Blog Six McMillan

Self-Cyber-Stalking

Not surprisingly, this will not be the first time I have googled myself! In high school, we all used to google ourselves and friends to see if we could find anything embarrassing or funny to pass the time in or in between classes. However this will be the first time I've done so in a while. Before I started googling and searching for my accounts, I thought about what I anticipated to find. I know that while my Instagram and Facebook are private, my twitter is set on public. Keeping this in mind I suspected that my twitter account would be easiest to find. However, I do not use Facebook often and the last time I used it regularly was in middle school. This means that I really have no idea how much I’ll be able to see when I search it. This makes Facebook my wildcard.

A picture of me while researching myself for this blog

 The Search

To begin my search, I googled my name “Josh McMillan” into a different browser than I normally use with all accounts signed out. The top results was the Facebook page for Josh McMillans. The rest of the results were scattered between various more famous Josh’s. I clicked on the Facebook link to find tons of people sharing the same name as me, but the results surprised me. I could not find my own account. There were dozens of people with the same name as me or similar to it but none of the profile pictures were mine. This must mean that ages ago when I first signed up for Facebook I choose pretty strict privacy settings. I am aware, however, that Facebook’s setting are a little bit more tricky than other social media platforms. On others you are either private or public but with Facebook there seems to be a lot more grey area so I must have chosen the private side of things when I set up my Facebook.

Here's what pops up when I google my name.

I tried to search Instagram for my account. However, having an account was required to search. So, I made my first ever burner account. Using this new burner account, I searched my name on Instagram. Many results popped up and I was surprised to find that my name was the 26^th result. I found that Instagram searching using the username along with the actual name. My username on Instagram is @Jmcmills20 so I can see why others would pop up before me on the results page. When you aren’t following me you can see my profile picture, the number of followers I have, number I follow and number of posts. You can also see my description. My description reads “CNU | ΠΚΑ | Duck Surf Rescue”. This is about as much personal information that you can get out of my Instagram. I go to CNU. I’m in a fraternity. And I work for Duck Surf Rescue. Besides that, my Instagram is very private. I like to think that I do not have a hyper-masculine presence online but the information my instagram gives out makes it seem like I'm guilty of just ta. I picked the things I'm proud of and think are coolest to go in my description. My profile picture is also of me and my girlfriend.  Hodapp (2017) would likely argue that I am crafting a version of myself to appear most manly. And although its not intentional, he seems to have a point. 

 

Twitter is the one account I have that is public. I searched twitter after I had searched Instagram so I figured the same theme would be present when I searched my name. This was true. My account popped up low on the list but once you find it its wide open. Anyone who clicks on my account can see my tweets, pictures I post, likes, who I follow and who follows me. This is a wealth of information that is available to essentially everyone. This is slightly unsettling for me because in my head I view twitter as almost a free for all and my image there is defiantly less polished than on other platforms. That being said I don’t post my own content on twitter really ever. I do still like funny tweets or memes but that’s about it. However, I keep thinking about what future employers would think if they saw the things I like. Although not all the time professional, I think I do a good job of not liking things that are terrible. On a side note, the shirtless header picture is proving Hodapp (2017) to be more and more right. 🤢

Since I was able to see where I know go to college and where I went to high school through both my Instagram description and my twitter, I was able to refine my google searches. First I googled “Josh McMillan Christopher Newport University”. The results that showed were for last years dean’s list. This site also showed my major. I then googled “Josh McMillan Brookville High School”. This mainly showed a lot of old baseball clips and scores. Finally I searched “Josh McMillan Pi Kappa Alpha” and “Josh McMillan Duck Surf Rescue” with few results for both.

 What's This Mean?

I ended up finding more than what I would have liked to find while cyber-stalking myself. Marwick and Boyd (2014) talked about how many teens want to be in the public without being public. I see myself as belonging to this group. I often find myself wanting to be involved in what’s going on and be caught up on the latest trends but this often times compromises my internet privacy. Another thing Marwick and Boyd bring up is the lack of control that people have on the content others post of them. I find this to be particularly true on certain platforms like Facebook and Snapchat. When people tag me on a post in Facebook it appears directly on my wall, for all my friends to see. Likewise in Snapchat, a friend could take a not-so-family friendly picture or video of me and put it on their story for all their friends to see. This obviously gives away some privacy but there is little I can do about it.

After cyber-stalking myself I ended up finding out more than what I thought I would be able to. Overall, most of the information found was very surface level and nothing I wouldn’t share myself. However, I now find it unsettling how much is available for everyone to see on my Twitter account. In the future, I will definitely think about changing my setting from public to private. But once again, I would give up the ability to have others retweet me, one of the main uses of tweeting. Another thing I cant help thinking about is how much is available that I didn’t see. I’m no pro at stalking. Its scary to think how much more a person could see when they know what they are doing. Moving forward I will certainly be more conscious about what I am showing to the world to see.

References

Hodapp, C. (2017). Identity, the internet, and masculine discourse. Men’s Rights, Gender, And

                         Social Media. Lanham, Maryland. Lexington Books.

Marwick, A. E., & Boyd, D. (2014). Networked privacy: How teenagers negotiate context in social media. New Media & Society 16(7), 1051–67. doi:10.177/1461444814543995