Comments on: Facebook vs. MySpace – Reclaiming and Reinventing Identity Online

By: tom

tom — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 03:56:31 +0000

it was certainly kind of you to post this. I have explored both sites and think that delving into them are good, for the most part. The photo tagging element of Facebook can be really neat, however, it would be best if there were some kind of a stop-gap, or “check” to prevent somewhat libelous (think photo-shop) or far gone images from being integrated into a person’s online life. Recently, I encountered a long-lost college friend who was frustrated, rightfully so, that a Facebook “friend” had posted and tagged images of her that were taken at a party many years ago. I cannot presume to know what the intent was of the person who posted the photos, but can say that it certainly would not have taken much time or thought- certainly less than it took to post said photos to Facebook- to consider at least the impact that their actions in posting the images had on my old friend. Some things- including the rowdy, silly or sometimes “under the influence” actions that many people do in their youth (now, more than ever, it seems, captured on film or digital camers) should certainly not be paraded out for others to see for many reasons- the most being that it can be painful and damaging for those who were innocently captured- often unaware that they were being photographed so- and displayed so. It’s just not decent.

By: yourfriendselectric

yourfriendselectric — Wed, 12 Nov 2008 14:23:44 +0000

Excellent post, I agree with you. MySpace and Facebook pretty much occupy different ends of the spectrum of Social Networking Site with regards to identity play, ‘authenticity’, scope for customisation, the kinds of connections they encourage.

MySpace’s default privacy settings make the majority of its profiles public and visible, it offers extensive customisation features and some scope for identity play (eg usernames instead of or as well as real names), and encourages the forging of new connections.

Whereas Facebook is the most private of all popular Social Networking Sites, restricting the viewing of profiles to those in shared locales and institutions, and so it encourages maintaining connections with people also known offline. It also has limited customisation options.

As you say, there are also differences in how people act and present themselves on these sites which are in part structured by the orientation of the sites.

By: renaldobernard

renaldobernard — Sat, 31 May 2008 17:31:25 +0000

I’m thinking about doing my psychology thesis on digital identity and this helped me somewhat. Thanks a lot for putting stuff in perspective.

By: Whitney

Whitney — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 22:24:56 +0000

This is a great post! I stumbled across your blog while I was researching this topic for a class and you made it so clear!

By: 2.0 weblogs

2.0 weblogs — Fri, 01 Jun 2007 22:20:44 +0000

i don’t know if you got a chance to check out the cnet staff video of the two. i’d say your view is a little more astute, but this is good for a chuckle…

weblog:
http://ThunkDifferent.com

video:
http://www.webware.com/8301-1_109-9724594-2.html

By: Terra

Terra — Mon, 30 Apr 2007 02:27:39 +0000

This is so well written!

Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!

By: adam

adam — Sun, 08 Apr 2007 17:06:23 +0000

thanks for explaining this so clearly. this is the exact same experience i’ve had with facebook thus far. (although i did have more friends on myspace)