Recently, I had a lengthy conversation with a friend about how I felt it was wrong and should be illegal for companies and the government to access Facebook and others. In as much as these sites are open to the public, should they be used to decide if you can be hired or used against you in court? How many times have you said something stupid to a friend, but that was just between you and them? How many times this week have you said something that was between you and someone else and not for general consumption? At one point in this country we made it illegal for others to record what you say. As we know that is also not as true anymore.
Social sites are by and large a wealth of information on people. Think about it, they tell the world everything from where you go, what events you attend which include political tendencies. Religious affiliations you hold to. The internet is a wonderful and awesome tool. But, like with any tool it needs to be used correctly. Locksmith has tools to open anything, but their are strong rules in place to assure they aren't used wrongfully. Social sites should be afforded the same protections.
No company, or government agency should have access of any kind to them. The government seems to have forgotten who they work for. Would restricting their access to the sites make their jobs harder? Well I would hope so, they are in the business of having to make their case. It should be hard.
In this article the defendant was to be placed on probation, but got two years because based on a photo the judge felt that the man was really not remorseful. This only illustrates again why we the people are have rights and protections under the law. Are you telling me that every other person before you believed them when they said they were sorry? That all you needed was a photograph showing other wise and you would have "put them away?" We are living in a time where we are increasingly being watched and recorded. In many parts of this world you can not go a day without being recorded.
Posting on a social site is the decision of the individual. I am amazed by some of the things people post too. Yet, isn't that what we have always done. Just before it was said between us and no one knew? Is it any different then it was 50 years ago, just now you can see and hear it more? It isn't anything new. Just now, non-breathing non-living entities claim the right to know and see them. They claim they need this information. We have already seen the concept of privacy all but die at this point. Is our privacy something we can even save at this point. Remember when your credit rating was private? Now anyone and everyone can see it, and use it to determine more then if you likely pay for something over time. It is used to decide if you are worthy of living in certain places, be employed or fly on a plane. Amazing how individuals are being told that they need to hold themselves to a level that companies and the government are not.
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Web networking photos come back to bite defendants
By ERIC TUCKER, Associated Press Writer
Fri Jul 18, 1:24 PM ET
PROVIDENCE, R.I. - Two weeks after Joshua Lipton was charged in a drunken driving crash that seriously injured a woman, the 20-year-old college junior attended a Halloween party dressed as a prisoner. Pictures from the party showed him in a black-and-white striped shirt and an orange jumpsuit labeled 'Jail Bird.'
In the age of the Internet, it might not be hard to guess what happened to those pictures: Someone posted them on the social networking site Facebook. And that offered remarkable evidence for Jay Sullivan, the prosecutor handling Lipton's drunken-driving case.
Sullivan used the pictures to paint Lipton as an unrepentant partier who lived it up while his victim r"
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