Take a look at your image in the Internet mirror; Google Search your name, FR screen name

The Dallas Morning News ^ | April 16, 2004 | By TOM MAURSTAD / The Dallas Morning News

[MeekOneGOP]

Take a look at your image in the Internet mirror

07:42 PM CDT on Friday, April 16, 2004

By TOM MAURSTAD / The Dallas Morning News

Have you ever googled yourself, maybe late at night, when nobody else was around? It's OK, you can admit it – everybody does it.

It's called "self-googling" – entering your name into the popular search engine to see what hits come up. And thanks to a communications professor at the University of Buffalo who researches online behavior and relationships, self-googling has become the latest mini-craze to sweep through the media and over the Internet.

It all started with an article in the university's student newspaper on April 8 in which Alexander Halavais, the aforementioned communications professor, asserted that "self-googling" wasn't merely an act of vanity or boredom but really an increasingly important act of image maintenance in our Internet age.

In the days since, follow-up articles and accounts have been pinging around the electronic universe. See for yourself: Google the phrase "self-googling."

"It's been a strange kind of fun to be at the center of this," says Mr. Halavais. "One, because this behavior is nothing new; it's known on the Web as 'ego surfing.' And, two, because this is not really the focus of my research."

Whatever you want to call it, checking out who you are and what's being said about you on the Internet is rapidly becoming a common-sense practice in a wired world. Think of it as the digital equivalent of looking at your reflection as you pass by a mirror, checking to make sure your hair is unmussed and there's nothing stuck between your teeth.

"It's truer for some than others, but more and more you need to be aware of and manage your online image and reputation. I talk to a lot of students who are applying for jobs, and they take for granted that a Web search is part of the process."

So, go ahead. Google yourself. Who knows what you'll find out?

Of course, Alexander Halavais knows exactly what he's going to find next time he gets the urge to self-google.

"That's it, I'm branded. From now on, I'm the self-google guy."

E-mail tmaurstad@dallasnews.com

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Online at: http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/041704dnartselfgoogle.310f4.html

[arasina]

Okay, it's either Sumit Mookenjee or Franic Ray, right? :o)

[MeneMeneTekelUpharsin]

Here's another good find from the Google search;

Click here for excellent web page.

[TheLion]

33,300 hits for "TheLion"....I'm amazed!

[ovrtaxt]

That's a great sign! Did you come up with that?

Zeitgeist has always been one of my favorite words.

Zeitgeist. zeitgeist. hehe, that's almost as fun to say as 'salsa'.

[MeneMeneTekelUpharsin]

Okay, it's either Sumit Mookenjee or Franic Ray, right? :o)

My name IS somewhere on that page. ;^D

[MeneMeneTekelUpharsin]

Another interesting webpage that comes up with pseudonym search:

Click here for web page listing several Freeper members.

[NYC GOP Chick]

Well, at least you had some entertainment -- my trip home this evening on the 3 featured a woman telling her sob story and just expecting money for it.

Then again, when I used to work up near Columbus Circle, there were some rather cacophonous "performers" on the A-B-C-D platform and when I had a *really* bad migraine a couple of times, I actually gave them $5 to *not* play until after I'd gotten on a train and was on my way outta there.

[katz]

I guess I don't feel as uncomfortable as you.

[speedy]

"I knew a girl with herpetology bumps once."

Yeah, that was a more innocent time. I freely admit now that as a teenager I not only knew girls who matriculated, I knew some who even masticated, right in the classroom. What did we know?

[lavrenti]

I have had those unfortunate run-ins. I guess I have a face that lends empathy and authority. My favorite was the punk rock girl who inflicted me with her tale of woe until I pointed out to her that 1) her backpack cost more than a Franklin; 2) that elaborate tattoo on her arm would be a quarter of my paycheck; and 3) that nose ring has an emerald, right? She clammed up after that. I lived in the LES and the East Village for fourteen years--I suffer these fools very lightly.

I worked on 57th and Broadway in 1991-92. Do you remember the old man who mimed opera on 57th and Sixth? That was always strange. He was so passionate but nothing came out.

Oh, then there is the Union Square station. Great place to make your migranes magically appear. If I hear one more set of steel drums...

[Sandy]

Yuk.

Sandy

[hellinahandcart]

Did you come up with that?

No, Paul Atreides did, after Al Gore himself got the ball rolling by saying Republicans were deliberately trying to insert themselves into the zeitgeist via talk radio, or some such nonsense. :D

[SkyPilot]

I am sorry! I didn't mean for you to have to change your screen name.

[ovrtaxt]

I freely admit now that as a teenager I not only knew girls who matriculated, I knew some who even masticated, right in the classroom.

*WOW*. Was their epidermis showing?

[ovrtaxt]

Eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeewwwwwwwwwww!!!!!!!!!!!

[speedy]

"Was their epidermis showing?"

You must have gone to the same kind of school as me. Not only did these tarts shamelessly flaunt their epidermis, some of them openly practiced philatilism -- in one case in loco parentis. And I'll never forget the time one of them showed her bare bodkin to the entire class!! Shameless, I tell you.

[ovrtaxt]

Okay, I give up! I have to go look up philantilism, lol.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

Did you mean to search for: "Lonesome in Massachusetts"

[speedy]

Yeah, guess we could keep this up longer than is healthy. For the record, a philatilist is a stamp collector. It's those lepidopterists you have to look out for......

[ovrtaxt]

Ah, lepidopterists. Didn't Mother Teresa adopt some of those?

But seriously. They aren't nearly as bad as numismatists.