Are you ready for your digital legacy?
Our words, images, video, and audio files will be around for a long, long time. To me, it seems very likely that the digital content we create through all forms of social media, Web pages, forms, etc. which are indexed by Google and other search engines will be around for an indefinite period of time. I can see at least some of this content being available in some form for decades.
Many of us have young children (mine are both under the age of ten) who aren’t as adept with Web functionality as teens and adults. Many Web users are teens and Gen Y types who haven’t yet started families and have no offspring.
Today your friends, family, colleagues, employers, neighbors, etc. can find out lots of stuff about you, especially if you are active in social media and use your real name.
In the coming years, your children, nieces and nephews, and their friends will be able to check out your Digg, Reddit, and Mixx voting record; your StumbleUpon likes; your photos and videos; your movie, TV, and music interests; your blog posts and comments; and so on. They’ll get a view of you that they might not see from face-to-face interactions.
Do you ever think about this? Does it concern you? Are you ready for this coming scrutiny? And do you ever think about the impact of your online content on the generation(s) to come?
Vedo:
There are great thoughts on our digital footprints. I think you are smart to bring this up if for nothing else then to provide a bit of self-assessment. Thanks for the reminder.
25 June 2009, 11:58 pmNoel:
Scrutiny will just make you a stronger person. It's a good thang.
26 June 2009, 12:06 amMark Dykeman:
Hey, a little foresight can go a long way…
26 June 2009, 9:54 amMark Dykeman:
I don't know if this is really a case of making you stronger, but it's certainly a smart approach.
26 June 2009, 9:55 amAdam Singer:
I love that my content will be around longer than me – hopefully forever. As an artist it is a real motivator to keep making more and better art. Same as a writer.
27 June 2009, 3:18 pmMichael Kozakewich:
I'm actually kind of excited to have an entire generation on file. I've read a couple of papery this-n-thats from my parents' early days, but they really don't have any sort of an online history.
1 July 2009, 2:55 amIt would be like looking at those old photo albums, and realizing your uncle in that photo was younger than you are now. Except more public.
mark mayhew:
recommending: “Are you ready for your digital legacy”
3 July 2009, 9:08 amMark Dykeman:
Immortality, Adam?
5 July 2009, 5:35 pmMark Dykeman:
Plus no photo album, right?
5 July 2009, 5:36 pmIan Rountree:
There's a certain merit to being findable, though the compressed timestamp effect is a bit disturbing. I've known people who have been fired for Facebook uploads depicting them ten years ago as drunken adolescents, which is a bit extreme. Conversely, I spent most of my life intentionally being impossible to google, and only recently floated myself a plethora of social media involvements for the sake of avoiding identity theft (fifty pictures on ten disparate sites can't be wrong about who the real me is, right?).
There's a fine balance to walk here, and I think one of the tools the parents of digital natives will need to use is teaching their kids how to keep things in context. It's not just “don't friend strangers on Facebook” any more, is it?
5 August 2009, 11:27 pmcariofthevalley:
That's actually a very interesting post. I just wrote a post about kids and their digital legacy (http://rawandrandom.blogspot.com/2009/08/childr...) but hadn't given much thought to the reverse challenge. I am very careful about my online world…I do use my name but I am well aware that everything I say will be out there for a long long time, perhaps forever, and that anyone with a halfway decent ability to do a basic search can find what I've linked to, said, etc. Any thoughts on conveying this kind of information to kids?
25 August 2009, 12:09 pmcariofthevalley:
Ian – I completely agree with the need for balance! I am concerned about my little digital natives growing up in a world where they create a legacy that can haunt them forever when they are too young to consider the consequences. It's important, I think, that parents stay a step ahead in understanding these nuances so we can protect our children (and ignore their protests) until they are old enough to really understand the possible impact of their digital footprint.
25 August 2009, 12:11 pmIan Rountree:
Quite. Having a two year old (at time of writing) of my own, I know we can't protect them from everything, as much effort as we put into trying to do so. The teaching of these nuances is necessary as well.
Too often the obsession with child-proofing the world overcomes the task of world-proofing the child.
25 August 2009, 12:24 pm