Meghan Daum Quotes

Creating a representation of yourself for the Internet stopped making sense when we were all on phones and connected everywhere.

I have a twitter, but I try to not talk about things like, "Oh, I had a grapefruit this morning and it was delicious," because, who cares? But, I think it can serve as a platform for talking about things that matter to me, like the organizations that I work with. As pretentious as that sounds, it is true. You can really make a difference, if you can create a following and actually represent who you are, as opposed to how people want to portray you. But, I don't know what the balance is.

If you don't have a Facebook, like, you're nobody. There's all of these sort of requirements now, and if you don't have all of these things - Facebook, Twitter, etc. - you're made fun of. And Twitter for celebrities... everything is just getting so personal. Pictures of yourself, of what you're eating for breakfast.

I'm not a Facebook girl. Even though there is a fake Facebook with my name, it's not me. I'm not on Twitter; it's not me.

Social media is changing the way we communicate and the way we are perceived, both positively and negatively. Every time you post a photo, or update your status, you are contributing to your own digital footprint and personal brand.

I had a blog where I tried to be transparent while giving away nothing. I tweeted and Facebooked badly. As a writer, your 'voice' is your calling card, yet my voice was becoming indistinguishable from billions of other voices.

I think that people post to social media to help shape their public identity.

I have a private Instagram and an official one, so I'm not opposed to social media.

In reality, quitting Facebook is much more problematic than the company's executives suggest, if only because users cannot extract all the intangible social capital they have generated on the site and export it elsewhere.

As kids, we say stupid things, and because there's not a record of it, nobody is going to give you a hard time at 30 years old about something you said or did when you were 8 years old. Online, you have all these social networks that are moving to a state of persistent identity, and in turn, we're sacrificing the ability to be youthful.

It's very rare that things are true about yourself that are on the Internet. It's just sad sometimes. So you definitely try and stay away from it as much as possible.

I didn't necessarily intend it for myself, but it just happens with Instagram and Twitter; people come up to me and call me Emrata; they don't call me Emily. That's my brand, my identity.

You won't be exiled to permanent unemployment just because there's a picture somewhere of you holding a red Solo cup and looking underage. But, your Google results tell a story: Have you been in the news? Authored articles or blog posts? What types of topics do you frequently tweet about?

Even when Facebook came out, and I was in college, I found myself never putting anything on it.

My Google existence is probably larger than a lot of people's.

In the media, I do not feel recognised, but that's because I don't put myself in the media. I'm not a player who is always on Twitter or Facebook.

I kind of came about at the same time as Instagram, and it becomes, like, your portfolio. When people search who you are, they search Instagram, and I feel like people aren't even using Google anymore.

I recognize that, to someone who doesn't know my history, maybe I seem like this guy who gets dressed up for the Internet.

Some people bare their entire life on the Internet. There are politicians and actors, who like that. But there are some who don't want to do that.

Of course, I always try to integrate my life on social media but I would be the last person to post a random picture just to get likes and just so that I can create some social media feed. For me, a post should have some meaning.

It's even rougher for the kids today because they have social media - it's as if they're being interviewed every moment of the day even when they're just interviewing themselves, putting out a tweet or an Instagram post.

[T]he ways in which the information we give off about our selves, in photos and e-mails and MySpace pages and all the rest of it, has dramatically increased our social visibility and made it easier for us to find each other but also to be scrutinized in public.

Do we value privacy in any real way? Thinking about blogs, Twitter, Facebook, MySpace... all these suggest we value exposure rather more. And instead of challenging this transformation, as they are supposed to - certainly at the more thoughtful edges of the art - novelists are buying into it wholesale.

You might not like that Facebook shares your political opinions with Politico, but are you really going to delete all the photos, all the posts, all the connections - the presence you've spent years establishing on the world's dominant social network?

In the world of Facebook and Twitter, you can treasure hunt for tidbits about somebody that you find interesting and pretty much find out everything you need to know - which is why I stay away from social media - I'm terrified of it.