Facebook vs. Privacy
Robynn Arnold recently posted an interesting article, “Is Anything Private in the Age of Internet Social Networking?” She explored how privacy is forfeited once a person shares profile information on Facebook.com – essentially exposing personal Identity attributes to the outside world, all in the name of establishing and nuturing relationships between participants.
It reminds me of a time several years ago when I accompanied a large group of young people on a church-sponsored excursion from Mesa, AZ, to San Diego, CA. We drove in a caravan of several vans, using CB radios to keep in touch with each other. It was quite amazing to hear these teenage kids talking to each other over the CB radios. Conversations that would normally be held in private, constrained to a small group in a closed room, were now being broadcast for everyone to hear. It was as though they didn’t realize that technology was carrying their private conversations beyond the boundaries of the car.
I think it is all a matter of choice. Each of us can choose to share normally private information in cyberspace, or we can choose to forgo the advantages of Internet connectivity. But we can be selective. I choose to be quite open through this blog, LinkedIn and my family website. But trust me, there are things that transpire in the Dixon household that will never reach cyberspace. Discretion is still operative in the Participation Age.
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