masterful manipulation of the American people on everything from the Iraq war to the economic crisis to the role of the banking industry and Wall Street to the foreclosure fraud mess to health whatever, they have little, if any, credibility - and trying to choke off other sources of information isn't going to improve the quality of the information at our disposal, it's just going to ensure that the traditional media retains control of information, so they can control the message.

I'm pretty sure this holds some appeal for the powers that be in government and in the corporatocracy - they don't much like not being able to control the flow of information, either.

If you look at Martha Nussbaum's body of work, what you see is a classic Soviet bureaucrat who hit all the right buttons at the right times, once or twice straying just far enough outside of the current orthodoxy to rate herself as a bit of a maverick--and by "maverick" I mean in the debased John McCain sense of the word. Now Nussbaum doesn't believe in marriage, you see--at least, she has to make a big public show of it, because her quasi-maverick, quasi-feminist books kind of corner her into pretending she's beyond something as cliched as marriage. So she always refers to Cass, whom she clearly loved in a very old-fashioned way right up until he savagely dumped her for someone younger, as her "partner." Which, you know, isn't at all a cliche.

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Speaking of that, Samantha's new husband Cass put out his most popular book yet last year, called "Nudge." See, he's a "paternalistic libertarian" who thinks the way to make America work is not to tell people what to do, but to-yes, that's right-"nudge" them to the right thing. (Sort of like how Cass "nudged" his wizened ex-partner Martha out of his life for the tight-skinned Samantha-supposedly, in keeping with the retro-70s horribleness, Cass and Martha and Samantha are all pals still.) Anyway, Cass's big breakthrough, the thing that got Obama's attention, is that Cass believes that government should nudge The People gently, and that way, The People will make the right choices but feel they've done it on their own. Because deep down, Americans will do the right thing if you just show them the way without pushing them too hard. Reverend--I mean Dr. Sunstein uses examples like 401Ks and organ donor cards to make his example. (You have to wonder if Sunstein stole this brilliant theory from a third grader's civics class report.) Like his wife Samantha, Cass has to make exceptions for just about every horrible thing that human beings do in order to make his theory work. So he makes those exceptions, and voila! Everyone agrees that it works! It's a hit! Now Cass and Samantha are a Washington Power Couple. Wow, I just gotta get their cards!

Slander and related concerns don't ever deal w/truth, rather, they are based in some opinion - which will exist and can be spread w/or w/o the internet.  If some employer wants to believe what people say about me on facebook, then that employer is stupid, that's not the fault of anonymity.

Likewise those who firmly "believe" some falsehood they read on the internet.  The hyperlink is wonderful tool - it can point the way to truth.

Here's a question, can these august public intellectuals name one person whose reputation was ruined by false charges made anonymously on the Internet?

back in 2005, wikipedia posted false and defamatory assertions by an anonymous contributor alleging that journalist John Seigenthaler, ex aide to AG Rbt Kennedy, had played a role in both Kennedy assassinations.  Those statements stayed up on wiki for some 4 months before being detected and removed by the site's owners.  Interestingly, accd'g to JS he was unable to edit the entry himself to remove the false charges.