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Every morning I drive the E12 – the AKLEH highway – to work. Every morning I read an electronic sign that says “Thank you for helping to keep our highway accident free!” It’s “our” highway. Like we are some kind of community. A community of people in cars who travel the same path. Do I know any of these people? Well, maybe there is an occasional colleague that I see or sometimes I get the same lady at the toll booth. Every once in awhile I see the same bus or guy on a motorcycle carrying a thousand newspapers (this guy makes an impression on a former kid-with-a-paper-route).
As much as I’m watching out for the paper guy or the toll booth lady, others may be watching out for me. Perhaps they are wondering if that crazy lady in the red Kembara is going to cut them off this morning (I never do that). Maybe it is just the traffic cameras taking notice (I just found them online). Whatever the case, we are some kind of weird community of people who are in the same space at roughly the same time. My actions leave an impression. I can choose to drive at or under the speed limit. I can choose to smile at the toll booth lady. I can choose not to curse the motorcycle drivers no matter how entitled they seem to think they are. My actions make an impact on the safety and dare I say overall cultural climate of our little highway community.
This I relate to the digital community where my actions also have an impact. We all leave our digital footprint wandering around. I used to teach a class to 7th graders called Online Literacy and I have to say I did enjoy the part where I showed them just how much I could find out about them with a simple search aided by their lack of knowledge of privacy settings on Facebook. It was great to pull something up they didn’t think I could ever see and then watch their freaked out faces turn to gratitude when I showed them how to use those privacy settings. Is that a twisted sense of humor or a teacher being rewarded by student growth? Maybe both, but you should quit judging me now because we have ALL Googled someone in our lives.
What I’ve been trying to wrap my head around are these sites that will show who has been looking at your profile. I go to Linkedin(without signing in)
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and see that whoever looked at my profile has looked at a bunch of people from Korea International School. Okay, I’ve got a friend who recently was hired there. I can figure that out. I also see by looking at the last 5 people who have viewed my profile that I actually know who 3 of them are (a former student, a good friend, a guy who is trying to get me to invest with him). And then there are a couple randoms. Why are these people looking at me? If I click on their name to find out more, then my name will appear on their lists. This is when the freaking out begins on my part.
I recently joined a group called Internations. Fabulous group. Very friendly people. But in the first few days of joining I had several people “twinkle” me. Excuse me? I’ve just been twinkled and I really don’t know how to feel about that. I also don’t know how to feel when I click on the first “twinkler” to find out who this person is and then get a message from him thanking me for viewing his profile. How did he know?!
Turns out that like Linkedin, you can know who is looking at you. This is where the freaking out continues.
I start to think about how a few years ago I was teaching kids to mind their Digital Footprints and here I am not paying much attention to what I’m doing tramping around the internet.
That’s not completely true. I mind what I put online. I just wasn’t minding where other people saw me wandering around.
Recently a friend posted on Facebook about teaching kids about their Digital Tattoo. A good update on our footprint metaphor I think. I mean this stuff really is more permanent than a footprint. Very few of those stand the test of time. Tattoos, now those are painful and difficult to get rid of. Mistakes can last a lifetime with those. Even if you do get a coverup there are probably people who can still see what was under there. It is never really gone.
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I love this idea of promoting the good footprint/tattoo as so much is usually concerned about the negative. Let’s think positive about all this. Get some good ink! Make your tattoo something worth having. I love it.
Don’t get anything permanent that you are bound to regret one day. Maybe you think it is awesome today but there will come a time when the face tattoo does not, in fact, put you in touch with the goddess within. (I’m just making some assumptions here with this lady)
To try to tie this whole thing together, I guess what I have been thinking about most are how these weird little or large virtual communities, be it the AKLEH highway or the information super highway, are affected by me and I by them. Just like a “real” community of people who live together or work together or whatever, what I do and say has a long lasting effect. So just like in my non-virtual communities, I will attempt to put forth my best foot in order to be a positive member of the community and allow people to see the best version of me.
SpectacuLarsen vs. the World 