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Colleges Help Students Fix Their Online Indiscretions
A growing number of colleges are providing graduating students tools to improve their online image. The services arrange for positive results on search engine inquiries by pushing your party pictures, and other snapshots of your lapsed judgement off the first page. Syracuse, Rochester and Johns Hopkins are among the schools that are offering such services free of charge. From the article: "Samantha Grossman wasn't always thrilled with the impression that emerged when people Googled her name.
'It wasn't anything too horrible,' she said. 'I just have a common name. There would be pictures, college partying pictures, that weren't of me, things I wouldn't want associated with me.'
So before she graduated from Syracuse University last spring, the school provided her with a tool that allowed her to put her best Web foot forward. Now when people Google her, they go straight to a positive image — professional photo, cum laude degree and credentials — that she credits with helping her land a digital advertising job in New York."
I don't know what she's talking about. First thing I see if that evil Newton killer's image.
When the foot seeks the place of the head, the line is crossed. Know your place. Keep your place. Be a shoe.
Facebook is one example of a site that has a crappy policy that only allows you to have one profile. It makes sense to have two social media profiles, one for your personal life which you share with friends, post your party pictures and aren't afraid to write whatever you want, and one for your professional life, where you add coworkers and talk about work.
Yet Facebook and other sites are forbidding this, making people put everything in one pot. It's becoming more difficult to separate your personal life from your professional life these days. Stupid real name policies and pervasive connection of everything to everything else is a curse.
We need a push towards policies that make it easy for people to keep personal and work lives separate. It's common sense.
I just keep my personal info completely off anything public on the internet. Tada, zero results (other than whitepages-style listings for people who aren't me). I don't have a Facebook account, my Google account has a fake name, etc. What a coincidence, I don't have problems like this.
"... that she credits with helping her land a digital advertising job in New York." Her first task: get herself and her company some Slashdot hits.
So we define positive in terms of social stigma? God forbid you would be associated with having some social accumen and having a good time. Its always a negative to find out someone has ever been to a party with alcohol.
I don't see whats so negative.... some people could hold anything against you. Do you really want to work for/with such people?
"I opened my eyes, and everything went dark again"
I just feel bad for John Goatse.
Why publishers/ad agencies often take English grads from oxbridge = we have an Oxford Alumni on our team (digital marketing for a FTSE100 company) - Bridget Jones worked in publishing and the diary has jokes about "wittgenstein"
This is arguably against Googles guidelines - and I have seen some dubious link directories that appear to be run the insiders in side universitys that try and leverage the high value and trust assigned to a .edu domain.
All the "bad" Samantha Grossmans benefit from this too. How does the digital advertising firm know they hired the sweet, innocent, non-drunkard Samantha Grossman?
Blackhat SEO is still unethical. Especially when she brags about kicking other people with the same name off the first page.
It's even better with me. My name is shared with a celebrity, so nobody ever finds me by directly searching for me unless they already have my nickname, which I would never give to a prospective employer or client.
It wasn't anything too horrible, Samantha Grossman said. I just have a common name. There would be pictures, college partying pictures, that weren't of me, things I wouldn't want associated with me.
So, how is this Samantha Grossman's prerogative to have exactly her pictures as the top result, instead of the other Samantha Grossmans, who now fret that there are pictures there that aren't associated with them?
I think there are more than 30 people on the internet named "Anonymous Coward"
Yeah. It works really well, too, when that nickname (Anonymous Coward) is shared by thousands of other users.
Indeed some HR departments (and US ones tend to be worst culprits) have ideas above there station eg Drug tests and back ground checks for some bog standard little development job - you imagine the HR director spends his weekend dressing up as the SAS /Seal team 6/SAD and running round the woods with a paint ball gun
This level of intrusion for job seekers is only really required/justified for a very small subset of jobs eg those with SC or TS (DV) clearance
I party. People know I party. People have evidence that I party. YTF am I supposed to hide that? How about employers stop being prudes and hire humans. I can't stand the fact that the only way to make it through an interview these days is to lie and spout buzzwords. Why is corporate quick to hire squeaky-clean idiots over human beings that have had human experiences?
Maybe you should behave yourself in public places so you don't do stupid shit that ends up on Faceook in the first place.
