Facebook, Privacy and Control.

Danah Boyd's article "Facebooks Privacy Trainwreck" alerts readers to many things we may not of noticed before...
Before everything is stated lets breakdown what Privacy actually means... Privacy can mean a lot of things to many different people it can mean personal space, secutirty, having control over the information shared with others or as Boyd describes it privacy or the concept of "private" is simply a single bit that is either 0 or 1 meaning the data is either exposed or not....
now lets examine the role of privacy in social networks...when we are on Facebook we dont stop and think who will read our posts, view our pictures, post on our wall...Why?? well we have the right to make our page as private as we can right?? meaning only our friends can view our pictures or our posts however we dont stop to think about other people who may also have indirect access to our pages...for instance your friend accidently leaves her Facebook open in a private setting and your page happens to be open..everyone as a result can view the page (without permission) but can do so anyways..so no matter how "private" we make our information on social networks such as Facebook we are left with little control on how much privacy we actually have...
A discussion was bought up in Tutorial about an instance in which a person posted pictures up on Facebook of himself on a trip the same day he called in sick at work?? so if the manager happens to stumble across those pictures do they have a right to give that person a warning?..fire them?... in my personal opinion individuals have to be really careful about what they choose to post on public social websites...at the end of the day what we share was our choice..no one forces us to share things we would rather not share to the public therefore we all make rational decisions which sometimes have repercussions.
so in social networks such as Facebook what is the barrier we cross in order to decide whether we are willing to give-up some of our most private moments to other individuals?
one can simply reply with friends and family...however how many people can actually go on their Facebook and declare that every person on their friends list is worthy of knowing all the details they wish to share...to be honest this may be a mere handful of people.
So at the end of the day we as individuals have to take a step back and examine how much Privacy we actually control...yes it is true that you can always deactivate your Facebook, delete all your information and pictures but your account still lives on in the vast world of cyberspace waiting patiently to be reactivated with the push of a button.
Therefore whether we like it or not our information lives on long after we are gone.

Why SNS?

There are many different social network sites out there by now and more people starting every day. Suddenly, I was wondering why more and more people join social network sites such as Facebook, MySpace, Orkut and Hi5 and so on. What do people get out of them? The main reason joining the social network sites would be that people can meet and find new friends. Everyone in SNS can browse the network and meet new people from all over the world. According to Dunbar, chatting and socializing in humans is similar to physical grooming in ape wild world. 'Language is much more efficient than physical grooming for one can talk to several people at once. Also, language helps people learn about cultural norms, evaluate others' behavior and keep up with the news and shifting opinions of their surrounding community. '(Dunbar, 1996) People say “hello” to their neighbors, ask how they're doing and share their common interests and news. So people can create social bonds. Moreover, SNS enables people to strengthen and maintain their relationships with friends.

I have an account with facebook. As my experience, Facebook is sort of a current affairs site where latest news and events are updated at all times. I want to know what happened to my friends and don’t want to miss out. So I view the posting and commenting on status reports wall. Especially, I have many friends who live in different country. It is hard to meet and have a chat on msn or any other instant messages because we all have time difference. So we normally leave the messages and commenting on facebook. To me, SNSs like facebook help me out to keep in touch regularly with my friends who live in different country.

Now people can do so much more with a SNS than just meet people and send messages. People add videos, listen to their favourite music and find old friends. Also, SNS let people share or promote their business, individual talents and help with a problem and ones’ concerns on a condition they may have. To sum up, I think people will get a friendship, networking and a sense of belonging out of SNS. Therefore, more people will join social network sites.