Digital Tattoo
Brief Overview:
A digital tattoo is the information that exists online about you or your activity. Traditionally this has been referred to as a digital footprint, however the term digital tattoo better describes the term as a tattoo is more permeant than a footprint which can be washed away. One must be responsible about their online activity to ensure that their reputation is not damaged or impacted in a negative way. In today's society it is very easy to damage one's reputation by posting something inappropriate on social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram. These damaging posts can hinder ones future plans such as acceptance to collage or even finding employment. Digital tattoos are not just what one portrays about themselves on social media it also encompasses personal information about a person on the web. This can be public information such as sale of a house, divorce, jobs, relatives names, addresses, and even birth days. It is important to know about your digital tattoo as many of our passwords or secrete questions to retrieve passwords to important personal accounts may be readily out there for the public to view.
My Digital Tattoo:
We were asked to search ourselves online and report about our findings. The first search I conducted was through google with "Joe Waski" typed into the search browser. This search uncovered the most information. It was found that I have a Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter account. The search also uncovered actual posts from those accounts including resent Twitter posts made for my EDU 776 course. The search also uncovered several newspaper articles from different sites that dated back to my high school wresting days. The search also uncovered my state championship wrestling bracket from 1999 on www.IHSA.org. My name was also found on a wrestling web forum called Illinois Mat Men. The most concerning information uncovered from this search included a lot of personal information such as current and past addresses, current and past phone numbers, my age, and a picture of my house.
The second and third search conducted was under "Joseph Waski" and "Joseph A Waski", my formal name. This search did not uncover as much information, however it did uncover more personal information such as current and past jobs, past salaries, relatives names, places lived, phone numbers, and even my mothers and brothers addresses.
I also conducted searches on Nuwber, Intelius, Spokeo, and Zaba Search. These searches did not produce as much information as my google searches. These searches found basic personal information such as phone numbers, addresses, places lived, and relatives names.
Self-Reflection on My Digital Tattoo:
From my recent search I would say that I do not have a strong presence on the web. I would even go as far and say that my reputation on the web is clean and there are no concerns about inappropriate information about me floating around on the web. I would say that I am very concerned about the personal information that is out there on the web. It seems that all the personal information floating around would make it very easy to steal ones identity or even crack some secrete questions by researching the information on the web. I'm very happy that I grew up in the era that I did back when smartphones with cameras and social media did not exist. I empathize with today's youth about the struggles some have with keeping their digital tattoo clean. I see many of my students and former wrestlers make inappropriate posts on the web. I tend to have conversations with them about their choices and content they post about themselves on the web. I let them know that I did not know I wanted to be a teacher when I was in high school, and if I posted some of the things that they post, I may not have a job right now. This assignment reinforced my concerns about social media and the impact that it can have on our youths future. I do believe that students should be taught from an early age that the content they put out on social media and the web is public information and can follow them into adulthood. Schools should have PSA announcements and cover this topic at schoolwide assemblies. My takeaway from this assignment will be continue to preach to my students about being careful of the content they put on the web. For myself, I will be careful about how I create my passwords and what I choose as my secrete questions.
Joe, you bring up a great point about our digital tattoos not always being the things we post ourselves, but what other people tag us in or post about us. In the case of the students and former wrestlers you refer to, they have to learn that a clean digital presence is a collaborative effort. Gaining consent before posting about someone or tagging someone is an important, and necessary, step. Like you, I hope this discourse continues now that our students are so inundated with online resources and social media.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the reflection, Joe. Social media isn't going away so to your point, living in a digital world needs to now become part of our standard curriculum and conversation. It's not enough anymore to do a "don't talk to strangers" chat with our students and then leave the topic alone.
ReplyDeleteJoe, you made a great point when you said that you see that some of your students make inappropriate post and that you have a conversation about it with them. I also touched on this in my post. I remind the cheerleaders that I coach that they need to be mindful about what they are posting. For the most part, they are all pretty good with this and I haven't run into any big problems. I do remind them that once they post something it can be out there forever and you never knew who could see it. As a rule of thumb, I tell them that if they wouldn't want their administration or our athletic director to see it, they should not post it.
ReplyDeleteHi Joe, I appreciate your thoughts on students and content they post on the web. The public nature of their content and the long-term consequences that come with poor choices seem to merge new lessons with old ones. Having schools take a more active role in educating students on this topic will certainly be helpful. I really like your idea of even having it covered at school-wide assemblies. Thank you so much for sharing!
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