This got me thinking a lot about blog safety and all you out there that I love dearly and want to keep safe. I started surfing the net and found a lot of articles on blogging. This one on MSNBC really speaks to the safety issue of revealing too much personal info online. It notes that 1/3rd of all students have blogs and only 5% of the parents know about it!!! MySpace.com is the prevelant choice it seems. There are obviously both pros and cons to blogging. You get a voice, and get to state your comments for the world. But do people all realize it really is available to the whole world to see?
Putting any of my thoughts and information on the internet makes me nervous definitely. I thought about it for quite a while before I committed to having a blog in the first place. And I had to think through what kind of information I was willing to put on this site. I definitely prefer only comments from people I've met or know are actual personal friends of my friends. But beyond that level of twice removed I am not so keen to strike up any other online friendships. Other people appear to do this more freely, but it makes me nervous. How do you know that person in Wisconsin isn't a serial killer or rapist just because their profile says innocuous things?! There was a Dateline I saw recently where they lured sexual predators in who targeted young kids online in chat rooms. It made me positively ill to know these people are in the world. And if it wasn't enough that they were caught on camera some were online and doing the same sick things the very next day.
This train of thought all started because I read an article today about how the blogs of two teenagers were viewed and used after they plotted to kill the girls parents. In a way it showed how much of our lives have come to be represented, or misrepresented online. I've heard other stories of kids talking about other kids meanly online for the world to see. Kids being expelled for what they wrote on their blogs about other kids. It reminds me of the old bashing books from elementary school (I can't really remember the name exactly). Maybe you never experienced it but I remember a time when a few girls kept books full of nasty comments about other kids. It was discovered and of course very hurtful to the kids talked about in it. Imagine if it was online for all to see and read?
Obviously our world is changing. How do we stay safe? How do we keep the people we love safe and still have a place to share our voice and thoughts with each other? The truth is we live in a world that is sick with sin, and we must be on guard against the ways evil still moves in the world about us. Blogging should be a fun place to share your thoughts with friends and maybe if you choose the entire world.
My few tips and rules for blogging safety so far are:
- Its best to actually know your blog buddies personally. If its a trusted friend of a friend that's probably okay.
- If you don't know someone you've met online personally be very safe about the information you let them know about you. (Your location, actual workplace, school etc...)
- Never ever ever meet someone you only know online only. Just be safe and don't go there despite how curious you may be. If you end up meeting someone you've only met online you sure better take a friend, meet only in a public place, and have a plan for what to do if the person is sketchy! But I just would avoid it all together.
Side story: One of my dearest friends went to meet someone in person they'd only met online before and was following the previously stated rules. She was supposed to call or at least answer her phone and let me know all was safe. And this didn't happen! It was the most mentally and emotionally stressful experience for me. I was sure she was being kidnapped and hurt and I was helpless. In the end it turned out her phone just was silent and she didn't get my calls until later, and she promptly let me know all was okay. But I was truly panicked!
I'm curious to hear your thoughts...
For some more light reading if you're curious I found some other articles on blogging. Here's an article on the evolution of blogging and in a way an editorial on its usefulness in today's society. This one really speaks to the phenomenon of creating a voice for yourself without the traditional constraints of print journalism.
6 comments:
Just wanted you to know I checked out your blog and boy do you have a good head on your shoulders. What a sensible girl you are. Love ya Chris
You are SO right! I'm guilty! I am WAY too friendly on-line. I guess I think nothing can happen to an old lady like me. Thanks for the wake-up call. I wish you a truly blessed Christmas. We didn't get any snow while our visitors were in town. Oh well, maybe next time. Merry Christmas! (queenmum)
Hi Katie,
Your blogging safety post has been sadly so uncommented... :-(
Wow, thank you so much for putting up this post; this is an issue I've been grappling with since I started blogging. Though more along the lines of what thoughts to air on the web, as opposed to physical information (Mom makes sure that we don't show any pictures of us or give any information on where we live on our blogs).
Sometimes I'll want to quote a friend and give my reaction to what my friend has said (often a negative reaction in this case), but won't for fear that my friend might stumble on my post and take offense. I know this isn't quite along the same lines as you were thinking, but I think it relates.
Anyway, thanks again; because of this post, my brain is going a mile a minute.
Yea more comments!! I know its not an exciting post but I do think its necessary...
So yes Foolish Knight I think about that very issue. Lets just say I knew someone who would actually write out those thoughts or issues with other people and when I read it I was always worried the person they were writing about would find out. Or that I was going to be written about also!
So personal irritations may be best left unsaid unless it can be done in the most generic way. Which takes most of the bite out, but then maybe we should be rethinking those thoughts anyway.
Wow. That posts makes me realize that I have very little personal boundaries or rules for myself whatsoever. I think that got me into trouble more than once in the past. Thank goodness those days of reckless abandon are over. Here's to married life : )
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