I've been blogging for at least 4 years now and have done my best to keep my identity a secret. Well, not so much a secret, as you sometimes see pictures of me and if you're snooping enough could probably figure out who I am, but I don't just publicize who I am out there. I don't ever reference my last name and I don't put out giant flashing neon signs to tell people that I have a blog. I'll leave little hints here and there.
I also have been keeping a top secret Facebook page for at least a year now (or whenever they invented fine tuning privacy settings). For a long time, you could only see that I even existed on Facebook if you were my friend. If you weren't my friend, I was totally invisible. I have about four different custom friend lists so I can differentiate who is allowed to see what about my life.
But as of late I've created this public persona. I'm not anonymous, so I feel like I definitely am out there. Between being team captain and [co-]founder of Babes for a Cure, starting a food blog, twittering, and exposing just a little bit more of myself through this blog, I feel like I can't be that secretive. I also meet tons of people while I'm out and about or through friends, that I feel like keping a top secret Facebook page limits me from making new friends online unless I seek people out myself.
So I'm stuck at this crossroads. Do I continue keeping my life private and not worrying about the consequences of people finding out things about me, or should I reflect my real life persona into my online persona?
I think I'll be able to do both. There are parts of my life that are meant to be kept private - these are things you'll never read about in my blogs or social networking sites. Facebook fortunately offers the ability to fine tune my privacy settings, so why not apply that everywhere else? You won't ever see me ranting about work, talking about personal issues, complaining about people I know, or posting pictures from the last outing with my girlfriends. What I don't mind is sharing my personality. I want people to know there is a real person behind my online identity.
What I will do is work on figuring out this "brand" that I have. How can I blend together all my little creations and share it with the world? How can I market my image to gain more readership and network? What can I learn from all of these new technologies?
And speaking of new technologies, I finally caved in and got a data plan for my Blackberry. I've had the Pearl for about a year and a half now and have resisted getting internet to my phone. I even went several months without text. I feel like now that I have dove right into social media, keeping two blogs, and use both gcal and my BB to organize my life, it only made sense for me to have it. Let's see if I can handle the extra thirty bucks a month to keep up with the Jones' and keep my life in sync.
I didn't think I'd ever see the day when I would pay to get internet on my phone. Now I really have no idea who I am these days! :p
I also have been keeping a top secret Facebook page for at least a year now (or whenever they invented fine tuning privacy settings). For a long time, you could only see that I even existed on Facebook if you were my friend. If you weren't my friend, I was totally invisible. I have about four different custom friend lists so I can differentiate who is allowed to see what about my life.
But as of late I've created this public persona. I'm not anonymous, so I feel like I definitely am out there. Between being team captain and [co-]founder of Babes for a Cure, starting a food blog, twittering, and exposing just a little bit more of myself through this blog, I feel like I can't be that secretive. I also meet tons of people while I'm out and about or through friends, that I feel like keping a top secret Facebook page limits me from making new friends online unless I seek people out myself.
So I'm stuck at this crossroads. Do I continue keeping my life private and not worrying about the consequences of people finding out things about me, or should I reflect my real life persona into my online persona?
I think I'll be able to do both. There are parts of my life that are meant to be kept private - these are things you'll never read about in my blogs or social networking sites. Facebook fortunately offers the ability to fine tune my privacy settings, so why not apply that everywhere else? You won't ever see me ranting about work, talking about personal issues, complaining about people I know, or posting pictures from the last outing with my girlfriends. What I don't mind is sharing my personality. I want people to know there is a real person behind my online identity.
What I will do is work on figuring out this "brand" that I have. How can I blend together all my little creations and share it with the world? How can I market my image to gain more readership and network? What can I learn from all of these new technologies?
And speaking of new technologies, I finally caved in and got a data plan for my Blackberry. I've had the Pearl for about a year and a half now and have resisted getting internet to my phone. I even went several months without text. I feel like now that I have dove right into social media, keeping two blogs, and use both gcal and my BB to organize my life, it only made sense for me to have it. Let's see if I can handle the extra thirty bucks a month to keep up with the Jones' and keep my life in sync.
I didn't think I'd ever see the day when I would pay to get internet on my phone. Now I really have no idea who I am these days! :p
1 comments:
Wow, I feel so fortunate to know what youre real identity is and who you really are.
But you bring up some good points up not revealing too much of your 'real' self online and keeping those things seperate. I also have been trying to keep lots of my personal identity and life off my blog, but I've found in effect, people who don't already know me, may not be getting a real taste of who I am and I'm also not sharing that much of who I really am. And yet, I don't want to open my whole life up for people's entertainment.
I'm still torn on this one myself.
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