Would you ungoogle yourself?

In an interesting interview in the Wall Street Journal earlier this week, Google’s CEO Eric Schmidt claimed that one day we might need to change our identity. This is as a consequence of all the time spent on social networks, where we might not fully grasp the reality of the material that’s out there online. Now this might be a nice idea for Schmidt to circulate as we await the announcement of Google’s own social network (which no doubt will overcome this issue), but does he really have a valid point?

It’s certainly an interesting view in the way our society is evolving – that one day everyone who reaches adulthood could be eligible to change their name to escape the horrors left about them online. Of course, it needs to be explored a bit further than that. To change your identity online will essentially mean changing your whole identity non-stop. As our social networking communities grow, we will eventually carry our entire lives with us from one site to the next. Our friends and acquaintances come along with us to the online spaces where we hang out with them. If you change your name then, you are essentially changing your entire life, else what’s the point of doing it? The consequences of this are far-reaching, yet Schmidt is addressing what for some, is already a very real problem, as new job applicants know they will be subject to being Googled or Facebooked.

UnGoogling yourself

Earlier this year Wired carried an article on how to ‘un-google’ yourself. Not a million miles away from what Schmidt was putting forward, the idea of how you can effectively delete all the content that’s circulating about you online. Or at least that which you’d like to delete. Unfortunately there isn’t a magic button that lets you do this, or even a Firefox plugin, but the answer is in how the content is created. Their first tip is to regularly Google yourself so that you know what others might see. Then it comes to down to advice such as requesting that your last name is removed from photo tagging/descriptions, controlling your privacy settings and not using your real name for online accounts, making comments etc.. The article is effectively centred around the idea of remaining anonymous, or blending into the crowd, making it near impossible for someone to find out something about you online.

This is in effect completely on the other extreme to what Schmidt was discussing. Not so much removing your identity online, but almost preventing one from existing altogether. Is this what the internet has left us with – no option for a real, true identity in the wake of everything being publicly available? This is a new and somewhat uncomfortable scenario, but I don’t really think you can ever control your online identity, because so much of it isn’t left up to you. In the ‘Un-Google’ yourself article for example, advice included asking others to remove tags or descriptions. This highlights the fact that not all the content about you online is under your control. People can write/upload/tag pretty much whatever they want, until the rules of libel come into play.

Controlling your own content

This is also a new social situation that we have to adapt to. I’ve had to request twice that someone remove a photo of me online, for different reasons (nothing outrageous, just personal preference!) and it’s a strange thing to do. You get into a conversation of why and you draw to them to original photo in the first place! Controlling your online identity could be a full-time job, depending on how popular you are. And that’s why I wouldn’t immediately discount Schmidt’s assertion that we could all need new online identities one day. It’s a possible solution to a very new problem. Effectively now when you meet someone you are bringing with you all your friends, job history, photos etc.. and placing them in the room for everyone to see. I don’t particularly have a problem with this as I’ve nothing to hide, but many do, and they have a right to.

The issue of identity online will evolve rapidly as we constantly find ways to address or control it. For every new technology that comes out, such as Facebook Places, there is a discussion around what this means for our online security and just how comfortable we are with sharing pretty much everything about us. Hey, at least you get to choose a cool new name for yourself

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