What has social media's impact been on your life?
This one is quite an important one for me, on many fronts. First and foremost I suffer from social anxiety disorder, It came on when I was in my 30's and was devastating to me, a guy who through his teens and 20's was never home, always out with friends, always at a pub or an empty (Scottish for when someone's parents or flatmate is away and everyone gathers there to get drunk) hanging out and generally having a rare old time. So to go from that to near enough a social pariah was a nightmare for me, I still dont know what set it off but I've lived with it since. So social media has been a godsend in one way, it allows me to keep in touch with my old friends that I don't get a chance to see otherwise, and in the case of SG it's allowed me to make new friends, people who over the last year when I was house bound with my broken knee tendon, they kept me sane, after a couple of months of me being off my own real friends got pissed off running up to visit me, so a special thanks must go out to @aobh and @ghillie and @blu and @lilymai and @erulisse these 5 beautiful ladies were the savior I needed, so yes social media has it's good points.
But it also has it's bad points for me. Facebook especially. twice in the last 18 months my work tried to have me sacked due to something I had posted on Facebook, the biggest tip I can give to anyone is not to have your current workplace listed on your fb profile. You can be tracked through it. Last July during an all night drinking session with friends I was joking with my pals about my company using the large amount of apprentices the company had as slave labour (yes we spell it that way in the UK) during the Commonwealth games that were happening in Glasgow at that point in time. One of my pals decided to Frape me by putting up a joke about what I'd been saying on my fb page, however also tagged the company name in the post. This flagged up on their notifications and before I even knew what was going on the company screenshot the page and seen from my profile I was an employee and charged me with making derogatory comments about the company, which is a gross misconduct charge and a sackable offence. I only got away with it by the skin of my teeth when my friend wrote a letter to my boss admitting responsibility for the joke, instead of being sacked they gave me a written warning saying I should not have let a friend access my own social media site and make comments about the company. So don't get drunk whilst logged into the Facebook app people.
So I am now very wary what social media sites I use and what I post on each of them, I often edit photos before putting them on Instagram to ensure no logo is in view, last thing I need is for some other company to say I used their logo without permission, or was doing something dodgy which could bring their name into disrepute. We all have to be really careful in this climate of everyone posting their entire lives online, there are lots of companies out there desperately trying to make an example of the small fry in order to put the fear of god into all the other employees they have.
I also have to say an extra wee thanks to the newbie @aurorer for being a great pal of late, I've just been paid off through ill health and her friendship has been a great comfort to me.
Thanks to @rambo & @lyxzen for such a great topic, It's good to get these things off my chest, and hopefully I can save some other members the heartache of social media attacking them in real life.
