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Facebook Haters Club

May 2, 2011 Agent X 3 Comments

It is no secret that there are many people out there that absolutely hate facebook.

In fact, FB has become the default website to blame for most of the wrongs on the internet. In someway or another, haters can track a relationship between facebook and pretty much any bad thing they happen to face.
Yep, facebook has taken over the title of “cause of the downfall of humankind”, which television used to hold.

So many people openly hate facebook, yet many of those same people use it all the time.
It is a weird, self-abusive kind of relationship that I personally do not understand.

It is true that information can be shared via facebook,which you may not want to have shared. Yet, the people complaining about this are the same people that put the info there in the first place.
If you don’t want the info online, then just simply DON”T PUT IT ONLINE.

Unfortunately, common sense seems to be turned off when a lot of people log-on to the internet, and this means that after they do something stupid online, they need someone to blame. So they turn to FB.

Many of the reasons that people hate facebook are silly little things that can, and should be, overlooked if you want to use facebook.
Getting angry & starting a group because you don’t like the font facebook is written in is ridiculous.
(Although, any groups asking for Friend suggestions to be stopped are totally OK with me. *LIKE*)
There are not just groups, but entire sites devoted to hating on FB, such as sickfacebook.com. These sites have top-notch articles on them, like “How Facebook makes you Dumb and Stupid“, “6 Advantages of Not Using Facebook” and “Facebook is Stupid”

I find it ironic that the articles on this site have a “Share to Facebook” link. Doesn’t that defeat the purpose of the site?

At least the Quit Facebook Day site had a clear objective to achieve. Granted, it failed miserably, but it let you know WHY it was asking you to leave facebook. Sites like SickFacebook are unclear in their aims and appear just to be against FB for the sake of it.

Overall, I am not personally anti-facebook, but there are things about it which annoy me.
However, I also realise that I need to understand that using FB is a choice I make, not a requirement to living.
And if I really find that I hate it, I can leave.
Or else, I can just go onto twitter and slag it off,like any other self respecting social-media user would do.

Your true profile

March 27, 2011 Agent X 3 Comments

Most employers check out potential new hires on facebook these days.

According to CareerBuilder.co.uk, more than half (53%) of employers research potential job candidates on social networks such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, etc.
The days of simply relying on the candidates CV and what their referees say, is long gone.
Our ability to easily upload content to the internet from anywhere means that future employers will be tempted to look for this content in order to better understand what you may be really like.

They want to confirm that what you have on your CV is factual, and that you are not a secret sociopath who may cause damage to the company in the future. Also, human nature being what it is, they just want to know stuff about you.

A decent percentage of employers do admit to finding out items online, which has persuaded them to not hire a candidate.
For example, this article discusses a female psychiatrist being passed over for a role, due to pictures posted on facebook.

And it does not end at getting the job.
As I have blogged about before, you can get “facebook fired” ifyou decide to post negative comments about fellow workers or the company that employs you.

The rise of activity like this has led to companies such as Reputationdefender.com, and many others, springing up. Reputationdefender.com offers to monitor your Web reputation for $10 USD a month, plus a one-time fee of $30 USD to remove something from the internet, if an unwanted item somehow gets out of control.
This is a good service and may be very useful to some people.

I still believe that the simplest course of action to defend your reputation, is simply to use your common sense.
If that fails, then here are some quick tips to keep in mind:

IF you want to post suspect comments, blogs or pictures, then make sure of your privacy settings first.
BEFORE you add work colleagues as facebook friends, set up a group with limited privacy settings, and add them to that group. Then (if you need to) you can post things that they do not have permissions to view.
IF you must post a suspect/spicey/goatse image online, try using an anonymous image loader, such as imgur.com.
Then, the image url cannot be traced back to you.
PRIVATE twitter accounts are easy to set up. Use one if you want to tweet & share privately. Just lock the account and off you go.
ADULT dating sites don’t always need your face in the picture. However, you still need to use your head when using them.
COMMUNITIES can be forgiving or they can turn on you. THINK before you post.
When something gets posted online, it can remain there FOREVER. Even if you try to delete it. There are backups, copies and caches to make sure nothing is lost.
(Although Twitter now removes deleted tweets from searches, some services such as Friendfeed,or clients such as Tweetdeck, can retain these tweets.)
RESPECT other people’s content and be aware that if you post or share their content it might breach copyright laws. For example, a photo that your friend took is their property, not yours. You can only post it online if you have their permission.

If you want to do well on the internet, I actually advise you to adopt a paranoid mindset, so that you will THINK BEFORE YOU POST. This will help make your online life much easier to enjoy.

Obey the rules

February 20, 2011 Agent X 7 Comments

Sometimes companies can have social media policies that do far more harm than good.

The “social media policy” is something that many of us can now find in our company handbooks or OH&S policies.
Apparently, only 29% of companies have a formal policy on employee social media usage in place, but of those that do, many seem to have gone a little overboard and made them overly strict.

While it is important for companies to set out guidelines on how employees can use online media while during work hours (an sometimes even dictating how they use it out-of-hours) these policies need to be flexible enough not to create issues every time an employee posts something.

Strict rules over social media use in the workplace, can lead to lawsuits and plenty of bad press – precisely the kind of thing these policies are trying to prevent.

There are many reports of people being fired due to posts on twitter and facebook. There is even a website documenting cases of people being “facebook fired“.
Some stories are funny due to the sheer ignorance shown by the poster like this one.
Others can be far more serious – such as an AP reporter being reprimanded for a facebook post, teachers being let go or being fired for letting off steam about work in your own time.

It is obvious that many businesses are unsure how or what to do regarding policing their employees & social media. But being dictatorially strict about it is definitely not the answer.
If you are looking to write a policy for how your staff use social media soon, why not browse through this library of Social Media policies from other companies, and choose the best course of action for your organisation?

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