Week 4: Social Media - does it define us?

Some parents worry that the emergence of social media has over-publicized the lives of their children and that it has made them too vulnerable. Some say that it dictates their behaviour, compels them to reinvent themselves and that it thus erodes individual identity.

The questions that came to my mind as I read this week's chapters and articles are along these lines:

1. Does social media dictate our behaviour?
2. Are we compelled to use it?
3. Do we become unemployable if we're not on LinkedIn, or uncool if we don't Tweet, or nerdy if we don't use Instagram? 

I think these questions are important for educators as the answers provide access to the psyche of the minds of our students, at least a little bit.

Is it possible that social media platforms are the only escape our children have from the ubiquitous supervision of their parents? I remember when I was growing up, my mother would push me out the door to go play and would not expect me back until I was hungry. Today's children seem to have little time unsupervised - they move from school, to the bus, to after-school programmes, to hockey or soccer, and then home again. So maybe kids need to spend time with their peers, outside of the adult gaze - and maybe this is what created momentum for the invention of tools like Facebook (Zuckerberg was a clever kid)?

I don't know - just wondering...

Social media sites like MySpace and Facebook are about self absorption, self expression, and the development of social networks (strong ties, weak ties, and strong weak ties [Jones & Hafner, 2012, p. 146]). So how come it's not just for kids? How come adults are as connected to social media as they are? Why do adults seem to be just as drawn into the desire to cultivate and propagate online social networks? Is there something missing in our non-virtual reality? Why do we have a need to become a part of this culture of hypervisibility? I'm not saying it's dystopian, I'm simply wondering why. 

Now to another issue I'm pondering. Privacy. 

As we align ourselves with free social networks like Facebook, we should also be aware that the network feeds off our data. In a manner of speaking, we are being exploited. Our data is mined and sold. We have become the product. As we go out there and manufacture our identities, whatever identity that might be (a different one for different purposes and different SM networks), our data is being gleaned. That's not always such a terrible thing - targeted advertisements are significantly less annoying than general broadcasts for things we don't want (like a combine harvester). So if we expect something in return (decent advertising, or a push prompt from an app that is pertinent to ones time and space) then that's just fine and dandy.

Regarding privacy, there are several considerations. Will privacy will become one of the most valuable commodities of this century? When you consider that sites such as Facebook are free, and that they collect our data, then we cannot expect to NOT pay for the Facebook service and ALSO think that we can own our data - or can we? I've heard it argued that as we create more and more public images of ourselves online, we are becoming (relatively unfamous) celebrities. With celebrity status, comes the loss of the right of ownership of our identities. In other words, those who seek to find a way to erase data may not be able to due to the very publicness of our identities in the 21st century (Keen, 2012 - Digital Vertigo).  

• I wonder whether there is such a thing as data literacy? 
• Does ownership of data become a political issue - data is power - we are data?
• I wonder what the government does/has the potential capacity to do with our data
• Actually, the government probably isn't the biggest powerhouse of data - what about Apple, Google?
• Can the data ever disappear or is it there forever - and do we want it there forever? 

Data that is disseminated through social media sites is not necessarily only personal data however. What about the shared intelligence created by networks of professionals. The potential to amass tons of data on one area of research via social media networks represents a rich source of innovation. What a disaster it would be if rules were created regarding the deletion of data - rules which generalized and which jeopardized information that resides outside the realm of self-absorbed consumption, rules which could destroy the productive potential of connecting billions of people together.

By the way, Zuckerberg said "you've only got one identity". Pretty sure he got that one wrong.

References (not APA):
Many of the ideas in this post are taken from Norman Lewis and the web site www.bigpotatoes.org; and Andrew Keen's book "Digital Vertigo" downloadable at https://archive.org/stream/digitalvertigo00keen#page/22/mode/2up.