Doc: So who do we have here?

Nurse: Patient name: John Doe. Arrived yesterday in a state of confusion, no identification, unwilling or unable to self-identify.

Doctor: Is that so? (Paper rustle) Sir? Do you know your name?

Patient: ...um.... I did.... once. I think.

Doctor: That's great! At least we have a starting point, right? Well we're going to help you try to recover that. Okay? We're going to help you find out... who you *really are*.


(Intro)



I was going to do an episode on tips and tricks for getting started in spring semester but it occurs to me that I've done one or maybe a couple of those already. So, little bit of a topic change. Not just because I don't like repeating myself (which I do do, regardless), but because of something that happened at the orientation last night.

Some background: every semester we offer new student orientations (what we call Wildcat Welcomes, I believe). The orientations go over the usual things you'd expect to be gone over at an orientation: how financial aid works, how advising works, what kinds of student life and engagement opportunities there are, some info about the bookstore and the library, that kind of thing. Pretty standard fare, I think.

However, the last portion of the orientation is saved for a faculty member to come and talk about what it's like to actually be a student here: a likely description of the day-to-day of your classes, how to interact with faculty, what to expect when taking accelerated classes, how best to learn online, and so on. I have the privilege of usually doing two or three of these every semester and I do very much enjoy doing them.

It's nice to get to talk to some students--not even my own students, which is pretty awesome in and of itself--in an honest, unfiltered way. It's also nice for them to be able to ask questions and get advice in the same manner, especially from a professor they're not getting a grade from.

I've heard some pretty scary stuff from students in these situations in the past, things I won't repeat here because they're just so bonkers, about various interactions they've had with instructors up to this point, so it's a pretty great learning experience for me, too, in that I can even bring some of those experiences back to my own faculty and maybe improve our own behavior and policy.

Anyway, we're having a great time, as always. Students are laughing and engaging, which is impressive because they've been there for two hours already, it's already dark outside, and I'm still going to be talking for another 45 minutes or so (which is precisely what ended up happening).

Toward the end of my spiel, I share a few different little one-offs that don't fit anywhere in the orientation as per the topics on the slides. Stuff like I've mentioned on the pod before: get a pseudo-whiteboard from Home Depot and nail it to your wall. That kinda thing.

So I look at them and I say, "Buy your own website."

Blank stares.

"Like, yourname.com. Buy it."

More blank stares.

I say it's $12 a year for a dot com URL. 	

Still, a sea of blank faces. I realize they have no idea why I've said what I've just said.

And this is the topic I wanted to talk about today: your digital identity.

I say to them, "When you're going up for a job or even just trying to make professional connections out there in the world, what do you think is going to give a better impression to someone you are quite literally trying to impress? 'Sure, my email is pinkfluffytoes at yahoo dot com,' or 'Sure, my email is me at myname dot com'? 

Eyes light up. They understand.

I say, "This also gives you the opportunity to create your own website, a place for you to point people that you have total control over. You can use it as a landing page with just links to other places like your social media or your current work's website profile of yourself (if one exists), you can use it as a place to showcase whatever work you've been doing throughout your degree, you could use it as an actual portfolio, a blog, a place to share photos, definitely a place to house your resume, whatever you want. It's your space. But the important thing is that it's your NAMED space. You don't have something like www.weebly.net slash mylongusername29 on your business cards or email signatures. It's, again, just yourname dot com."

I see smirks and nods. 

I continue: "And look, even if you don't use it--and you don't have to; you could just have it redirect to somewhere else, it's up to you--even if you don't use it, you owning it also means that *nobody else can own it, either*.  There's a level of protection, there. Now, if your name is John Smith, you might have to get creative, but still. It's a dollar a month and it's one of the best small investments you can make in terms of value for money."

So that's the part of your digital identity that is... passive, let's say, in that people need to go to *it*. But what about the part of your digital identity that is *active*, in that you can go to *them*? Yeah, social media. 

Here's the thing a lot of people forget about posting things on the internet: it's permanent. Sure, it may not feel like it because you can delete a tweet or remove a Facebook post but, effectively, it's permanent. And if you put it on the internet, it's not private. Those two things are diametrically opposed. Now, sure, they can be _secure_ and even _encrypted_, but those things are *not* the same as "private." No amount of encryption can save you from someone stealing your friend's laptop and having access to everything you've shared with them online. 

In that way, being safe and secure both online and off (ie, encrypting and locking your computers and harddrives, using strong passwords and two-factor authentication, having a remote kill-and-burn switch for your devices, etc) is much like getting vaccinated: it doesn't just help you but it also helps all those around you. Anyway.

You're putting stuff online. You're using your real name as a Twitter handle, like I and man others do. And that's on purpose. You're trying to build a (and I can't believe I'm going to use this word but here we go): *brand*. Your identity online is still just a version of you. A curated version that can unfortunately be boiled down to a single 280-character tweet, for example, or one Facebook post you made while upset. It's easy to forget that people behind usernames and avatars are actual humans and are therefore messy, complex, even self-contradictory. So we see a single message someone put online and probably didn't think all that much about because, at the time, it was in context and made total sense even if it *was* a sub-tweet, but that in two years when someone runs across that one message without context and without understanding it a) was a subtweet and b) knowing what that reference was to, can misconstrue just what was being said. That, in turn, paints a picture of the person that in no way describes them as a whole.

The solution? Get off the internet. Hah. Just kidding. It's 2020, we can't do that.

One solution if you don't like mixing your personal and professional personas (and, for many people in various professions, this is *crucial*) is to just have two accounts. On Instagram this is known as a Finsta and Rinsta ("fake" Instagram account and "regular" Instagram account, respectively). The Rinsta is the carefully curated version of yourself you want the world to see. It's performance, pure and simple. The Finsta, the "fake" account, is a place to put everything that you would *never* consider putting on your quote "real" account, is usually private, is tied to you by neither username or picture, and is usually just close friends. This is the place to complain, be silly, share inside jokes, and otherwise be the *rest* of the *real you*. The messy, human version.

Which is not to say this needs to be confined to just Instagram. Many people have Twitter "alts" that serve the same purpose, for example. So if you're concerned about how the world at large will see and, even possibly *judge* you (and if you think that's harsh, remember we're talking about *the internet*, here, where the "bravery of being out of range" is endemic), try that Rinsta/Finsta method on for size. 

What it all boils down to is owning your identity online. Being the person you want the world to see and having full control over that. And it starts... with your name.


(Outro)

As always, thank you for listening to this little podcast-thing of mine AND ALSO happy 2020! If you found it entertaining or informative or useful, please do subscribe and rate it on the podcatcher of your choice, whether that's iTunes, Stitcher, Google Play, Spotify, or however you listen. And, as usual, I'd love to hear from you. You can find me on Twitter at newprofcast. Show notes, transcripts, and more can be found on the website at thenewprofessor.com. Until next time.