Comments on: Excuse me, sir, but your online persona is showing.

By: Facebook In Reality at cac.ophony.org

Facebook In Reality at cac.ophony.org — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 14:00:16 +0000

[...] all the talk on this blog about Facebook and other social networking sites (see here, here, and here), here’s something that humorously encapsulates some of what unnerves many people [...]

By: Manicuring that Cyberface at cac.ophony.org

Manicuring that Cyberface at cac.ophony.org — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 19:15:24 +0000

[...] To open up this new year, I would like to extend a discussion that got off to a good start in 2006-7: the new possibilities and challenges associated with the fact that we increasingly–whether we like it or not–have an online persona to project, or at the least protect. Kate got this ball rolling with her post, “Excuse me, sir, but your online persona is showing.” [...]

By: Kate

Kate — Sun, 18 Jun 2006 07:06:30 +0000

Great questions, James…

By: James Drogan

James Drogan — Tue, 13 Jun 2006 00:37:20 +0000

I dsitributed “For Some, Online Persona Undermines Resume” to the graduate students and some undergaduate students first thing this morning.

I should have also reminded them of Drogan’s Third Law: “Never put things in an e-mail you would not like to hear read in court.”

I’ve googled myself to find out what’s out there about me. One time I discovered a picture of me that I didn’t know had even been taken. Googling yourself is less an exercise in vanity and more an exercise in awareness.

Now to my point. How does this issue raised by Kate suggest we change the way we teach communication? I’m taking this issue up in a note — “Another Look at Communication Effectiveness” — that has been provoked by this year’s symposium. And I note that early in July preliminary planning for next year’s symposium will be taking place. I hope we also take up the matter of “Communications and the Internet” at this time.

The internet allows for a strange persistence of memory and easy access to that memory. The internet allows (encourages? requires?) new means and methods of communication. Sherry Turkle, in a September 2003 HBR article titled “Technology and Human Vulnerability” makes the point and raises a question: “We knowthat technology changes our lives — but could it be changing our selves as well?”

So, is communications as we have know, love, and practice it be fundamentally changing?