(1) Crafting an online persona is important for professional branding and opportunities, but one must carefully define themselves for their intended audience and field, knowing that anything shared online can have long term consequences. (2) Social shaming has a long history dating back to colonial times when public humiliation was seen as a worse punishment than death, and people today expose themselves online for attention from strangers in the same way. (3) Prospective employers now regularly check candidates' social media to learn more about them, so one's online actions and persona should be managed carefully with the "mother test" in mind, as your future career prospects can depend on mastering self-branding and connecting online.

1. Missed job opportunities and lower
potential income are some of the costs of
not carefully crafting your online persona.

2. What should I do?
Define Yourself
Professional branding will take on different resonance
depending on your field, but, for many, social media can be an
important tool for professional definition and promotion. (1)

3. Know Your Audience
I treat my social media identities as concentric circles with closest friends and family
at the center, extending outward to colleagues, acquaintances and unknown followers.
(1)

4. The problem ... how best to live our lives in a
world where the Internet records everything and
forgets nothing — where every online photo,
status update, Twitter post and blog entry by
and about us can be stored forever. (5)

5. What aspects of my online
actions are tracked?
Every single day;
Every word you say;
Every game you play;
Every night you stay;
I'll be watching you (3)

6. 'Modernity had diminished
shame's power to shame -- or so
I assumed.' (2)

7. How far back does social shaming go?
‘I took my seat at a microfilm reader and began to scroll slowly through the archives.
For the first hundred years, as far as I could tell, all that happened in America was that
various people named Nathaniel had purchased land near rivers. I scrolled faster,
finally reaching an account of an early Colonial-era shaming.’ (2)

8. Social shaming goes way back!
''Ignominy is universally acknowledged to be a worse punishment than
Death,'' Benjamin Rush 1787. (2)
[ignominy - public shame or disgrace]

9. Why would anyone expose
themselves to the possibility
of being socially shamed?
Their motivation was much
the same ... -- a bid for the
attention of strangers -- ...,
hoping to amuse people
(they) couldn't see.(2)

10. Why be so diligent crafting an online persona?
'..employer clients find it commonplace to
check facebook, with some asking
candidates to "friend" them, or to provide
passwords.' Deborah Howden - Partner
Labour and employment group - Shibley
Righton LLP. (6)

11. Use the 'Mother' test. If
you wouldn't want your
mother to see it, don't
post it. (6)

12. In the new work era, your future depends on mastering self branding,
entrepreneurship, and hyperconnectivity. You will need these to
stand out in the vast sea of human capital. (7)
What does the future hold?

13. Self-branding
'In today's world, self-branding matters more than
any other form of talent,not least because the mass
market is unable (or unwilling) to distinguish
between branding and talent.' (7)

14. Self-branding
Antoine Saint-Exupery put it, "perfection is achieved, not when there is
nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away." (7)

15. Entrepreneurship
'Entrepreneurship is about
adding value to society by
disrupting it and improving
the order of things: it is
turning the present into the
past by creating a better
future.' (7)

16. Hyperconnector
No one except your family and maybe your friends, care what movies you watch, let alone where you are
travelling. Only as a hyperconnector would you have thousands of people reading your movie and trip reviews
and using that information to make their decisions. In this latest state of marketing evolution, a hyperconnector
is the digital equivalent of being an intellectual. (7)

17. Where is this going?
The US military is developing software that has the capability to secretly
manipulate social media sites with the use of fake online personas. A service
member would be able to control 10 separate identities around the world. The
identities need to be convincing and be operated 'without fear of being discovered
by sophisticated adversaries' (8)

18. Software to create fake
persona’s - ‘sock puppets’
It also called for internet traffic from the project to
be "mixed" with traffic from outside Centcom to
provide "excellent cover and powerful deniability' (9)

19. It all started off with the mundane task of a job search. Before you know it, prospective employers are
scrutinizing your every online keyboard and mouse click. Your social media persona will never be what everyone
is looking for. All you can do, is craft it to the best of your abilities and hope for the best.

20. (1) Brand for Hire: Crafting Your Professional Persona Online, Or, Have
You Googled Yourself Lately?
Kelly Scott (Konevich) Posted on March 6, 2014
https://www.northeastern.edu/careers/blog/brand-for-hire-crafting-
your-professional-persona-online-or-have-you-googled-yourself-
lately/
(2) Ronson, Jon. "Feed Frenzy." The New York Times Magazine, 15 Feb. 2015, p. 20(L). Literature Resource Center,
go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=LitRC&sw=w&u=queensulaw&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA401653701&it=r&asid=ce25ebb24e3352e84d3
612e3bdd40799. Accessed 2 June 2017.
(3) "Every Breath You Take Lyrics." Lyrics.com. STANDS4 LLC, 2017. Web. 2 Jun 2017. <http://www.lyrics.com/lyric/12202092>.
(4) The Web Means the End of Forgetting, By JEFFREY ROSEN, Published:July 21, 2010
(5)The Web Means the End of Forgetting, By JEFFREY ROSEN, Published:July 21, 2010
(6) Making the most of social media: Having an professional, vibrant ...Bowness, Suzanne;Special to The Globe and MailThe
Globe and Mail (1936-Current); Jan 11, 2013;
(7)The Future of You by Tomas Chamorro-PremuzicJANUARY 01,2013
(8) Revealed: US spy operation that manipulates social media.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/mar/17/us-spy-operation-social-networks
(9) US military creates fake online personas By Christopher Williams, Technology Correspondent 4:54PM GMT 17 Mar 2011
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/8388603/US-military-creates-fake-online-personas.html