Do you have different personas in real life that go to different places and dance to the music accordingly?
No? Then why should you get a free pass online to make an ass of yourself in public?
xoxo,
Mom
Mine is better still. A quick check of my name shows that, well...
I'm not even on the first three pages in here...
I see mugshots, wannabe presidential candidates, lawyers, dentists, babies, and even politicians. There's even other tech-oriented folks in the pile. Every conceivable race, creed, and color.
Dear HR drone: Umm, yeah. Good luck with that. :)
Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
Actually it is better to have some "good" images set to public on your facebook page, because if you use your real name (and don't set your privacy settings to hide) it is almost guaranteed to come up on the first page and you can use it to make yourself look good. Setting up an empty Google+ account designed to make you look good is also useful as no one uses it, but it usually appears on the first page of goolge.
That is far more effective in the OP's case because it was someone else with the same name that was making her look bad and so your suggestion wasn't an option.
null
Guys guys! I have the best idea to fool the internet into giving her even MORE fame! Let's get on the front page of Slashdot!! So everyone googles her name!!!!! :D Those silly fools will think they're just reading the news.
...until I was about twelve years old and that no-talent ass clown became famous and started winning Grammys.
People will grow up. Society will realize that everyone does stupid shit and recognize it as part of life.
If you can't party well, how are you going to land advertising clients?
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
Interesting image there.
Warning: this article may contain humor, sarcasm, parody, and perhaps even irony. Read at your own risk.
Sadly, drug tests and background checks means cheaper insurance.
The Kruger Dunning explains most post on
It's an advertisement for . They claim to use SEO techniques which are "white hat", but of course any SEO techniques that attempt to game google results tend to piss off Google, meaning that there's no such thing as "white hat" as far as Google is concerned.
Like most SEOs, this will get you good results for a short while until the back end comparison is made on Googles end to show graph deltas over time, and there's a huge shift in geometry on the particular search tems. At that point, the results she wanted to show up get penalized down in the returned results for searches.
I guess this might be OK, if you expect to look for a job and get one more or less immediately after you do the SEO, but less so if you end up being on the market for a while, at which point the results will be skewed *away* from those you considered desirable when you identified them to the SEO company in the first place.
This type of SEO is probably the only place SEO will work at all, but only if you are in a sellers market for your labor such that you get snapped up quickly before the bias detector figures out what you've done. Since this rarely covers the case of recent college grads with no industry experience, I'd seriously caution against using a service like this until you know what you're getting into.
Why publishers/ad agencies often take English grads from oxbridge = we have an Oxford Alumni on our team (digital marketing for a FTSE100 company) - Bridget Jones worked in publishing and the diary has jokes about "wittgenstein"
But are any of them capable of forming a complete sentence?
Matter of time. Right now, the economy sucks. Employers have their pick of candidates, but also hundreds to choose from. It's impractical to interview so many, so they need to apply some heuristics to narrow the field. Quick and good-enough tests that'll eliminate the undesireables. The 'google check' is one of these, along with mostly-automated 'must have qualification X' standards.
its more like taking a forest clearing logger to cut down one tree. or in car terms, what you say employers do is like taking a perfectly good car with a dent in it and sending it to the crusher because of that dent. nothing wrong with the car, just didnt look quite right, so get rid of it. This practice is the worst because I can make my resume/CV look like exactly what you need, but does that mean that it is what you need. you catch too many qualified candidates with that practice and throw them out the door. leaving you with cheats and liars who when it comes to interview time, well mostly suck.
I feel very fortunate for two reasons.
1. When I started using the internet in the late 80s I was paranoid enough never to use my real name.
2. My real name is shared with a well renowned uber geek programmer.
About once a year new people in my life will contact me to ask me if I am "number 2"
you catch too many qualified candidates with that practice and throw them out the door. leaving you with cheats and liars who when it comes to interview time, well mostly suck.
So? If a company is only hiring candidates who are buzzword proficient, they will get exactly what they deserve. You'll only be frustrated if you go work for them.
Eventually they may replace their HR people with competent folks, or they may slowly go out of business. Not my problem.
John
There are six billion people in this world.
A recruiter who Googles you expecting to find, well, you is a recruiter you don't want to work for.
