I get a lot of slack from friends about how I’m “branding” myself online these days. The way I see it, search engines being what they are, you’re never more than a query away from your redneck past. So when I comment on articles around the web, I make an effort to do so in a way that adds value to the content on which I’m commenting. I believe that the social internet can be a sort of 4th dimension of reputation. It’s important that the person I say I am in person is the same person others would find me online.
That said, I can be picky with my commentary on the web. I don’t want my name associated with an unhealthy amount of incendiary forum drama and I don’t want to Google myself and find my name associated with sites or communities to which I did not explicitly subscribe. I was a bit frustrated last night when I got a Google Web Alert for a site called Mozzler.
Yes, I’ve got Google Alerts set up for DR1665.com, Gearbox Magazine, and my name. I want to know where I come up if I’m not the one bringing something up. It’s also nice to see when others share stories from Gearbox Magazine elsewhere. In any case, I check out this Mozzler site and it looks like they’re just scraping tweets and whatnot. I don’t have much of an online presence down under, so I decided to let it slide. I’m not sure what they’re doing with my tweets (their ‘about’ page isn’t the most comprehensive), but they’re just tweets, so whatever.
Midway through this morning, though, I get this email from another site I’ve never heard of called MyProps.org.
I’m sorry, but “An anonymous user wants to share a link” with me? If this is any kind of valid community or site, someone needs a good boot to the head for this sort of tactic. I have been watching a bit more SNL content lately online, but I haven’t commented on it, nor have I signed up anywhere to watch it. If someone I actually know wanted to share some SNL funny with me, they’d email/tweet/Facebook it right to me. This just has shady, everything-that’s-wrong-with-the-internet-today written all over it. How creepy to think there are sites out there where you can just anonymously input a friend’s email address and the site will forward a link to them without any details about the site or information on removing your email address from their system. It’s a sure-fire spam notice and I hope they get a lot of those.
I’ve been working on not complaining as much lately (at least not online) unless I’m prepared to offer a possible solution to the issue. Bitching, by itself, is generally unproductive, so if I think I know better, then it’s my responsibility to offer alternatives for discussion like an adult. I would have just let Mozzler and MyProps be ignored and blocked, but then I get this email from driverside.com during lunch.
First of all, let me just say that I don’t consider this email spam or shady at all. They’re telling me, by the second sentence in, why they are contacting me. Because I am an AutomotiveForums.com member, they’ve set me up with some kind of new functionality which they’re hoping will entice me to participate more within their community. I’d say this is a decent move by them as well. They offer a call to action that makes sense too. “Your garage already has your car in it. Please check that everything was added correctly and your mileage is accurate at [link]“
I clicked on that link and, sure enough, there was my Eagle Talon (well, a stock Talon photo) with 144,000 miles under it along with options to update service records and all the things the email suggested would be there. Promise, deliver. That’s what it’s all about, right?
When I sold my beloved Talon over a year ago, it had over 210,000 miles on it (all mine, by the way). That means that it had been a year and 66,000 miles since I last did anything with my profile, not on DriverSide, but AutomotiveForums. Full disclosure, here, I always felt AutomotiveForums was too big and commercial. A quick login attempt reveals my last visit was in May of 2008 and that I’m an “AF Newbie” with a total of 2 (just two) posts. How does that compare with 2GNT.com, where I’m an administrator with 14,561 posts. I digress.
I can appreciate AutomotiveForums’ efforts to provide a new product to serve their community. I also appreciate that they took the time to send me such a simple, yet professional, email to let me know how they’ve set things up to make it easier for me to participate. What rubbed me the wrong way – frustrated me, if you will – is that the email begins with a welcome message that -at least to me – comes across as suggesting I signed up for this.
In a manner of speaking, I did sign up for this; about five years ago, when I joined AF to make a couple posts. I’d offer that starting this message out with a slightly different choice of words might not raise people’s spam concerns. Since I know this isn’t spam, I now return to my focus on my online reputation.
Given the size of this community, it’s no stretch to imagine those two old posts of mine on there being a bit more favorably ranked by Google than I might like. If someone searches for my screen name or whatever, should those two, random posts show up anywhere a normal person would be looking? Or should the results be more aligned with the fifty or more posts and comments I post on a weekly basis recently?
And that frustrates me. Not that those two posts have shown up at all, but I’d much rather people associate me with the likes of Valeria, Olivier, Tino, Kim, Mike, Dan, Derek, 2GNT, GalantVR4.org, GearboxMagazine and Carchat. So tonight I’m off to close that account, lest Google see new content on their site from me and find it relevant.
