What I found to be the most interesting concept of "The Facebook Effect" is the whole idea about the positive and negative outcomes about expressing too much of yourself on the internet. According to Mark Zuckerberg, social and personal lives should not be separated from one another. The world should be open and honest and a place where each individual has one identity. Evan Sheryl Sandberg explicitly states, "You can't be on Facebook without being your authentic self." My biggest question is determining whether or not this is a valid statement. There is always that chance of a fake identity which "The Facebook Effect" talks about later in the article. Someone could create a fake name and create an entire persona based on lies. To counteract this assumption, Zuckerberg explains how the people around you help create your persona even if it contradicts the fake life you are trying to create. In other words if you write one thing on your status but your friends write something else on your wall, it is clear that there are many different aspects out of your control that contribute to defining your identity.
Following along the pathway of not having control, nothing on Facebook is confidential. Although there are multiple privacy settings that have been tweaked due to popular demand, Facebook contains information that extends beyond a small circle of people. For instance, companies have rejected 35% of applicants due to inappropriate pictures uploaded on this website. Athletes have been suspended from schools after the principal witnesses pictures of these students smoking or drinking at a party. There are even more extreme measures such as a women being arrested due to animal violence after publicly displaying pictures of drowning rabbits on Facebook. Overall, this leads back to the same repeatedly asked questions. How much information should be displayed on Facebook? How is Facebook positively and negatively affecting the lives of people on a more extreme level? How could we be sure out information is being used the way we say it should?
In my opinion, the idea of being your open, honest self is not necessarily the best thing to do. There are consequences for revealing your full identity on the web and I think some aspects of your life should be kept private. How do you guys feel about this idea?
Also what I found interesting was the fact that Facebook along with other forms of new media websites is not just something on the web. It leaks into our everyday occurrences. It becomes addicting and people can become obsessive. Some people must take pictures and post them on Facebook to prove that a night actually took place in the real world. According to the article, "Social Media and Young Adults" Facebook has taken over the social network of choice for adults 18 years and older. Everyone is aware of how much social networking is taking over lives in contemporary society. "Writing, Technology and Teens" has several surveys that discuss the allure of social networking communities and how they affect people of different race and gender. Although girls have a higher percentage of usage, boys are using social networking devices as well in order to keep up. According to a 9th/10th grade girl, "It sounds stupid and everything but once you like get into it it's really like addicting..." This article continues to show how prevalent social networking is today and the effects they have on the lives of students inside and outside of school. The fact that social networking slang could even seep into our schoolwork is another aspect of new media that I found shocking. People actually tend to unconsciously use informal writing in school and daily communications. One girl even admitted to saying "LOL" out loud! What does this say about social networking today? Although it increases communication skills which is definitely a positive contribution to society, do the negative aspects outweigh the positive? What do you think?
Rian,
ReplyDeleteYour thoughts are very similar to mine and brandon's. As I wrote in response to his post, I agree that being one's open and honest self on facebook isn't completely true. Not only do some people keep aspects of their life private from facebook, but I also think that there are people who change their identity on facebook to give themselves an image such as "cool", "funny", or "mature".
As you said, many people post pictures of themselves on facebook to document a night. This could be a form of changing their image, if they document only certain types of nights, like one's of them drinking. This behavior could be an attempt to change one's image to "cool kid". There are many other ways to do this as well, but my point is that there is definitely not 100% honesty on facebook profiles.
Additionally, I find the fact that a girl admitted to saying "LOL" out loud as an indication of just how taken over much of the world is by social media. It consumes many of us, myself included.
Questions that come to mind about just how addictive social media websites are: What is it about facebook that makes it so hard to resist checking every day? Why has it taken over other similar websites like myspace?