Socially Acceptable Media

Social is not private.  That sounds so elementary, doesn’t it?  Why is it then that so many people seem to forget that single, basic tenet when they post something online?

I think a great deal of this duality springs from the nature of computers themselves.  We think of them as machines and as tools.  We think of them as typewriters, and televisions, and DVD players.  Our laptops and cell phones are at our beck and call, dutiful servants of our modern age.

But instead of dutiful servants, what if they were actually agents of our enemies, sent to infiltrate our lives and report back on our most secret dealings?

Here’s the important safety tip for today.  Computers are the agents of our enemies.  We have to begin to take the same caution with our relationships on the Internet as we do with the local gossip.  Don’t say anything you don’t want everyone to be able to find out.  Put in the language of popular culture, Facebook is actually Gladys Kravitz, the nosy neighbor from “Bewitched”.

Here’s a perfect example:  you’re out on your personal Facebook page and let’s say you have the Facebook average of 120 friends (from Lifehacker.com).  You then post a message to a friend’s wall, and then proceed to converse back and forth for a period of time.  You can always go back to the wall and review your conversation, or continue it – but did you know all of your friends, and all of their friends can see it too?  And they can comment on it?  Suddenly, what you had assumed was a private conversation is no longer private at all.  You might as well have been sitting in a coffee shop where everyone could eavesdrop.

Viewing the Internet as a city is much better than viewing your internet connection as a tool.  In a city, you can have movie theaters (YouTube and Hulu), you can have cafes where you can gather with friends (MySpace and Facebook), or you can have broadcast media (Twitter) where anyone who’s listening can join in.  We must remember that just like in any city, anything we say when we aren’t completely certain we’re alone, may come back to haunt us.

What we say isn’t the only thing that can haunt us though.  Where we’ve been, and even who we’ve been, never really fade online.  I mentioned earlier than the Internet can be a theater, a cafe, or a broadcast center – but it’s first and best function is that of a library.  The internet is a labyrinth of corridors and rooms and dusty shelves, where nothing is ever purged.  Anyone with a little computer experience can find virtually anything, about anyone, online.  Curious as to whether that new friend, classmate, or business associate has any secrets?  Go hunt down their MySpace page.  Before supplanted by Facebook as “the” landing spot on the web, MySpace was notorious for creating bad impressions.  Yes – it was a good way to share information with friends, but there was zero privacy, and it was prevalent at a time when no one really thought about privacy.  You would be amazed at what’s still out there.  I used to work with someone who was actually denied another job because of some things posted on his MySpace page.

How do we achieve privacy online?  We need to be very careful about what we post and on comment on.  We should all carefully craft our online personas to reflect exactly how we would want people to see us.  We need to tailor our internet experiences based on who we interact with and how those associations fit with the rest of our lives.

There’s nothing wrong with being social, so long as there’s a private place to come home to.

I don’t use Facebook anymore.  I did for a time but came to realize that it simply was not an appropriate venue where I could digitally exist; my personal and professional relationships were just too complex to coexist in such a small space.

Still, in light of this series on managing online identities, I decided to interview someone who seems to fit the profile of the standard Facebook user.  Kate is a professional hair stylist/makeup artist for print, TV, film, and theater.  I presented her with several questions in an effort to get a sense of how and why she uses Facebook:

Do you use any social networking platforms?  (i.e. Twitter, Facebook, etc)

Yes.

Which one do you use most regularly and why?

I use Facebook.  I chose Facebook because it is the easiest and least intrusive of the social networking platforms I researched. It’s easy to post updates to Facebook, and I don’t receive constant communications from Facebook.  I found Myspace to be too cumbersome (I’m not a programmer – I’m a user), and receiving “tweets” all day long would be too annoying and intrusive in my daily life.

How long have you been using your primary social media site?

I signed up with Facebook about a year ago, but have only actively been using it for the past 6 months.

What was your initial reason for joining?

A friend recommended it to me as a means of professional networking.

Why do you continue to use it?  Do you use it for personal or professional reasons?

I do continue to use Facebook.  I use it for both personal and professional reasons.

If you use the site for both personal and professional contacts, how do you manage the blending of information between groups?

