What is Privacy in the World of Blogging?

With the vast technological advances that have taken place in the past couple of decades, and the inexplicable ability to make contact with virtually anyone, anywhere within seconds, we start to wonder how valuable privacy truly is to the millions of users worldwide.

Personally I feel as though we all want free control of our own privacy to share as much, or as little as we personally desire. At the same time we also want the reassurance that the creators of the technology that we are using have our privacy in mind as well. This is where Facebook steps its way into many of our lives.

Almost everyone has heard throughout the media about Facebook’s battle with privacy, and how many users have reacted to the lack of privacy. Over the years the privacy settings have been altered and made easier to navigate, but did everyone using Facebook really expect full privacy? Constantly we hear about people being turned down for professional and academic opportunities because of their account material.

From the time I initially had an account in high school, which was hidden from my parents who were against the idea, I was always pretty carefully about what was posted.  In the past year though I have felt somewhat torn and have joined the many, altering my settings from time to time. One on hand I would like to make my settings very public for business networking purposes, but on the other hand as private as possible from strangers. I have found myself asking whether or not it really makes sense to even have an account if I do not want most people having access. Motives and individual differences in my case especially have played a huge role in my viewing and sharing habits. Overall, I would consider myself more reserved than most in my interactions on the internet.

Up until reading about ‘work blogs’ I had no idea that these types of blogs had a specific terminology attributed to them. These blogs give the individuals the opportunity to ‘reflect critically” on their workplace experiences. These blogs are rather fascinating as they would most likely be a great resource for any higher up individual, or company establishing guidelines for treatment of their employees.

Obviously when these blogs are anonymous there would be no way to track down the author as they would technically have full privacy. When they are not anonymous the consequences are detrimental to the employee’s professional life. One would hope that with the rise in this type of blogging the workplace would adapt and provide an outlet for their employees to give constructive feedback rather than risk their job through bad mouthing their employee and company on the internet.

Culturally, these work blogs should highlight some very important areas for improvements within the working world. Like anything else on the internet, and in common with a number of blogs that I have followed the work seems too often be highly dramatized and maybe not so close to the truth as we often times make it out to be. As a result these must be taken with a grain of salt, and as noted make them a “slippery slope” for studying as they are so constantly changing.

Ultimately, aside from how the computer site is designed to protect us we must make our own decision at the end of the day. It is up to us to protect ourselves and choose what type of information we would like to disclose to others, amongst the vast number of strangers who also utilize the internet around the world.

~ by Shelby Iverson on January 28, 2012.