I had a really interesting conversation today with my coworker Patrick. I told him I was presenting at an upcoming conference where it's common for speakers to put up their contact information including Twitter handles, e-mail addresses, etc and I was worried that "adidav9" was not exactly the most professional moniker with which to represent myself. adidav9 is/was my handle on Google, Twitter, Instagram, Flickr, Github, and probably a million other places. It has been my identity on the internet for a very long time - since 2009 for this blog, and all the way back to 2004 for my e-mail.
There were two facets to the conversation. One was just the handle itself. adidav9 stands for something rather silly. I went through a phase in middle and high school where I was obsessed with the actor Viggo Mortensen for his portrayal of Aragorn in the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Obsessed is actually an understatement - once in high school, I baked a cake for his birthday and brought it in for my classmates to enjoy (which they gladly ate, but gave me weird looks when I explained the occasion). So adidav is an acronym for... All Day I Dream About Viggo. Yup. And the 9 represents the number of people in the Fellowship of the Ring. I simultaneously cringe and laugh so hard when I explain this to anyone. Changing the handle seemed like an appropriate thing to do, and luckily there aren't many other "Ruosi Fan"s out there so after a few profile updates, I'm now @ruosifan on a lot of social media.
The second facet was the content. What would Google ideally return and not return when someone looks up my name? Patrick took on the more conservative opinion that anything that isn't strictly professional is better left under a separate username or moniker. I disagreed; I felt that the lines between my personal and professional life tended to be fuzzy, and it made sense for it all to be under one umbrella. Plus the idea of managing two blogs, two Twitters, etc was not appealing (people who do this amaze me!). Patrick and I agreed that our differences in thought probably reflected our different age groups - younger people in their 20s tend to not think too hard about putting themselves out there since the internet has been around for most of our lives and our interaction is primarily via "pulling" content with instant feedback (likes, retweets, etc). On the other hand, people in their 30s and 40s who adopted the internet later in their lives probably may be more wary of putting personal information out there, and if they do engage, especially in a professional sense, it's likely in more of a "push" way, e.g. here are my thoughts in a blog or an article, go read them.
I did little bit of field research aka Googling of my colleagues to see what turned up in their search results. Almost all of them had defunct blogs - many were technical, but some had more personal content like poetry, vacation pictures and essays. One coworker even maintains a fashion blog that overwhelmingly dominates her search results. Most of these findings made me go "Hmm, that's interesting, maybe a bit unexpected" but didn't make me think any differently about them professionally. Then again, I already knew these people personally, so it was impossible for me to try and get an outsider's/stranger's opinion.
As for me, I interact online both as a puller and a pusher. I think I may be the only person out of my friends and family who writes regularly (>10 times a year) in a public blog and I estimate that a good 20% of what I put in here is not material I'd be enthusiastic to share with an employer, client or complete stranger. For example, there are posts here that date back to when I was 19 years old that 1.) do not reflect my way of thinking today and 2.) are straight up embarrassing because I was a doofus at 19. Then there's the post from a few days ago where I shared which presidential candidate I am planning to vote for, which is up to date but probably creates an adverse reaction among some people who might read this blog. Both types of content could definitely affect my professional life - from a smirk to a straight up "we're not hiring you."
On the other hand, this is my corner of the internet and filtering myself from certain opinions or topics seems fundamentally wrong. I'm proud of my blogging history and I often read and reflect on my past entries - and one day I want my children to read them, too. If employers or clients don't like what they see here, then that's an early mutual filter for the both of us. Plus, many of the people who I follow and admire - Aaron Swartz, Malala Yousafzai, Brad Feld - wrote or write about their own politics, mental health, insecurities. Relative to many others, I'm barely scratching the surface when it comes to controversial content.
I guess it comes down to the multiple hats I wear - consultant, technologist, traveler, US citizen, feminist, friend, daughter, sister, fiancee, amateur photographer - and which of them I feel can be stored on the public shelf, and which I'd rather keep more private. There will invariably be new hats down the line, too.
I'm still pretty undecided about all of this. For now I'm leaning towards keeping it all together under ruosifan and considering making a small amount of posts private/for my eyes only. I did change my Flickr pictures to be accessible by friends and family only, as those are pretty much 100% casual/vacation-based and I can always curate which ones to share via Instagram and here. My Facebook is accessible to people I know and my Twitter is open to the public, both of which I'm 100% okay with. It's this blog that baffles me, since it's a mix of all those aforementioned hats, and I'm still undecided on which, if any, would better be tucked away.
