Internet generation realizing a downside to growing up online

Steven Silvers calls them The Transparent Generation. In his recent post he laments about how our younger generation of kids who grew up with the internet may now be regretting some of their online habits. I have to agree. Just as the resume is no place to list personal information such as marital status and hobbies, the internet is now part of the job search process. Anything you dont want employers to know should not be posted online. Job seekers must keep things professional at all times.

Here's what he writes...

They're the first true children of the hyperconnected information age, and they were using the Internet before they could write cursive. Now they're starting to graduate college, ready to launch their careers as responsible, tax-paying young adults.

And many of them are waking up to a nagging concern about their online trail of screw-the-establishment web sites, embarrassing party photos, gushy poetry blogs and message board diatribes - all created way before they ever thought they might be Googled by a potential boss.

"For nearly the last decade my personal thoughts and feelings have been registered on the internet," an intern candidate wrote to me recently. "I have to wonder, do I need to start avoiding message boards I've posted on for years for the sake of an organization I'll belong to?"

It depends on the content and context, of course. But what he and his generation are coming to realize is that their use of the Internet to socialize and explore their innermost selves has created a transparent, permanent record by which complete strangers are making decisions about their future.

Read his full post >>