[Byronic Antihero]

An odd thing happened to me today; I replied to a topic and saw a photo of me next to my post. Not just any photo, but one I actively use when promoting myself online. One, I should say, that is recognisable as me.

It should go without saying that I wouldn't have uploaded such an image, so why was it there? One of the obvious answers is that it is the Gravatar (http://gravatar.com/) attached to my email address. On 99% of sites, I want people to know who I am, but this is not really the kind of place where I want my face plastered next to my discussions of being bipolar. I've chosen a generic avatar now, but I am shocked and disgusted by the fact that my photo was used without my knowledge.

Can someone please look into this? There are probably a number of other people with recognisable Gravatars and I really think it hurts this site's credibility (ignoring possible legal issues) if members are being exposed in this way without their permission or knowledge...

[Admin - Rethink]

Hi there, as far as I can tell the gravatar option is only if user selected it (see image attached). However if this happened without your consent, it must be a bug - we can remove gravatar option if so. If you can confirm you didn't choose the gravatar option we will disable the facility. Thanks!

Attached thumbnail(s)

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[mias]

I have never even heard of a Gravatar but I realise now what it is. Actually I remember someone mentioning that they signed in via face book and their profile picture came with them?

[Byronic Antihero]

I think my Firefox (like so many other modern browsers) auto-completes fields, so it's possible that I was just a victim of a 'helpful' code. I don't remember seeing that form above, as I just signed up without setting options like avatars and signatures, so the helpful code might be at your end. The moderated first post thing meant I never saw how my reply would show up, or else I might have noticed and (possibly; just coming down from hypomania) remembered that form.

As to the Facebook thing, I kind of expected that; I never use Facebook or FB Connect if I want to retain any degree of privacy. Normally, things like Gravatars and importing user pictures is a good thing, but in a community like this, maybe it might be worth erring on the side of caution. For many of us, hiding our mental illness from friends and family is part of our coping strategy.