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Bill Sodeman writes about management, mobile computing and information systems

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Impression management and Facebook

Posted Thursday, 3 January 2008, 16:24 HST @058

I’ve been removing apps from my Facebook account over the last month. Some of these apps sounded fun when these apps were a novelty. Over time, I got more and more invitations from other Facebook members to add more apps.

But SuperWall and FunWall were slower than the default Facebook Wall. I didn’t really want to draw graffiti on my Wall.

The Oktoberfest app was fun in September, when it first appeared. After it morphed into beer, it became dull.

Finally, I decided I had enough. MyAquarium infected our Windows computer with malware that took 3 hours of systematic registry hacking and file deletions to remove.

After I did my little victory dance, I deleted MyAquarium from my account and reported the app to Facebook.

The New York Times ran an article today about online impression management. Academic researchers have examined how users post meaningful photos of themselves, and send carefully worded email messages. As I mentioned last June, employers have used MySpace and Facebook to investigate job applicants. Users who claim this form of background checking is an invasion of their personal privacy should consider why their made their profiles publicly available during their job search.

Because my Facebook site is linked to my university e-mail address, my Facebook site makeover continues. My page is still fun and festive, but it’s a bit more guarded these days.

Tags: facebook, linkedin, management, Microsoft, myspace, networking, reputation, research, security, social, teaching, Windows
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