A recruiter who FINDS you, specifically and undeniably you, will still find you and the things you've advertised to the world online anyway. And that's just about work-life separation.
But the person who thinks that people are Googling them and that's affecting their job prospects (without, I imagine, a shred of evidence because it's likely illegal under employment law anyway without due notice to the application and verification that it's actually them - no worse than hearsay from a stranger), and PAYS to improve the results on her name (and the other 10,000 people with that name)? I wouldn't touch her with a bargepole. What do you have to hide?
Likewise, tattoo removal is a booming business.
It would have been nice if Samantha Grossman's "cum laude degree" taught her something about chronological order. Because her resume certainly doesn't display that. Add in the fact that she's advertising that she's a member of a social sorority and has a "fun fact" of "having the most social media profiles", and her resume would go straight into my circular file,. . .
But you'll be able to eat and pay rent. For some people, that's actually more important than frustration.
So instead of complaining about not doing two things in one place (which might make it easier for someone to find both profiles swirling around, and let fbook know both your jekyll an d hyde personas), have it be that Facebook is one of your two or more social media profiles.
:>)
At my school, Facebook is what your parents are on, so your profile on Facebook is the clean parentally approvable appearance of life: what you show to your parents may not be what you show to your friends on other networks or thru txting. If you want to keep X and Y separated, just keep them separated instead of complaining that you can't have X and Y separated on the same site.
.
You might as well go to the bank and complain that you want two different bank accounts for the same profile!!!! (wait, the local credit union will let you have your personal and other accounts as subaccounts on the same account number by appending a suffix digit). You could just as well also go to another bank and open a separate account with a different tax id number just for your business!! Only that bank and the IRS have to know the linkage! (and your states Business License division, etc.)
not enough. You also must never do anything embarrassing (or which can be misconstrued as embarrassing) within eyesight of someone with a smartphone. Your web presence is not entirely up to you alone.
Didn't say it was me that went to Oxford - I am dyslexic techie on the team I just went a a "bog standard comp" and then day release at the local college of FE.
Though I suspect that Oxford would have been more sympathetic to dyslexia than my high school - certainly one of my My uncles did his MA at oxford orally because his writing was so bad.
Another plus for the NHS or the German system - the whole point of insurance is its a pooled risk picking the pool is having your cake and eating it.
Is this a comment on the person who did this? Or is the "Tool" some type of Hardware and or Software?
What's so wrong with having a life before work and outside work when you are all grown up?
What's so wrong with enjoying yourself in the company of friends?
What's so wrong with having a few drinks and maybe even dancing in a silly fashion for a laugh every once in a while?
What a miserable world this is turning into.
Stick Men
Fix online image fix: set facebook page to private... problem solved
Fix online image fix2: set your other accounts to private, doesn't have a private non-web crawl setting? Don't use it.
Now about counteracting reverse image searches... wear glasses & possibly a mask, have fun. Thankfully employers are as of right now too dumb to use it. Fix #1 done upon account creation would prevent your photos from being looked up as well I believe.
That's not how insurance works. It's all about segmentation. People with similar risk profiles go into the same bucket and are charged the same rates. The more buckets you have, the more flexibility in pricing (and consequently marketing and customer acquisition) you have. Customers demand it (I want to lower my insurance premiums) and eventually insurance companies respond (create a more stringent profile that allows them to charge smaller premiums).
"Hot lesbian witches! It's fucking genius!"
You are just a number. A face in the crowd. The company knows nothing about you, and has no previous relationship. One qualified person is as good as another. There is usually more than one qualified person applying for a position. As long as their system does not weed out ALL of them, they still have a few qualified people filter down to the next stage. That's all they care about.
It's a lot like love. Because we all know /. is the home of analogies. There is more than one person that is a fitting partner for you. Most of us will stop at the first one, which may not necessarily even be the best one (and rarely is), but we stop looking all the same. The effort (and more importantly the time) to find a better one, or the ideal one, is not worth it.
"Hot lesbian witches! It's fucking genius!"
I can't remember any porn start named Anonymous Coward. But it must be some kinky thing involving masks and submission. I'm not particularly attracted to that kind of stuff.
so failure of regulation the insurance industry is far more opaque than say banks are ask the insurance industry to explain how with profits funds values are calculated.