Posts for Tag: privacy

My last post on Facebook

Over the past few months, I've slowly started feeling as if my privacy controls on Facebook have been slowly tinkered with. Maybe it's because I've started getting a lot more friend requests from folks or maybe the latest Zuckerberg news got me skittish but I went to my privacy settings and sure enough some of my settings (or new settings) had been changed to "Friends of Friends" or "Everyone" from "Friends Only". It seems I'm not the only one either. To clarify, I won't deactivate my Facebook profile as I think it's still a great way to connect with old friends. I just won't be updating any more photos, statuses (stati?) or posts. I'm sure my Facebook contacts will appreciate having one less thing to read in their ever growing feeds.

The ever shrinking private space...

Just read on ESPN.com that an employee of the Philadelphia Eagles was fired for a post he put up on Facebook. Basically, this employee was upset that one of his favorite players, Brian Dawkins, signed with the Denver Broncos. His post was:

"Dan is [expletive] devastated about Dawkins signing with Denver ... Dam Eagles R Retarted!!"

Seems pretty harmless by sports forum chatter standards. The employee later deleted the post but was still fired a few days later. I've heard of similar things happening in other non-sports related companies where employees have been terminated for making detrimental statements on social networking or blog sites. I'm sure the threshold is different for each company and I can't speak to what I'd do if faced with a similar situation. Most likely, my take would be that unless an employee is leaking private company information or committing deliberate libel towards the company or another employee, it's really not a big deal. Employees shouldn't be afraid to voice their opinions about their employers. If nothing else, I'd view it as a valuable communication tool for employers to improve the way they do things. However, incidents like the above are just another reminder that in the new age of Facebook/MySpace/Twitter/Blogs/etc. we have far less privacy than we'd like to think (a lot of which is our own fault). My rule of thumb is I expect every post/update/comment/etc. that I make will be read by every single person in the world from my business partners to my mother. If I wouldn't want any of them reading it, I shouldn't even put it up.