When I was younger I didn't really give a crap about what personal information I posted on the net. I think I was very naive but also I didn't have a reputation to keep up. As you get older you definitely need to think about how much of your identity you're making public on the net.

I have a friend who got turned down for a teaching job. She eventually found out that the reason behind her failure was the fact that the school principal actually looked her up on MySpace and her profile picture was an unflattering drunken image of her dressed as a pirate and gulping down a jug of beer. The reality is that there are A LOT of employers who now look people up on social networking sites in order to 'investigate' them! Also... look at the amount of people in the public eye who have been caught out with pictures of them doing something naughty which were found on a social networking site or something.

I am careful about what I post on the net but at the same time I'm not paranoid or anything. I keep my Facebook profile and pictures completely private and only add people who I am close to. I'm am also active in a lot of other internet sites, such as YouTube, Last.fm, forums, etc, and my band as a myspace... I've had a few weird internet stalkers but it's never been too much of an issue. They never know enough about me to stalk me in real life and I can always just block them or something. Although I think sometimes I am a little too trusting and need to be a bit more wary...

the simple way to avoid this situation is to treat anything you post on the net as if it was on a public billboard. too many people treat the internet like their personal digital playground, and while it may have started that way for some it sure as hell isn't that way anymore.

Well, I've been pissing people on the internet off since 2004 and so far I'm still alive.

Though Ethan did play a mean practical joke on me a few months ago by posing as some chick who was offended by my rants on feminism and threatened to kill me, knowing where I lived and everything, it did freak me out.

A practical joke should - I think - at some point in time, be funny for everyone involved. I doubt many would look back with a smile at the time someone said they wanted to kill you and they had your address .. That's just a bit too mean!

Yeah but since when was anything Ethan ever found funny actually.... funny?

On the other hand I did once try to hack into a guy's email account and send child porn to everyone on his contact list.

Don't worry, I didn't actually do it.

But I am gonna put his email address on 4chan eventually. Which will inevitably lead to the same thing anyway.

Oh yeah......

Ethan did that to me too. :laughing:

Thank you Boo Boo for scaring me even more :p: After discovering how easy it is to find out all sorts about myself just based on my username alone, I've decided to change it.

.. Just in case I ever kickban some hater who migrated here from 4chan.

I'll keep it recognizable though.

oh now you're just being paranoid, don't you think? i guess you're a mod so you're in a somewhat different position than the rest of us, but still, the only reason i poked around is because i felt challenged to do so. anyway i'm pretty good with google - most people probably can't find that much stuff ;)

/offtopic - your avatar is sooo cool. where did you get it?/

Maybe, but on the other hand it's just a username so as long as I'm recognizable, it shouldn't matter much if I change it. Needless to say, I didn't plan on becoming a mod when I chose. In the first post, I wrote that I tried to be anonymous on the net and that it's a principle I try to follow. Finding out then that it takes anyone here about 1 minute to find everything they need to contact me is just a bit ironic :p:

As for the av, thanks! I can't remember exactly where I got it. I think it came up on a google image search, then I cut it, fixed it and added transparency to it myself. :)

I've always called you Tore anyway ;)

I share a lot of information over Facebook, but I'm very slective over who can view it Same concept on here. There's a select group of MBers I do/ have shared personal information with.

Links that come up when I google my full name:
-Facebook
-Myspace
-My XC Information(times etc.)
-A forum i joined a view years ago
-More Running/Myspace links

Wow I just googled my fullname, some weird stuff came up:

* M.C. is my name... you can call me MC Hammer.

To be honest I had no idea you were even a woman until I added you on last.fm... so privacy wise I think you've nothing to worry about.

Tho I don't think anyone would know much about my previous forum memberships, other than my taste. I do also think that there's too much unnecessary fear going on over the internet. The same thing happened with the computer when it first got popular, it was "The screan will cause blindness if not used with shades". I don't think there's need to worry about any of those.

My Facebook still keeps suggesting me to add you, lol.

That damn Facebook is one insistent bastard. It was telling me forever to add this one person, then I added that person, and Facebook actually had the gall to tell me to "Help make Facebook better for this person"? Pshhh..
What's more, it even tells me I need to "reconnect" with that person.

Facebook is trying to rule my life. I'm not havin' it.

That's weird. I don't think you've ever showed up on my suggested friends except for when I imported my MSN buddy list.

On that subject matter, I think a lot anonymity on here has been disestablished by the MusicBanter facebook group. Which I don't mind at all, because even though there are many MB members I would except/send friend reguests from/to. I currently am only friends with 3.

I was bothered when I first seen this thread, now I'm back to not really caring. I don't have anything to hide. I don't email anyone. I only get digital flyers for events in my area and telling me stuff like people have left me love on bebo. Nothing actually important. So, I don't care much anymore again.

Oh yeah... I actually just joined that. I probably won't add anybody because I only add people I've met face to face. Still it's interesting.

Everyday life is filled with these same people. I have more faith in humanity online than anywhere because I see all the support groups and forums that are there to help people who need it. Anyone who doesnt believe this go check forums for things like depression and such. Lots of helpful people making your fellow internet users feel better about them selves.

Then theres sites like 4 chan :)

Yeah, it was a PM. Up until that point, I hadn't been active in the discussion. I saw someone post that Norway hunts for near extinct species .. Of course that's not true, so I posted the quota (1000-1200 animals or so) and the actual numbers of minke whales hunted (about half the quota every year) compared to the north-atlantic population size which has been hunted here for hundreds of years (>100 000 animals) and the worldwide population numbers (current estimate is >650 000 I believe).

I made a point that a discussion on Norway's whaling shouldn't be so much on whether or not it's ecologically harmful - because it is sustainable. Then it makes more point to talk about the fisheries. It should be a discussion on morale and I didn't actually present any kind of view myself whether I view whaling as immoral or not, but it seems the factual numbers alone was enough to make someone want to kill me and my family. ;)

I wonder how many death threats people like Richard Dawkins get per year.

GreenPeace types hey... Probably think you're 'one of them' :D