Following The Digital Footprint of a Friend

With the permission of my friend, I scoured the internet to see what kind of digital footprint he has. His instagram is private, so someone who he hasn't accepted as a friend would not be able to see any of his posts or tagged images. He doesn't have any posts anyways though so it doesn't really matter anyways. He was tagged in a few pictures of him and his friends in their high school graduation pictures from 2020, but those are the only pictures I could find that he was tagged in. His bio states that he is in the University of Regina Education program and a link to the Trevor Project. I went through his "following" list and was able to see that he is a fan of hockey and cars.

When I went to his Facebook profile, it stated that he lives in Regina, goes to the University of Regina, and owns an automotive detailing business. He doesn't have any posts that are not promoting his business but his mom posts a lot about him on her facebook account. After going through the posts about him on her page, I can see that he did track and field in highschool and did pretty well. I was also able to see that he has two younger brothers and a dog. I found out his birthday, how old he is, and plenty of pictures of big life events and milestones. Note: he told me to tell you that his Facebook tagging setting is set to friends only so what I seen was because I was friends with him and his mom.

I then searched his name on Google and was surprised to see that there is a famous art director with his name, an important Canadian environmental Lawyer with his name, and a semi-famous TikTok influencer with his name that all popped up before I found anything about him. I did find his ePortfolio that he made for ECS 102. From his e-portfolio I know that he is Indigenous. Other than this, I could not find anything about him

Based on his digital footprint alone and trying to set aside my friendship with him, I think it’s hard to say whether or not I would trust them fully or want to be his friend because his digital footprint doesn’t really tell us much about who he is. I think if I hadn’t met him, I would be open to meeting him and getting to know him by the link to the Trevor Project in his instagram bio. I think that says a lot about what is important to him and that aligns with what is important to me as well. I think from an employers perspective, I think it is good that he doesn't have a concerning digital footprint as he is going into education but barely having a digital footprint at all can be a red flag for some employers too. My overall impression of him based solely on his digital footprint is that he is clearly a very private person, has some interests and hobbies, values social justice and his financial security.

I know a lot of people think that education students should have a very specific and tailored digital identity for the public, and that is fine. I do believe that he has a right to privacy and shouldn't be expected to spend time outside of his job and school to craft a digital identity for the purpose of others to see. I think that people have social media for all kinds of reasons and for him, it's more about intaking content and communication rather than content creation or public identity. My only advice for him about his digital footprint is that he would probably benefit from updating his e-portfolio. It is very empty and hasn't been updated since 2021.

In general, I do see the appeal of having different social media accounts or platforms for different things. As described in the "Having multiple online identities is more normal than you think" article, many people have separate social media accounts for different audiences. In education, I know many teachers who have a public instagram account for parents and students to see, and a private account for their friends and family. Personally, I have tried making a "finsta", a separate instagram account for close friends where I post more often and share what I want to without worrying what the people following me are going to think. I kept up with it for a few months but fell off my posting routine and I haven't updated it in close to a year. Here is a website with some great tips for having social media accounts as a teacher.

In regards to teaching youth about digital footprints and their activity on social media platforms, I think one of the biggest messages I think they should take home is about the productivity of their online activity. I don't mean that they should necessarily follow accounts about productivity, but when they are commenting or posting on social media, I think they should consider whether or not their post/comment is going to be productive. Is sending hate or death threats or cyberbulling someone to someone who is different than you or doesn't have the same opinion as you going to be productive for either of you? Probably not. I think that the constant negativity on the internet leads to mental and emotional exhaustion, something we definitely do not need more of in our lives.

My main piece of advice for people online is "be mindful as to how much emotional energy you spend online and simply be productive and kind". I think that there is a difference between calling someone out or holding people accountable for their actions, and cyberbulling people. I think it is also important to recognize how different people are targeted by online shaming. As Jon Ronson explains in "How one tweet can ruin your life", when a man gets shamed, it's "I'm going to get you fired". When a woman gets shamed, it is much more dangerous and leads to threats of sexual assault.