By Michael Walsh
With Facebook and Twitter becoming institutionalized in our everyday lives, privacy jumps to the forefront of issues to worry about with every single status update and tweet. Never has this been more true than now, as real-time statuses left from smart phones are taking the place of hours-old statuses left on a computer. It has never been easier for someone to know where you are, where you frequent and where you’re going.
Why on earth would I want to let someone know where I am at that very moment? That’s the question I tackle myself when I even consider using Foursquare on Twitter or Facebook’s new place features to “check in” to a location, letting my friends and followers know where I am at the moment. And if you’re using one of the aforementioned features or applications to do so, you might want to reconsider as well for your own benefit.
There are situations in which all of these features can be used wisely and for positive results. For instance, if you contain your Facebook profile to people you know, and are comfortable knowing, then by all means, this sort of technology can be absolutely beneficial. And if you’re attending a conference with like-minded individuals, you might be able to search for people who are living, breathing and working right among you, some of which might be ready to engage in productive conversation.
On the other hand, if you’re the type to accept every friend request that comes along and don’t bother to limit what they can and cannot view on your profile, you should be hesitant to let them know where you do your grocery shopping, what bars you prefer to frequent and when and where you work. And it goes beyond someone showing up at those places to make your life a living hell. Do you really want to let someone know when your house or apartment is vacant? I can’t imagine what I could gain from telling people, “Hello, I’ll be working at this specific place for a few hours, if you’ve ever wanted to take anything of mine, now’s your chance.”
The website Please Rob Me started as a tool to raise awareness about over-sharing. Before it halted its efforts, the website would search Twitter feeds for location-based tweets, and then message that user automatically telling him or her that their location is public to the entire world on Twitter. Ironically, the site came under some critical fire because it might have been raising too much awareness to the fact that these people weren’t home. It has since stopped serving it’s initial function, but still shares the same message about over-sharing of location-based information.
Foursquare claims that it gives you and your friends a new way of exploring your city or town, but I’ll object. They’re turning real life into a silly game, where checking into a certain location earns the user points and badges. They can eventually even become a “mayor” of a location, meaning they frequent that spot more than anyone. Just sitting on Foursquare’s homepage has let me know that a certain person has become a mayor of a specific laundromat in a specific town in Vermont. Is this really something that our society has begun to become fascinated with? The fact that someone spends more time at one place than anyone else? God forbid someone a little overzealous (or creepy) finds a certain liking or disliking in one of these mayors. They won’t be hard to track down.
We’re all victims to over-exposure, and I’ll admit my partaking on Facebook and Twitter. Now I don’t hold myself to the high opinion that I’m someone worth stalking, but just the idea of this growing and over-exposed society has begun to freak me out. We’re moving at a pace no one has been able to predict. No, it’s not quite like having a big government brother watching every move, a la George Orwell’s 1984, but the idea is there. Of course, in this situation it is our own decision to broadcast our whereabouts and our every move. It’s your conscious effort that allows someone to know that you’re currently sitting in a Starbucks on Main Street in Newington, and nobody else’s, and so the possible repercussions should be conscious as well.
Alternatively, should Facebook and Twitter consciously partake in these location-based features? And if they do, should they warn their users about what they’re really getting themselves into? This is a societal and cultural issue that isn’t getting nearly enough buzz. I can’t even fathom why people feel the need to use it, but that’s best saved for another time and for a deeper study into the mind of a 21st century 20-something year old.
I promise, I don’t intend to freak you out, but we’ve all heard it in the news. The media loves to report on murder, abductions and the disturbing like when it involves technology, because it gives them a fresh and new spin to a depressing subject. And rightfully so, what with the super fast progress of all the social networking platforms. The best thing you can do, if you really want to use these features, is to make sure that the only people seeing these posts about where you’re at are the ones that you want to. The rest should continue to wonder, and shouldn’t have such easy access to your life.
