I'm wondering... does this social media thing have the best of intentions? We're now singled out as those "kids" who fail to check their facts. Obviously, none of us in fact meet those descriptions, but the two-dimensional sphere of social media has us pegged that way. Sure, we're "kids" essentially, in that (probably) none of us own property, have children, or any sort of real responsibilities. We are, however, intelligent, coherent people, who (almost) have a college degree, and do research so to contribute relevant information to our class blogs.
A myspace profile has various blanks for personality traits, as do our blogger profiles. Age, sex, location, etc. Sometimes there's a section for favorite books, one for movies, and even a place to input a favorite song to play for visitors. Sure, you can write about your political party stance, hopes, dreams, whatever. But does this really say anything about you?We put ourselves out there, labeled by these social media profiles, and not one of us is represented to the full extent of our potential. Is that good? Do we feel the need to veil our identities behind a mere 6 point image profile? I'm not saying that we should put all sorts of information on the internet. Of course I stand by the fact that we should keep things to the imagination. I just worry that our "digital selves" don't do us justice.
This whole Digital Axle thing has really bothered me. Mainly because I hate it when people label without justification, but really because I think it's entirely contradictory. Check our facts, huh? A classmate's bold post upsetting the CEO is just as bad as brazenly labeling an entire class as one incompetent body. I never blogged about the Digital Axle issue initially, because to be honest, I didn't find it that intriguing. The aftermath, however, has really struck a nerve. I hate to harp on this, and I'm not trying to take the activist stance, but I'm merely pointing out how social media has its downfalls. We're not bad people, we're not incompetent, but without further research, the internet can portray anyone in that light.
1 comment:
I'm going to comment on several things in one fell swoop.
1) I see where you are coming from about how it limits us, but in a sense that limited idea of who we are is broadcasted EVERYWERE. but most assuredly, we should keep the kegger pictures to ourselves.
2) Watching the CEO of Digital Axle try to clear his name in the wake of this bloodbath reminds me a lot of the current Roger Clemens situation: desperate, sad, questionable, and ultimately pathetic. I think there is a good saying that is "let your yes, be your yes, and your no be your no". I don't have a problem with this guy defending his position once in an open forum. Hats off to him. But don't expect for everyone to instantaneously believe you, and seriously, attacking students on a hardly viewed blog is a little much. I'm not pointing guilt or innocence but sometimes people go to very unnecessary lengths to exonerate themselves, when really they should be running a company or pitching baseballs. Honestly, even a bunch of "kids" know better than that. We learned it in public relations 101.
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