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This article challenges the librarian to consider the ethical use of social networking sites by libraries and the responsibility librarians have to protect patrons’ privacy.
Facebook and Myspace have the ability to share users’ information any way they want. They can change privacy settings without the users’ knowledge. Facebook and Myspace “own” users information. Social networking sites are under pressure to make money. Sharing personal information about users is fundamental to making a profit.
This article and the lecture for this week prompted me to adjust my Facebook privacy settings. I now have all my privacy settings set to “friends only” except for videos and photos I’m tagged in. Only I can view photos I’m tagged in. According to this article, "25% of Facebooks’ users can’t even find the privacy settings, leaving them at the mercy of the sites’ default settings." I hesitate to post much of anything. Why would I want to give my private information away for free?
Helping patrons and students understand the nature and mission of social networking and how to limit exposing too much personal information is an important part of the library’s mission. According to the article, “By creating a profile on these sites, libraries also risk further legitimizing them, and encouraging users to be passive regarding their own privacy. If libraries take a comprehensive view of privacy as a core value, encouraging user to use products that do not have the same regard for privacy should give librarians pause.”
Discussions about internet privacy happen routinely at my house. I live with two teenagers. They understand nothing they post or text will ever be private. Still one of my children lacks the discretion to understand what is really negative and could potentially hurt him in the future. His idea of negative and my idea of negative aren’t the same.
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I hadn't really thought too much about using Facebook as a reference tool, but I found this post which included a poll taken of how people would like to contact or ask questions of librarians. Only one out of 200 wanted to get help from a librarian on Facebook.
ReplyDeleteYou can find the poll here:
http://userslib.com/2007/07/12/facebook-users-prefer-in-person-librarian-interactions/
It's so hard to decide what to do regarding Facebook in the library because on one hand you have some librarians saying that Facebook is a great way to communicate with patrons and on the other hand other people indicate that they have little desire to contact librarians on Facebook. I personally don't have Facebook, but I can see the pros and cons of Facebook. I know your post was about privacy, but it got me thinking about this aspect of Facebook.
Leah
I actually think the whole Facebook flap represents a great opportunity for an enterprising library out there to talk to people about online privacy.
ReplyDeleteYou know what would also be more popular now than usual: a presentation at the library on how to adjust your privacy settings on Facebook! Perhaps the library could also release an online version (.doc format or a powerpoint or a podcast or something) showing people how to do it.