That we regret the rise of MySpace

[Crisb92]

As previously promised, this is the second in the series of debates.

 

So, what is your opinion on the topic?

 

Personally, I have not dabbled in the MySpace site, preferring to stay out of that area due to the inherent dangers that occur if you are less than vigilant with the information you give out. To say that we should disallow the entire process, however, is a bit harsh. There should be warnings as to the less than pure intentions of some of the people on these sites as well as the interesting fact that employers can find out about who you were from the trail you have left on the web.

[ninja_lord666]

My Space sucks. It should be deleted from the web. There is no point to it.

Warnings of people's intentions? Is My Space supposed to be psychic? There is no way of knowing a person's true intentions.

[Crisb92]

Warnings of people's intentions? Is My Space supposed to be psychic? There is no way of knowing a person's true intentions.

 

I was referring to the lack of warning that MySpace offers to people who may be vulnerable to sexual predators or the like, not that they should check every single person. Recently, MySpace claimed to have deleted the profiles of 7,000 known offenders, but had somehow overlooked the 29,000 others they had found. I refer to this article.

 

This was what I was talking about, that they should illustrate the dangers of sharing information about themselves with people they don't know in a general statement when people sign up, not that they should somehow 'know' everyone's intentions.

[Dark0ne]

The concept behind MySpace is perfectly reasonable -- keep in contact with your friends, family, past school chums, etc. through one centralised location (plus the obvious networking implications). Unfortunately, MySpace quickly turned into MySpaz once people realised how easy it was to exploit the system. Couple the easy exploitation with the overly crap styles of most MySpace pages, like the pink backgrounds with white text, etc. and it turned bad fast.

 

I am quite a happy user of Facebook. I don't use it religiously like some, but, from a university student perspective, Facebook is extremely handy to keep in contact with the people you meet out and about.

 

Security doesn't bother me. I don't have children, and I believe I'm old enough to not be exploited by a 50 year old man masquerading as a 16 year old emo girl.

[Vagrant0]

Myspace never worked for me, don't have any interests, don't have any pictures, don't have anything I could actually put there that anyone could see any value in. The same goes for pretty much any site with similar features, have nothing to put on there that I think anyone else should have an interest with. As for people getting your information, if they were determined enough to get it, they will. As for employers... Aside from the issues with privacy and the fact that what I do in my spare time is my own business and not indicative of any performance issues which may come up, personally, I would see it as a benefit over other applicants since the employer would have a better understanding about the person they are planning to hire, and anything which makes you look better than others is always good.

[Peregrine]

This was what I was talking about, that they should illustrate the dangers of sharing information about themselves with people they don't know in a general statement when people sign up, not that they should somehow 'know' everyone's intentions.

 

If you're too stupid to realize that giving personal information to strangers is a bad thing, you deserve what you get. This is a matter of common sense, if you're capable of using the internet, you're capable of understanding it. If you actually have that common sense, MySpace involves absolutely no risk. Well, maybe a risk of insanity from reading some of the profiles there, but nothing else.

 

as well as the interesting fact that employers can find out about who you were from the trail you have left on the web.

 

Good for them. Unlike some people, I have the intelligence to avoid posting under my real name online. The trail left by "Peregrine" only meets up with the real me in the minds of real-life friends.

[Karasuman]

"If you're too stupid to realize that giving personal information to strangers is a bad thing, you deserve what you get."

 

I completely agree. The "exploitation" of many individuals on the internet comes down to an amazing lack of common sense. There are 1,000,000 ways to exploit people besides MySpace, and if MySpace were eliminated, so what? That would only leave another 999,999 ways. As was said, if someone wants your personal information bad enough, they have multiple ways to go about getting it, MySpace or not. It gets old seeing this MySpace scape-goating that occurs all-too-often lately.

 

It should not be too much to ask of an 11 or 12 year-old, much less a 20 or 30 year-old, that they exhibit a bit of intelligence when using the web. If the youth of this world (or anyone else) hasn't figured out that there are predatory people who wish to do them harm out there, then this earth is doomed indeed.

 

If people don't like the idea of becoming victims, then they probably should avoid blatantly putting themselves in positions that cause them to be victims in the first place. Let's at least attempt to practice a little self-preservation before we go pointing a finger at MySpace or whoever else. And, if you can't be bothered to employ simple sensible logic, then you deserve every ounce of the evils done to you.

[Peregrine]

It should not be too much to ask of an 11 or 12 year-old, much less a 20 or 30 year-old, that they exhibit a bit of intelligence when using the web. If the youth of this world (or anyone else) hasn't figured out that there are predatory people who wish to do them harm out there, then this earth is doomed indeed.

 

An 11-12 year old doesn't really belong on the internet unsupervised anyway. Parents need to show some responsibility and not let their children into potentially dangerous situations until they are mature enough to handle them.

[Switch]

"name_not_availble"'s post removed. Didn't really add to the debate, seemed rather spammy to me.

[ResidentWeevil2077]

You know, the creators of MySpace should've realized the potential of pedophiles and other demented sickos to get onto their God-forsaken site just to look up the profiles of dumb, stupid, and just plain brain-dead young girls who are too horny to think about such things (the typical "MySpace angel", if you will). I know Peregrine mentioned common-sense with regards to things like this, but one must realize that "common-sense" isn't so "common" anymore (even I sometimes catch myself lacking common-sense o_O ).

 

Today, one must practically be told HOW to live their life, and a parent can't necessarily always keep an eye on their kid(s) 24 hrs a day, espceially when both parents work (which has got to be the stupidest notion of running a family - only a complete workaholic a$$hole would do such a thing >:( ). No wonder this world is going to Hell in hard-cart fast, because stupid, lame-ass parents care more about their g*ddamn careers than actually trying to care about where their kid(s) go on the Internet.