It is at times like right now that I wonder if I am looking too hard, or if people are not good enough at hiding things.
Time and time again, I have decided more or less at random to spend a few minutes poking around the Internet, mostly with Google, for information about people I have just met. This is probably not really the best habit to be in, I know, but nonetheless it is how it is.
Sometimes, I have come across blogs that I am absolutely certain were supposed to be… private at the very least, if not totally secret. Other times, it has simply been some old, probably forgotten blog that was started and left to fade from the memories of all involved, all except me, that is.
It’s fascinating to me, I guess, to see these semi-private versions of a person’s life. That’s probably why I keep looking. At the same time, it can make things a little awkward. Suppose I read something I know I am not supposed to know. Then, the next day, I talk to this person.
Now, perhaps this is where I stray from what is a reasonable course of action, though really having done all of this other stuff, I have already departed from a “normal” course. But, regardless, I will do all that I can to conceal having looked for and found this assumed-private information. And I think pretty much from then on, unless they should eventually reveal to me the existence of this thing, and I might be able to have a plausible excuse for knowing the things that I do, it remains a secret still, though now both a secret they assume nobody else knows, and the secret that I do but can not ever really reveal.
The other times, when I should find such a blog before ever really getting to know them, seem in retrospect easier. That is, when I do not know a person, I have generally felt less inhibited when it came to leaving snide remarks as comments, maybe even not snide remarks, just… corrections of wrong information or something. In the few occasions where it was the blog I found before the actual person, it seems to have worked out pretty well, as when I finally did end up being properly introduced in person, it was just sort of acknowledged and moved past, that there was some sort of internet-rapport that existed before.
Part of me is confused though, at how the things that I read that are almost surely supposed to be restricted to a very small number of people, come to be read by me. I am confused because it is really not so difficult to either not put them in public reach online or utilize better tools for restricting access. It’s true, from time to time I have put something here that is “protected” and though I imagine it is possible that some clever and resourceful and determined person who was not intended to read it could, I don’t worry too much even then. It is adequately concealed to satisfy me, and short of a gross breach of trust amongst the people who were given access to read it, the information remains in a limited pool of people.
I guess I would encourage generally being more conscientious about putting something online that you’d be worried about a random stranger reading. Or perhaps worse still, not a random stranger, but somebody for whom it would have a great deal more meaning because they do know you. I am now rambling and so instead of carrying on I will conclude this paranoid, and looking back, self absorbed, rant. Maybe I just give myself too much credit.
2 responses so far ↓
1 angelicism // Sep 10, 2006 at 7:34 pm
On occasion I forget but usually I’m very aware in the back of my mind that my biggest privacy problem is not, in fact, the random stranger reading my blog — what would they care about what shoes I bought or who I fucked that day? — but people I do know, or maybe even are talking about, but don’t know me well enough to read my blog. Or for some other reason don’t read my blog.
It’s a little frustrating because on one hand, I want my blog to be read by people, or I would either just keep it on my computer or keep it password protected. I obviously don’t mind my friends reading it, and there have even been points where I use my blog as a rather passive aggressive mode of communication (not my better days). I think there is even that little bit of exhibitionism (ok, a big bit) in me that is amused by the idea of a complete stranger reading about my life.
On the other hand, I do actually write my blog oftentimes like I would a diary. I write what I did during the day, what I thought, how I felt, and I’m pretty sure a lot of the stuff I write has absolutely no bearing on anyone, whether they’re close to me or not.
The side problem is when it does have some bearing on someone I know. Like how X person made me upset today, or how Y person did Z thing that made me think they’re stupid, etc. and I’m never sure whether I should abstain from writing such things because it’ll probably ultimately bite me in the ass, or just brazenly write them and if I’m confronted with it later, simply point out the person didn’t have to read what I wrote.
I suspect I’m pretty cowardly, though. I don’t write detailed anything about acquaintances, and only write the occasional scathing diatribe on my blog to, say, Rick, or Ani, or Sasha, who I know are capable of taking it (in the case of Rick, that was probably more because I didn’t care how he felt about it while we were in the process of breaking up and I was unbelievably pissed off at him).
I think I should really consider also keeping a private diary for myself where I can write all sorts of things no one should ever be able to read.
And I apologize: I’ve just written an essay in response to yours.
2 pantsfarm » Blog Archive » accidental discoveries // Dec 3, 2006 at 10:21 pm
[...] What there was, however, was a document called cornell1.doc or something, so I pop it open only to discover it’s the college application essay for somebody who I backed up their hard drive once on my computer. I had forgotten about the files, apparently, as had I known they were there, I would have deleted them for the hard drive space a while ago. Instead, however, they are here now and so I read over one. Then, since my curiosity was now piqued, I read another one. And then I thought “wow this is kind of creepy.” and I stopped reading. But it was too late, and now I’ve got all these questions I don’t really think I should ask, and knowledge I don’t really think I should have, and I’ll just have to be careful. And, if you’ve read this a long time, you’ll know this isn’t the first time I’ve sort of stumbled into something I should have had the good sense not to read. [...]
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