Finding Myself Online
After moving between the three platforms that I use online, Facebook, Pinterest, and Tumblr, I noticed that whether it be purely for personal use or for my academics, they each presented some form of my academic self. My Facebook is used purely for school related activities, therefore, my academic self is extremely present. Because I use Pinterest to find personal DIY’s and inspiration for class projects, it is a combination of both my personal and academic self. And even though my Tumblr account is mainly used for personal reasons, my academic self is still present in the content. Once I determined each of their uses, I came to the conclusion that in some shape or form my academic self was in each of my social media platforms. As described briefly before, I can find my academic self in three ways: how I am using the platform, through my inspirations and throughout the content.
Looking through my Facebook page, it is clear that my academic self is present. Whether it be in the people I am friends with, through the things I post about or just due to the fact I use it for school. With my classmates taking over the majority of my friends list, I tend to think about what they would actually want to see. So I post about what I am studying and topics that I think relates to their interests. For example, I am studying graphic design and tend to post videos about calligraphy. Because my classmates are also interested in these types of videos, they tend to leave comments or like the post. Within my major there is a type of “internship” that the school offers which is called, Design Lab. While in Design Lab we use Facebook as a way to communicate within our group and to share our designs with the other groups. Due to the majority of my time being spent on Design Lab and it using this platform, my Facebook is mainly used for school purposes.
When it comes to Pinterest, my academic self and true self are both noticeable. This is where I go to find inspiration on a class project or to find a new creative thing to add to my apartment. My boards range from ‘typefaces that you should never use’ to DIY home decor. When looking through my boards, I would say that my school interests overpowers my personal interests. As an example, for about every five boards on something related to design, there is one board on something related to decor. Although I would love to use this platform more for personal reasons, this is one of the best sites to find inspiration for my projects when I hit a creative road block. There are hundreds of designers who create boards to share their work with other inspiring designers. This site is also perfect for keeping my inspiration for certain projects separate. All of the tools that this platform offers is one of the main reasons why I chose to use this site for academic purposes.
Tumblr was the one place where I thought my academic identity wasn’t visible. But after taking a step back, I realized that throughout my content there were bits and pieces of my academic self. I noticed that in-between the posts of my favorite bands and the hilarious videos of cats, that there were posts on designers that I was looking to for inspiration. With every couple of posts, there was an image of a poster, a creative package design, or even a logo design. I usually went to Tumblr for a good laugh or to see what was going on with the world. I didn’t think that my academic self was impacting the content of my page until I was looking for it. Now that I have noticed it, I see myself looking more and more for things that relate to my studies or to the arts in general.
After looking throughout my online platforms, I have decided that my academic identity and my online identity are one in the same. Throughout every detail of my online presence there was always a piece of my academic self, even if I didn’t notice it before. Now that I am aware to the fact it runs a major part of my online identity, I would like to go back and make sure that the information that regards my true self is to the standards they need to be at. If future employers look into these platforms they would get a great understanding of my academics and my inspirations but they wouldn’t get to see who I really am. Because who I really am is lacking, I have decided that my online identity needs more of my true self spread throughout it and maybe a little less of my academic self.