You guys, this? (click it) Bothers me.
It bothers me that my friend Allyson had to write that post. It bothers me that I have to read articles like this one in the New York Times (click it) It saddens me that this is even an issue but it is, and I have a few words (or more) to say on the matter.
I realize that while the Internet has been around for a while, it’s still kind of new. It’s new in the sense that it’s ever evolving. Nothing ever seems to stay the same around here. I remember using Google in the late 90’s for my college papers and I remember websites then were about as plain as you can get. There were no social sites. E-mail was still DOS for me. It was a very different place.
Here we are – hell, here I am – out publicly for the world to see, however the world lands here, and the landscape is a lot flashier, no? We’re all socially connected on Twitter, Facebook, Google+ and wherever else. Some of us blog. Some of us don’t. It’s kind of cool and it’s kind of creepy. The Internet, it’s like The Force. It binds us. It penetrates us. It brings us together. It breaks us apart. It’s a crazy thing, this series of tubes, you know?
But you guys, what’s going on in the world? I feel like nothing is safe.
As a mom, I am absolutely horrified that people are swiping photos of other people’s kids and misusing them. HORRIFIED. It shouldn’t be happening, but it is.
I realize there are two very different sides to this, and I do understand both. I do.
One could argue that anyone who publicly publishes photos of their kids on the WWW is just asking for it. You’re putting your kids faces out in the open for the world to see and that you’re just a ticking Pandora’s Box waiting to cause problems for yourself.
But, like I said, this place is old, yet it’s still new. There are no rules here yet for this sort of thing. We’re all still trying to figure out how the hell to govern a common place that seems to have no geographical jurisdiction.
Me, personally, I am an open book. I love having this space that I just started (after many failed attempts at blogging), however, I don’t feel right putting photos of my son on this site. There was a time where I had posted quite a few to Twitter, but I soon realized that I didn’t want those pictures existing anywhere I didn’t have control because you know what? He may be small, but I started to not feel right posting photos of a person who has yet to make an identity for himself. He’s still growing and learning and becoming a person in the world, and while he depends on me to make every decision for him 100% of the time, choosing to put him out there is not a decision I am making. That’s my ethical stance on the matter for my family, but that’s me.
I am in no way saying this is how it should be for everyone.
Photos exist of my son on Facebook under lock and key and that is a somewhat controlled space I feel I okay with. (Although with Facebook’s ever changing privacy policies, I may have to revisit that statement and take them down sometime soon.)
But there is an actual culture of blogging amongst moms that exists to share photos, information and real-life stuff that I find kind of awesome. Some good friendships have developed in the blogosphere and it’s those instances in which I think the Internet is kind of a groovy place.
You know, I worked with Allyson briefly a few years ago. Thanks to social networking, we connected after our brief co-working experience and we socially interacted online.
I haven’t seen Allyson since I worked with her. But I have been able to “hang out” with her, watch her pregnancy with her first daughter, and eventually her second. I have watched her blossom in her career. I have laughed with her. I learned how not to freak out while trying to conceive (mostly) from her and I also learned that mothers are human, too. And it has all happened from the comfort of my own sofa whilst clicking away on my MacBook.
It’s because I’m socially connected to Allyson that I reconnected with someone from my past who I can now affectionately refer to as godmother to my son.
The Internet, it is awesome.
I’ve yet to actually hang out with Allyson in real life (let’s set something up soon, mmkay?), but we’re connected.
While posting photos of family, friends and children is not something I want to do personally on my own blog, I don’t see the problem with it for others. That’s their subject matter. That’s what makes their blog theirs. It’s what makes them who they are.
That’s their decision and THAT IS OKAY.
There are SO many countless families out there doing the blogging thing and I like seeing that real life stuff. I like seeing life happening in the world. It is real reality, unlike reality TV. I’ve learned things about motherhood that I’ll never learn from a book because I’ve seen real moms doing it online, pouring themselves out in the open, the real, nitty-gritty stuff that no one talks about.
But, just because it is out there and in the open in no way gives anyone the right to go ahead and help themselves to photos and misuse them in some twisted game that, for reasons I will never understand, exists.
It’s sick, you guys.
I hate that a friend of mine has to go through this. I hate that anyone has to go through this. I hate that the little creeps decided to latch on to me to get to my friends. I’m sure they were waiting for me to post pictures of my little guy. Well, they can kiss my ass. I’m not doing it. I’m not-not doing it because of them, but all the same, they can still kiss my ass.
This is the Internet. As I was just told by a good friend of mine, there is no jurisdictional issue here. Copying data from unsecured sites is not illegal. There is no digital break-in.
There is a way to 'lock' jpegs to prevent anyone from downloading them, but even that extra-cost measure doesn't prevent someone from taking a screenshot and using that bit of information.
So, since it’s not illegal, allow me to go ahead and show you MY screenshot of someone who has been stealing photos of little girls and using them in an online game. World, meet “Kalina,” an Orkut user. I’m sure that’s not her real name and we all know that’s not her real photo.
Why am I doing this?
I’m not stooping to her level. No, that wouldn’t be right. What I can do is at least go ahead and grab pictures of every single user tied to my friends’ kids’ photos and plaster them all over the Internet in hopes that hey, maybe some of you will go ahead and help me report them all to Orkut. There’s a nifty button that allows you to do so. You have to join, but we can all create aliases, just like these little asshats have, and report, report, report.
EDITED TO ADD: YOU GUYS! I found Kalina's YouTube channel! (CLICK!!) Hey, go report the little jerk, will you? She has many videos featuring photos and video of OTHER PEOPLE'S BABIES.
Perhaps you won’t. Perhaps you will.
Whatever the case, I’m standing by my friend who, because of all this bullshit, feels she has to hide her voice because it’s been violated in a really creepy way.
As a fellow writer, that’s just sad. It’s sad and it’s unfortunate and I hate that anyone has to feel that their outlet, the place which they feel is the most cathartic, has been sullied.
Grow the hell up, little girls of Brazil. Grow up.
One by one, I promise you, you'll all be deleted.
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