"Being socially exposed is AOK when you hold a lot of privilege, when people cannot hold meaningful power over you, or when you can route around such efforts. Such is the life of most of the tech geeks living in Silicon Valley. But I spend all of my time with teenagers, one of the most vulnerable populations because of their lack of agency (let alone rights)."
http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/archives/2008/02/04/just_because_we.html

For all the potential of social media and the rush to adopt, there are untold consequences that many of us aren't really considering. I don't know if this is denial, foolishness or idealism but it's time we all started thinking a bit more intelligently about what it is we're doing with these tools. Especially those of us who are not holders of power - those of us who are already struggling to keep pace with technology, hold down jobs and support families.

I'm pretty aware of what I put on my feed ("Sobered up in an alley" etc. is not something I'd tweet etc.) That said I see tweets and blog posts almost like that and wonder what they are thinking. (Of course, my personal/humour blog is pretty edgy & I'm happy to only do business with people who think how I am is OK, so...)

Melanie has a good point - teenagers aren't always aware of the reprecussions that their blog posts/tweets/facebook postings might have on a prospective employer or how it might later come to bite them in the...er, getaway vehicle.

Then again posting pictures of drunken parties on developer community site might increase you buddy list, but might cause concern with potential recruiters.

Then I caught the dealer's tweet. "I'm almost there." it read.

True story.

http://www.thebigklosowski.com/2008/09/want-to-be-president-better-shut-down.html

In 20 years, how many candidates for President will be having to explain their tweets. It's going to be hilarious!

This cartoon is dead on. Good stuff.

@julia, maybe there's some hope that social expectations will shift, with a recognition that, yes, people do let their hair down sometime. But I suspect, if that happens, it will take a while.

And short of legalization, I don't see a future where it makes sense to Twitter your drug deals. :-)

If the courtroom scene seems a little far-fetched, consider the story of Hossein Derakhshan, a Canadian student born in Iran whose blog convinced border officials that he was a risk for overstaying his welcome in the U.S. (I wrote about his case, and the larger issues of inadvertently assembling a social media dossier on yourself, on the Social Signal blog.)

Finally, @jv, you may want to talk to your doctor - that sounds like acid reflux.

Everyone is doing his own business, Who Cares?