PCH chapter
23
There has been a lot of debate about the uCreate initiative
from the Edge Project as discussed in chapter 23 of the Participatory Cultures
Handbook; one of the main issues of this project being anonymity and privacy. It
was concluded that pseudo-anonymity was the most beneficial for participants in
this setting because it allowed youth to be identified and take pride in their
work yet allowed distance from published material should it prove to be
damaging at a later date. Hiro posted the question: What is being done to
educate the younger members of society – minors who have never known a world
without Facebook, Twitter, and the like about the consequences of misbehavior
in the digital age? This question brought to mind this famous Facebook post:
Supposedly, in an attempt to educate her daughter about the
dangers of internet exposure a mother posted this picture to show just how many
people have access to anything posted online. I agree that the youth of today
are faced with a problem that previous generations have never dealt with,
establishing an online presence without tarnishing their identity. I think
awareness is the key to solving this issue. Acts such as the above picture that
physically show the theorized consequences are the best way to educate the
youth about their actions. Maybe it will prompt them to think twice before
posting content that would later prove to be incriminating.
I agree with Krysanam and Hiro. I worry for the children of today's generation who have never known a world without the internet, social media, or smart phones. When I was in elementary school I remember learning not to talk to strangers who approach me and in person. I hope that elementary schools and media education campaigns are teaching today's children to not talk to strangers not he internet. I am happy to see that there are parents like the one that Krysanam has posted in the image above that are demonstrating to her child that images and information of the internet can spread like crazy. This makes very difficult to be safe on the internet and to prevent a silly mistake from tarnishing you later in life.
ReplyDeleteI think that the choice for participants to use pseudo-anonymity for the uCreate Initiative was the best choice. I think it's probably a smart idea to use pseudo-anonymity for most thing we create online. This way we can not be connected to 10 years down the line if someone does a google search on you. There have been too many people who have got their lives ruined are repartition tarnished by what they have posted online so it's smart to start early by teaching children not expose their full identities.