Self Audit

This self audit has really given me time to reflect about my social media usage and my online footprint. Everything I google, everything I buy, everything I post ends up tracing right back to me. This is incredible to think that every human that uses the online web most likely has a huge online footprint but it's invisible if you don't look close enough. 

For my online digital footprint it must be very big because I am constantly using google, or going on youtube or writing emails. Something I also realized is the fact that I read a lot of books and whenever I buy a book on the kindle it keeps track of my library of books which traces back to me. 

The main social media platforms I use are instagram, snapchat, and linkedin. These three social media platforms all require for the user to enter in their phone number, email, and birthday. Taking a step back that is very personal, and the app stores that data forward. The main social media that catches my eye is Linkedin. While it is supposed to be used for finding jobs and networking. Random people could find out a lot about me because I am a public. This is the risk I am willing to take so that employers can view my page. 

Some of the information that is presented on my social media is what state I live in, where I go to school, what fraternity I am in, what some of my accomplishments are, and even what classes I am taking at school. 

While social media can be used in many ways I also believe there are many downsides that come with it. For instance social media can be fake in a way. People are only posting the best pictures of themselves. The point is people are faking that they are happy all the time, and it has almost turned into a competition, people only put content out that makes it look like their life is perfect with no flaws. If social media is overused it can definitely lead to depression, people can leave mean comments or nice comments that give you that instant gratification.