Very carefully.  I am fully aware that my personal view may have an impact on how my professional contacts view me.  I tend to steer away from political or controversial updates and statements, although occasionally I do post something that may raise an eyebrow, usually in response to something I find particularly narrow minded or strongly disagree with.  I have found that my personal philosophy tends to me more in line with those of my professional colleagues, so I haven’t received any negative feedback professionally.  I think it’s paramount to keep personal and professional information separated, but I temper that with the philosophy that it’s also good for professional contacts to know a bit about me personally.  It strengthens the professional relationship – so long as the communications aren’t too inflammatory.  Personally:   I have found using Facebook is an optimal way of keeping up with friends, some whom I had not heard from in years.  My personal contacts are interested in what I’m doing (both personally and professionally), and I’m able to manage the separation by using “the wall” for my personal contacts  and conversations and using my public wall to manage both simultaneously.  So far, it’s worked beautifully.  That being said, I think it’s important for those who use this platform to be conscious of who’s viewing their account.  I always keep this in mind when writing.  Rarely have I written something that I felt I just needed to get off my chest.  I reserve those conversations for private gatherings – usually in person.

What has been your best experience using the site?  What has been your worst experience?

My best experience is an overall experience.  I have been given access to professional contacts whom I otherwise would not have access to.  As such, I have expanded my professional network far beyond what it was even 6 months ago. Also, I am thrilled to finally catch up with people I had lost contact with after they had moved to other areas of the country.  It’s nice to see their families and keep up with what’s going on in their lives.  Facebook makes it easy.

My worst experience is a personal one – people who aren’t aware of who may be viewing their postings have said things that are personally offensive to me.  This is good in a way though, you do get to see who people really are, but it has impacted a few friendships.  After reading these offensive postings – I really question the validity of the friendship and whether I want to continue it.  It seems to me, that in some cases it brings out the worst in people.  They can reveal their deepest and ugliest secrets and opinions because they feel anonymous behind a keyboard.  They fail to realize that there are people attached to the viewing eyes on the other side.

As you can see, Kate has managed the delicate balance between personal and professional lives and can use Facebook to the benefit of both.  As she said though, it is important to remember who can see what you post – and to always be aware that the people who read your posts are part of your community and their views and sensibilities should always be respected.

“We all have a face that we hide away forever
And we take them out and show ourselves when everyone has gone.”
© 1977, Billy Joel/Impulsive Music

Most of us are social creatures – in fact, if you’re reading this blog you must have some level of interest in social media or social networking likely belong to one or more sites or groups.  Social media sites are wonderful tools because they allow us to disseminate information to a wide audience very quickly and anyone who follows us will get the message.

But is it that way in the physical world?  Would we want everyone who “follows us”, all of our friends, relatives, and business associates to read the same messages?

For myself, the answer is a resounding “no!”.  It’s also the same for many people I’ve spoken to on the subject.  In “real life”, we tend to refer to this concept as worlds colliding, and such a prospect can have equally disastrous sounding results.  Family members being exposed to business conversations, associates eavesdropping on things you tell your friends, or even a potential employer finding your profile and dredging up everything – all of these could make for a very bad day.

Before the advent of the internet, search engines, and social media; managing these kind of collisions was relatively easy.  We could compartmentalize areas of our lives and makes sure the contents of one compartment never overflowed into another.  Today things are far more complicated.  When we post something to Facebook or Twitter or Friendfeed or any other networking site it’s there for any of our followers to see, and without some digital gymnastics it stays there forever.

Solving this problem is fairly straightforward if you’re just starting out.  If you can identify the compartments in your life, you can tailor multiple online identities to allow you to segregate your contacts.  I have three separate Twitter accounts, two Yahoo identities, and manage three different websites; all done in an effort to keep everyone in their own tidy little compartment.  My professional life, my closed personal life, and my semi-public personas all have their own outlets.

This isn’t to say that information is never shared between them, in fact many times I paste the same tweet to each group.  Also, there are some people who know about multiple feeds and subscribe to more than one.  My primary reason for compartmentalization is to separate my professional/academic life from my social life, and having multiple identities has become the simplest solution.

Deciding to split your personalities after the fact is much more challenging though, especially once you’ve already built a robust network of followers.  For a public persona, you’ll want to leave the follow feature as open as possible so anyone can join without you having to constantly review and approve their requests.  For the more private self, you’ll want to maintain as much control and privacy as possible.  The problems are the people who are on the fence; the friends who are too close to just be professional, but not quite family.  How do you tell someone you don’t want to friend them on Facebook when you have a close rapport with them in real life?

This is where the digital life collides with the psychology of relationships, and where this post ends.  Online or offline, personal or professional, we need to manage all of our relationships with care.  It’s too easy to forget that behind the bits and bytes on your screen are real people with real feelings.  The best way to build lasting relationships in the real world is through honesty and respect, and we should strive to remember that in the digital realm the same ethos applies.

Feel free to add comments on how you might have encountered some of the problems illustrated here, and how you may have found ways to solve them!!