Being Public is a new competence we all have to learn
Fake It got a lot of coverage, when it was launched in Finland March 25th 2013. One of the interesting discussions of the book was a talkshow called Bettinas. She had invited a famous anchor, Vieraina Baba Lybeck, who is pretty private about her life online (apart from the fact that she is preparing for at triathlon). And the famous politician Mikael Jungner, who is pretty open about his private life online. And, yes, then me as an expert and author of the book.
Not only did the staff from the show actually film the first time I saw the book behind the scenes at Bettinas where we discussed, what a datasexual (an oversharer) is. They also showed some of Mikael Jungners pretty private videos with his, now former, girlfriend when they were deadly in love (the videos are now gone from YouTube).
But the most interesting thing was the discussion about being public. They asked me, if I would every share the same time of video as Jungner did. I said no, but explained that our book is not targeted people like Jungner. I am pretty sure that he knows what he is doing as he has been a public person for many many years and he uses social media to build his brand. Our book is mostly written for people who are not used to being public. Because that is what most of us need to learn: What does it mean for us that almost everything we do online and definitely on most social media sites is not private. It is public. It can never be deleted, you can always go back and find it. This was part of the discussion, and I hope the main message came through: Always regard social media as a public forum (Facebook’s so-called privacy setting are misleading) and before you post think: Would I say this on national television? If yes, go an post and you probably wont be toast.
Here a teaser for Bettina’s show, and here is the actual show.
