About six months ago, a digital security expert writing for
the New York Times made a valiant attempt to “disappear from the Internet.”
It failed.
I faintly recall my first internet venture, a modest page on
Facebook created so I can see what my kids, who preceded me with Facebook pages,
were posting.
That was a fail on two fronts. When the parents arrived, the
kids left or learned to hide posts from any who weren’t on special lists,
gratis of Facebook's cleverness. It was also a fail on a second front for the
first five years, because I never looked at my empty page and thus ignored genuine
friend requests from people who are real life friends and did use Facebook.
Some of them might have felt rejected, as my daughter later pointed out the
tiny check on the Friend Request button. “Really, Mom,” she said.
But, with that modest inaugural arrival, my name was on the
internet along with Facebook frenetic data collection.
Once I had a book contracted, I also had a website, and when
the book was published, I went into high gear to open accounts on anything
and everything the publishing mavens said were “musts.”
The awkwardness of it all, the feeling of vulnerability,
gave way to modern demands to be there or be less than a tiny square.
There are many reasons to want to get off the digital deck and
disappear from the Internet. If you are a target of sophisticated fortune
hunters (this applies to individuals of great fortunes) or have controversy
attached to you that brings out the nastiest among our race, you may wish you
could erase your digital presence.
There should be a way to do it. A service calling itself DELETE
ME claims they can and will, for a fee, do it for you. The New York Times
reporter says they sort of do, but not really.
I don’t feel good about the lack of choice, but like the Serenity
Prayer says, “I accept the things I cannot change.”
Unless laws come in, and with them real life enforcement and consequences for violators, the Internet has us where it wants us, whether we like it or not. I’d add another line to the prayer: “Please don’t put me in a position where I will need to hide.”
This, because there is no longer a place to do so.
6 comments:
For better or worse, we'll live on the interwebs. My husband has no internet presence save for what I might post online. My daughter has deleted all social media...she's expecting her first baby and wants her privacy. A wise decision.
This is a concept I hadn't thought of previously. I already had published books I wanted to share with other people before I discovered the internet. Of course, there are times now when I see people posting pictures on Facebook of their children or grandchildren and I wish I could do that, but I can't. My daughter told me from the time of their first child that she didn't want me to post pics of her kid(s) on the internet. And since I can't do it for those grandkids, I've always felt I couldn't for the other grandkids either.
Your initial Facebook experience gave me a chuckle. And it's true that the kids have left. Facebook is for 'old people' now, I presume. People say once it's online, it's forever, but my very first blog on AOL-- remember them? -- disappeared, never to be seen again. i'm amazed that Blogger is still in service.
The days of disappearing (we used to call it "dropping out") are over. Big Brother can always see you now.
I too am amazed that Blogger still exists. I have over 10 years of my life on here and it could all go Poof with a press of a button by an unknown Google tech or maybe even an AI program. I've mentally prepared myself for that happening eventually.
Lorraine and Karen Jones Gowen, I'm aware that what I post here is Google property and I'm in "their house." I write most of my posts on WORD and save to my computer, not directly into this app. So, in the event Google makes Blogger "go poof", I will at least have my posts for me and to share with people I know if there's any reason to. But the public facing of my posts would be gone. So will yours, which I have cherished over the years. 😥
I hope both of you keep your posts elsewhere as well.
There's always the possibility that Blogger will allow a transition time to migrate whole blogs and all their content elsewhere. But then, we may not choose to.
Truth is that everything disappears eventually, including us.
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