Recent stories in the news and around the web have prompted me to re-post an important reminder for all you Xangans, LiveJournalers, and MySpacers out there: The Internet is a public place.
It’s amazing how many people lose sight of that simple fact, but it happens all the time. I guess some of it may be due to surroundings—you’re comfortable in your bedroom or somewhere, your music playing, surrounded by your stuff—private. It’s hard to remember, maybe, that as you pour out your soul on your blog, or post funny pictures for your friends to look at, that you might as well be sticking them up on a wall somewhere.
Not that there’s anything wrong with that, mind you; it’s just very important to think carefully about what you’re posting, and what kind of information you’re revealing about yourself. If it’s stuff you only want your friends to read, for example, do you need to have your real name visible on the site? Won’t they know that you’re “xxSeverelyxxDisorientedxx” or whatever else your user name happens to be? If a site requires that your personal information be visible on pages that you create, I’d seriously consider not using it. Even then, there’s a good chance a profile can be traced back to you some other way.
Anyway, here’s the new twist that prompted this post: Based on an article from BusinessWeek Online last week (You Are What You Post), it looks like it’s becoming fashionable for some employers and even colleges to use the vast archive of “private” information available on the Internet to do impromptu background checks on potential employees or students. So not only should you be concerned with who’s reading your blog now, but who may be reading it in five or ten years down the road.
[Santangelo’s] says with a half-laugh that so far “it hasn’t hurt me too bad,” but he fears for the MySpacing, YouTubing, Facebooking masses — the bloggers and vloggers (video bloggers) who fail to realize that there is no such thing as an eraser on the Internet. “I see people do that sort of thing now, and I think: ‘Oh man, that could come back and bite you.’ ”
So one more time: The Internet is a public place. The things you do and say there can have consequences, now and further down the road, since stuff on the Internet tends to hang around. (Look! It’s an email I sent to a discussion list in 1997! ;-)) Best to follow the sage advice, “Don’t say anything on the Internet that you wouldn’t want to see on the front page of the New York Times.” If you must spill and/or vent, it might be better to buy a nice paper journal, and make your friends read it. 😛