Boomerang

A friend recently told me that during the interview process he does a quick “MySpace background check” on potential employees. Apparently, using that not-so-secret online identity for information gathering is a growing phenomenon. This public accessibility to online identity has some people thinking twice about how they portray themselves in social networks and for good reason.

Developing online personas and profiles prompt a new kind of self reflection where we must choose who we want to be in an explicit way. What is the best way to project oneself onto the screen in a virtual community? In the online world, each word, each photo, and each comment left from a “connection,” says something about who we are or who we’re not. The flexibility and power provided by the ability to create this “second self,” is the underlying issue for fears about online safety, questions about who is a reputable information source, and perhaps most importantly, concerns about how projective media is transforming human psychology.