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Susan Mernit is a consultant with a practice focused on hyperlocal news, community & civic engsagement and the future of news (see houseoflocal.o...
 
 
 
 

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Over sharing, Blogging and Transparency—Notes—and Quotes-- from a Talk

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This past week, I gave a talk at Arse Electronika, the conference about sex and technology and culture with my friend Viviane on blogging, transparency, authenticity and identity. Viviane is my friend I met through reading sex and relationship blogs right after my divorce; once we met in person we became fast friends and use social media, email and the telephone to stay connected.

Our talk, entitled “Avoiding the Emily Gould Effect: Over sharing, Transparency & Blogging” talks about identity and reputation management in a world where many people stream big chunks of their lives—and don’t always anticipate some of the situations that may result—or how their readers may bit back. The presentation—along with annotated links—is going up on SlideShare this week, but I wanted to share some of the notes for an essay I wrote as I worked on the preso.

We live in a world where everyone knows everything. It’s Being There and EdTV for real.

The narrative of our lives is that we are real, and that we package the real in the virtual and ship it out to you. Yep, it’s all about the lifestreaming, just like EdTV.

  • Robert Scoble is online 20 hours a day, talking with 20,000 people + as millions listen in.
  • Jefferson is the Samuel Pepys of the slut blogosphere, obsessively chronicling every encounter, from just legal coeds to Nubian sex parties to housewives out for a thrill.
  • Julia Allison, gossip and relationships writer and TV spot personality, starts life streaming, sharing the very public hassles of her relationship with Jake Lodwick, a controversial start-up millionaire.

These acts of sharing your life in this way support the narrative that our lives are stable, and we’re persons of note. It also supports the assumptions that being interesting will reward us with respect and success--because our lives, our ideas, our friends, and our jokes are so valuable, so compelling.

Just like on reality TV, we don’t have to do anything—we just have to be—only with less nice clothes than Paris Hilton and Nicole Richie.

Is there any surprise that we’ve become a culture addicted to fame?

And that blogging on the Internet has become, for many people, the cultured and erudite way to achieve the celebrity and recognition garnered by movie stars and cam girls?

And of course, that brings us right home to sex, relationships, blogging and over sharing.

In a culture where celebrity can be bought, and where reality shows rule, ordinary but ambitious people can become micro-famous by virtue of many things—from their bisexuality (Telia Tequila) to their frank authenticity (Robert Scoble & Violet Blue) to their dating, relationship and media ambition (Julia Allison).

But, you know all that, don’t you?

You, the people formerly known as the audience, as Jeff Jarvis has said, are the consumers of their enduring narratives. Bloggers spin the tales, and you consume.

So when, you might ask, does exposure, or transparency, become annoying?

At what point does sharing information about the latest breakup, the sex toy, the current flame, the past flame or the three-some become two much information—either for you, the audience—or for the exhibitionist you are so cheerfully watching?

And when the world hits TMI with the latest blog celebrity smack down, when it is good fun and when it is over sharing?

Sure, it’s tempting to focus on the public breakups, the flame wards, the Team Nicole and Team Paris camps, but it’s more interesting to examine how other writers—bloggers like ourselves—think about and manage their own boundaries as to what they write (and to ask you to think about what your boundaries and personal rules are).

To that end, we asked some of the bloggers we talked about in our preso to answer the following questions:

  • Do you feel you're public figure and you need to let everyone what's going on with you, or do you feel you have over shared at times?
  • How did you come to the transparency you have?
  • Did you feel that you over shared at times? Why or why not? About what? And what did you learn from this/did you change your voice?
  • For people who feel they have ended up more of their personal life than they intended, what advice would you give them?

Here are some of the responses we collected (and some relevant items already out in the blogosphere):

Rachel Kramer

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SINgleGIRL 5 pts

For years I had friends begging me to blog about my dating life but I held out until recently because the Emily Goulds and Julia Allisons of the world creep me out. There is no such thing as TMI in their reality, and for that I feel a little sorry for them.

I started my blog a couple of months ago, for a variety of reasons.  But I realized that I couldn't do it without keeping it anonymous.  There are a few dozen people who know it's me, so I guess it's not completely anonymous.  But the fact that my name isn't linked to it helps keep me from editing out things I might not otherwise say.  

I just can't imagine the hell of having some man I'm dating google me and finding out the details of my dating life from my blog.  NO, that's not for me. 

SINgleGIRL

Sex, Lies and Dating in the City
http://sex-lies-dating.blogspot.com/

halflifecrisis 5 pts

It's possible to write openly and honestly about yourself without being an exhibitionist, but it's not easy.  I blog about my life, but my blog operates on the premise that my experiences are not singular or special, and my inner journey is more interesting than my outer life. My blog wouldn't be possible if I became a known personality. I'm not ashamed of what I write, but without anonymity my need for approval would easily trump my desire for an honest and open exploration of my experience.

I've recently installed comments and I already feel the pressue to please- to never offend. It's a hard line to toe, but I love my little blog and it needs me to be me, despite my fear of disapproval. If I ever stop having opinions, or start posting diary entries and pictures of myself at events, consider my blog a failure.

( http://www.halflifecrisis.com ( http://www.halflifecrisis.com/ ) )

Bill Cammack 5 pts

I think the key question here is "Are you a public figure?" and then what does that mean to you and what do you get out of handing out TMI?

For instance, in Julia's case, everybody knew she was going out with Jakob, so even if she posted information without naming someone, it would have been clear who she was talking about... assuming she framed her posts in real-time and not past tense.  The question then becomes "what do you get out of telling people your private business?".  If one's goal is to eventually write a screenplay or become a TMI columnist, then it makes sense.  If the thing that attracts people to your site so you can sell advertising is TMI, then good for you. :)  In most cases, I find that it just turns you into a personal train wreck and you're more likely to become infamous than famous, with people talking behind your back, going "what an idiot".

Also, handing out TMI could be a form of therapy for the writer.  Kind of a purging of demons and things that bother someone.  They get to float it out to the universe and let it go, or maybe they learn something from people's responses to what they wrote.

There are still others who get some kind of kick out of oversharing.  It's like the people who talk when nobody asked them anything.  They don't really care that YOU don't care.  They just love to hear themselves talk.  They like to believe they're being heard or being listened to or having some effect on society or some form of notoriety.  These are the people you can find "lifecasting" and sitting in front of their webcams telling people they're about to go to the store for cigarettes... WHO CARES?  Nobody cares, but they like to FEEL like somebody cares, so they turn on their cameras and bore people to death.

The obvious problem with giving out personal information is.... that you get KNOWN FOR giving out personal information, so people that don't want their business in the streets don't want to have anything to do with you.  Since people are going to google you ANYWAY as soon as they're thinking about dating you or messing with you, you don't want the last person's private business to be the first thing they find... or the second thing or the third......

Anyway, you're right that we're now living in a culture where you can create your own fame via youtube or myriad other sites with communities where you can become popular.  Depending on how you carry it, you either become known as someone who writes interesting dating and relationship posts or someone that runs your mouth indiscriminately and is just completely BAD NEWS for anyone that interacts with them intimately.

I guess what it comes down to is what's more important to the writer.  It's either going to be being trusted by the person they're currently dating or being trusted by their viewers & readers to hand out the personal scoop of what happened to you this week, regardless of the IRL relationship consequences.

~ Bill ( http://billcammack.com )
I blog at billcammack.com ( http://billcammack.com )