Barack Obama wants you (to spill your secrets)

Mon, 24 Nov 2008 11:45:00 +0000

In his first press conference after the election, Barack Obama cracked a joke about Nancy Reagan holding séances in the White House. (It was factually inaccurate; the former first lady was into horoscopes, not "Hellraiser.") This provoked the administration’s first apology, but not the first bipartisan critique. That came a week later, with the release of the administration’s job application.

In 63 questions over seven pages, prospective White House employees are being asked — in addition to questions about finances, gun ownership and, possibly, flossing habits — to list “all aliases or ‘handles’ you have used to communicate on the Internet,” everything they’ve written, “including, but not limited to, any posts or comments on blogs or other websites,” links to their Facebook or MySpace pages and any potentially embarrassing “electronic communication, including but not limited to an email, text message or instant message.”

Old people Facebook disasters

Mon, 29 Sep 2008 10:11:00 +0000

The day that Kim Bowen accidentally sent a video of a woman shitting in a hot tub to 200 of her co-workers was the day she knew her relationship with Facebook would never be the same.

"It was horrible," says Bowen, a 30-something filmmaker, in the tremulous tones of a former bank hostage. "I'm a pretty wild person. I like a laugh. But not like that."

What happened was this: A friend (now former) posted a video on Bowen's Facebook wall. It depicts a bikini-clad woman sliding into a hot tub occupied by two other women and a man. Seconds later, she is overcome by a gastrointestinal issue that sends her tub mates scrambling for refuge. (The video, which originally appeared on the purported humor site ebaumsworld.com and today persists on YouTube, has been largely debunked as fake.)

This was cold comfort to Bowen, who uses her Facebook account mostly for professional networking. "It was disgusting," she says. "I thought, 'I don't want that on my wall.' So I went to delete it. Then an on-screen message popped up: 'Your video has been forwarded.' And I thought -- what? Who has it been forwarded to?"

Salon.com > Michael Martin

Barack Obama wants you (to spill your secrets)

Old people Facebook disasters