Jon Jolly

The BBC are running a story today about the dangers of posting too much information to social networking websites like MySpace, FaceBook, etc. While this information is nothing new (stories of cyber-theft, bullying and suicide have been coming thick and fast for a while) the article comes at the angle of how this information can ruin future careers.

Some 71% of 2,000 14 to 21-year-olds said they would not want colleges or employers to do a web search on them before they had removed some material.

The Government’s Information Commissioner’s Office found half of those they surveyed made personal information public.

“The cost to a person’s future can be very high if something undesirable is found by the increasing number of education institutions and employers using the internet as a tool to vet potential students or employees. This shows that when young people are made aware that their details could be being passed between parties - legitimate or unscrupulous - they are worried. We have to help teenagers wise up to every aspect of the internet age they’re living in.

To this end the ICO have launched a website aimed at letting young people know their information rights.

The tables have turned…

No longer is it safe to assume that as an adult you are safe in internet chatrooms as this story suggests. From the article:

“A 22-year-old Florida man has been held up at gunpoint after going to meet an 18-year-old he made contact with on the MySpace network.According to reports, Ernest Evans had arranged a date with a woman calling herself Natalia after the two had been chatting online. Natalia claimed she was 18, and said in her profile that she was “Lookin’ for something fun”. However, Natalia is said to have been a fictional persona invented by a pair of teenaged girls, 13-year-old Rafaella Yusupova and 14-year-old Yana Galilova.

When he arrived at their agreed rendezvous, Evans told police, the two girls approached him and asked to borrow his phone. Once he had handed it over to one of the girls, the other held a loaded gun to his head and demanded his wallet and money.”

I love how surreal this story is: two hardened schoolgirl criminals setup and rob an innocent adult! There’s some similarity to the recent provocative and uncomfortable movie Hard Candy, but thankfully no bloodshed involved. There’s no way I’m ever going to meet up with someone I met online now, imagine having to explain it to your friends!

Although I signed up for MySpace back in November, I’ve not really done much with my page as I post most of my thoughts up here. If I’m honest I still don’t really see the purpose of adding millions of friends and then never speaking to them, BUT I’ve now found an excellent use for the site.

By changing my profile to a Band profile, I’ve uploaded some of my songs that I recorded with Ben and Dave and you can listen to them online! If you’re a MySpace guru, drop me a line to help me edit, design and utilise the page better.