Dangers of digital communication
It is not a secret that I am a big proponent of global expansion of digital media. I beleive that strong digital networks are a solution to many world ills. By 2020 you wouldn't be able to get a job, without having a good understanding of the way social networks work. Anyone who has ever worked for a major corporation and had to sign a release form for a background check should understand. I wrote in the past on our need to study these networks now, so we can learn to work with their security features, protecting our exposure. I often laugh when someone posts up a report of someone who has been burned by overexposure. We've all seen pictures of teens being busted by their parents after they posted pictures from their kegger on Facebook, or employees getting fired for leaving "too drunk to work" away messages, while calling in sick.
I often though myself immune to these sorts of events, but turns out I am not. Digital age has managed to sneak up on me, and from the most unlikely source - my mother.
I am generally considered a polite young man. You will rarely hear me utter a curse or be generally crude. I was raised with the beleif that in good company there is really no excuse for inappropriate behavior. I have a personal beleif that English language simply lacks the vocabulary to properly express severity of emotions that would require a good cussing. Russian language however has a whole separate dictionary for times of great stress. Its considered a peasant's language, highly inappropriate for inteligencia.
I've had several frustrating moments in the past few month. Usually I deal with these by taking my roomate out to dinner and talking it out, untill he convinces me I am full of crap. However these emotions came to a boil late last night, and my roomate was not home (he and his girlfriend are housesitting at her parents), so the sum of these feelings ended being wented in a form of an away message on my AIM account. To call the message inapropriate would be a severe understatment, its not quite ear-wilting, but it is certainly close. I deemed the posting relatively safe, because I have no Russian speakers on AIM (my brother doesn't count). I suspected that the message may transition to some other IM accounts I have (I use a multi-service Pidgin as my front end tool, linking my Yahoo, Google and AIM accounts), but at most the damage would be exposed to my cousin, who probably also doesn't care.
Imagine my surprise when I get a phone call this morning from my shocked mother asking me if I have been hacked. Apparently my mother has GoogleTalk. She has me added on GoogleTalk. I don't have her added, which means anyone can see my account, without me being aware they can (I'll be fixing that security flaw tonight) My mother was extremely upset. I was very apologetic. It was amusing in parts, but mostly embarassing.
Kids,
Don't be angry and post things on the internet. You don't know who is watching.
P.S. This is not my first instance of being stupid on the internet. A friend caught me posting some very personal messages on my prior iteration of LiveJournal (uJournal - now defunct). That time was when I finally became aware of global internet exposure and started my quest to secure certain facets of information. This failure is embarassing, also I am sure not the last one :)