Digital Tattoo

Digital Tattoo

I only recently. two years ago, got my first tattoo. My first tattoo is a tribute to my dog. When looking at my social media feed, I do not post much, but most frequently if I do post, it is of my dog. So it was interesting to see that what I chose to permanently put on my body, I also choose to permanently keep in the digital world.

Image Source: giphy.com

Our digital tattoo is permanent, whatever we post will essentially never go away. We can try to hide it, but it can always be found in one way or another. I have had a internet presence since I was 10 years old, starting with my first AOL screen name and email. Later a mini blog called Xanga, that later transformed to a Myspace. As a young child with access to internet, but no real guidance, I did not know that things never leave the internet, even if you delete them. Some of my posts might have been a little reckless for the first 5 or 6 years. But in my defense, I did not understand how to be a digital citizen, neither did my parents, everything was extremely new to us. Since then and during the lather part of my internet career, I have been extremely cautious by being an observer for the most part. Making a twitter for this class made be extremely uncomfortable because it forced me to post and interact when I'd rather just be pretty invisible online.

I have done my own version of data mining on myself in the past. Especially going to college, and then my sophomore year when I knew I wanted to be a teacher. I needed to clean up my internet life. I did just that, and from what it looks like did a pretty good job covering up things I don't want found. I also do not have my real name on any of my social media accounts in order to stay out of the spotlight and for students not to find me.

Data Mining

These were the results of some of the searching I did.

Image Source: My Screen Shot

Google- When I googled my name no imitate photos came up. Later in the image search, towards the bottom of the page, there was an old professional photo. What did come up was my LinkedIn account, my school website, a Prezi presentation (the link did not work), and an old resume on Scibd that I used to get my first teaching job. There was also a link to a Facebook page which was not me, it was another women with the same name who lived in Poland. I also found my salary and profession in the public records.

Facebook- When typing my name into Facebook another account with the same name comes up but it is the same women from Poland from the Google search. I found my brother and mother's account when searching my name. I also found an old picture from 2011, when my real name was still on my Facebook account. Luckily it was just a selfie of my friends and I in college.

YouTube- I was surprised to find two separate accounts under my name on YouTube. One was not me at all, looked like a littler girl posting a few silly videos. The other was actually me, there was only one video. The video was a group choreographed ice skating routine I uploaded for a grade for an ice skating class. When I search my school user name, a screen-cast assignment came up.

These next few were really something!

TruthFinder-

Spokeo-

Fastpeoplesearch-

Instantcheckmate-

In all the searches I did from above I found my age. I also found old addresses and properties I own. All had names of my family members. BUT Fastpeoplesearch went one step further, they had my full addresses, ages of my family members, and even the month and year of my birthday. The one this none of these found was my current address of two years, which was surprising.

How Did This Search Make Me Feel?

Actually I felt pretty good after this search. I did not find anything that I wouldn't mind people knowing. The only thing that concerned me was that picture from 2011, otherwise it looks like I did a pretty good job covering up my presents before I started teaching. Overall I'm content with the lack of personal presence. I truly enjoy technology and all the cool things we can do and share, BUT I don't want my life to be too public. Of course I post here and there, I contribute to social media, but not in the extent as my others. I just do not want to. My life is my business. As a part of the social media society I'm already sucked into the content, that leads to comparison and self doubt in many situations. For the sake of my own head space in the recent years I have cleaned up my feed and only try to consume the content that serves me and does not rot my brain.

On that note I think its extremely important to teach the impact of a digital tattoo and how to be a digital citizen to our students. I have actually done a full unit on digital citizenship with my middle schoolers in the past. The youth is even more consumed with the internet then I was as a child. It is a magical tool that can be lethal when not used in a smart way. Since schools and teachers and using technology more and more, I do believe the basics of digital citizenship should be talked about in school. Although, today's students have parents who are millennial who should be well aware of the ins and outs of the internet. Parents should be informing their kids as well! With both teacher and parents involved we can mold smart digital citizens!

Resources:

Video: How To Raise Digital Citizens?