How to Ruin Your Life

When I hear stories about kids posting incriminating pictures and stories on social websites like MySpace- it makes me sick. You are inadvertently doing something which will affect you for years to come. You may not realize it now, but it will happen. I pulled up a copy of a website today (that I developed in 1996) on The WayBack Machine internet archive. In case you've never heard of it, it's an archive of websites- saved for future viewing. You can find copies of almost anything, even if has been deleted off the internet for over 10 years.

As a young adult, you'll be heading off to college soon and applying for jobs in another 5-10 years. When you do, your potential employer will "google you", only to find the pictures of you doing a keg stand at that all night bash. It was cool that you bragged about it when you were 16, but they won't see it the same way.

And then there are the kids that lack any common sense. Whatever you do, don't confess to murder on your homepage. In fact, don't get drunk and drive a car in the first place (as she did). This story hit our local newspaper yesterday and I couldn't believe my eyes. I bet she wasn't thinking "self incrimination=prison" when she was posting that. As with everything you do, THINK before you act and you might stop yourself from doing something that could cause you problems for years to come.

Filed in: CWS, Google, myspace, WayBack, confession