Privatize Your Private Lives

I have a blog. No secret there. Aside from a few posts (in particular, "A Tale of Two Undies"), I comment on issues that affect me but don't necessarily address everything about me.

For example, I won't talk about my sex life or extremely private relationship matters (although I did publish a scathing post-breakup post [detailing lies I was told and my heartbreak caused by those lies] for a few hours, which I then disassembled from this electronic gallery due to my guilt over publicly lashing him - even though what I wrote was all true), share photographs of anyone other than myself, nor will I provide personal details about family members.

That being said, the Web has entrapped itself in its own weave. It's now fashionable to make your private life public, and social networking takes nodes and structures to a new level beyond the layperson's basic comprehension. When you create a profile on Facebook, you're doing more than just posting a profile and a picture. (If you want to learn more, go have fun with words like Dunbar's number, cohesion coefficient, and so forth.)

Our elementary glee with "Googling" ourselves, friends, family, and past loves makes me wonder whether all of this public information blurs, if not obliterates, the lines of privacy and protection. Have our lives become mere bits for electronic investigation?

What would we want to see hidden from public view? Is it even possible anymore?

So, before you post that pic to MySpace, blog about your boyfriend's orange navel from his half-baked attempt at the tanning salon, and join a seemingly-innocent network on FaceBook, think about what that information can do to you, your career, and your social network - and I'm not talking about the binary friends online but the flesh and blood, breathing friends who you will have to face in the real world.