Fuzzy Content

The stage is set for the next loop of the perennial conflict between children and their parents. Not unlike the divisive difference of old and new world in “Fathers and Sons“, this iteration is about the clash of cultures.
Only this time, it’s about privacy. While the helicopter parents are doing their desperate best to keep the cruel world away from the children, the kids are already changing it — online. While the fathers and mothers work hard to pass legislations at various government levels to protect the privacy of their daughters and sons, the millenials are publicly posting their most intimate thoughts and conversations along with contact information — online.
Google made privacy impossible. MySpace made privacy unfashionable. In trial and error of learning and creating the rules of social networks, the new generation is effectively giving up on the myth of privacy.

When SaltyCracker23 runs for senate in 2012, she won’t need to worry about opposition digging up dirt on her early years. All of that will be readily available, etched into the permanent stone of vast Web archives, indexed, catalogued, and accessible with one click to anyone remotely interested. And because the opposition (and pretty much anybody else) is likely face the same issue, one can only wonder about how this will change the way the world works.

Say hello to the transparent generation.