Cutline Speaks

My Conflicted Life Online

posted by Erin on June 2, 2008

By now you might have read the recent piece in the New York Times Magazine by Emily Gould. It's a great story. And one that got me thinking about my own life online. It's also something that we've discussed here at Cutline. When I started in PR, social networking was about as much of a reality as taking a ride on the Enterprise. But, alas, it is now what shapes our world to some extent. At least the world we live in here in Silicon Valley. And most definitely here at Cutline.

We're all now on Facebook. I'm pretty sure we're all on LinkedIn, too. Recently we, as Cutline, signed up for our very own Twitter account (we even found a cool little gadget that posts our tweets right here on Cutline Speaks). Several of us have our own blogs - some are private and some are public. We all contribute to Cutline Speaks. We post reviews on Yelp under various pseudonyms. We have Picasa, Flickr, SmugMug and other online photo accounts. We upload silly videos to YouTube about our home decorating experiences and our pets. We subscribe to things like FriendFeed, which is a scary proposition for some in that it aggregates all of your various social networking accounts into one neat little package. I'll even go out on a limb, while I'm on a roll, and admit to using diet and exercise sites (like SparkPeople) as well as online dating sites (it's enough that I'm admitting this; I'll refrain from sharing any more). Many of us are always down to try the latest and greatest whatever-it-is. But, for some of us, there's still the need to keep our private life private.

Not for me. My life has become a very conflicted state of, well, state. I don't mind putting myself out there. I didn't, however, think that it would get to this point. Despite having several conversations with colleagues as well as with friends, I didn't really put a lot of thought into my life online (in a serious way, that is) until I read Emily's piece. And the more I've thought about it, the more I've realized that I'm OK with it. When I started my blog, it was really intended to update my friends and family. I didn't think they would read it but I felt like I was doing my part to keep up with everyone. Fast forward several years later, I now have a pretty healthy readership. And I am OK with it. There was once a time when I wasn't. In fact, I deleted my first personal blog after about 18 months when I realized that people I didn't know were reading it.

That was then. Now we live in a different world. The lines between work and life are blurred. And I firmly believe that it's a very personal decision to put yourself out there or not. So, whether you are out there and have managed to delicately balance this cliff or you're not and have decided to refrain from potentially being fodder for public discourse, it's all good.

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