The Impact of Your Digital Footprint and Digital Citizenship

 Week 4 of Exploring Your Digital Portfolio introduced me to my digital footprint.  Prior to this class,

 it was a term that I myself had never used.  In her blog What is Your Digital Footprint?, Lisa Nielsen provides a definition from Webopedia that describes it as, the trail, traces or footprints that people leave online. It is information transmitted online, such as forum registration, e-mails and attachments, uploading videos or digital images and any other form of transmission of information- all of which leaves traces of personal information about yourself available to others online. In her blog post, she also provides helpful information for establishing an online identity. She stresses that what you do online is permanent so careful consideration should be taken when establishing your digital trail.

Giving millions of people access to so much of your personal information online can be very dangerous and have negative consequences. Providing too much information can make you vulnerable to identity theft, burglary, stalking and cyberbullying.  It can also have negative consequences for you at work and in personal relationships. 

In a blog post by Joe Ross titled In 2016, Think Twice About What You Share on Social Media, he discusses various ways to protect yourself from possible negative consequences such as: understanding your privacy settings that control who can see your photos, status updates.social profile, etc; using discretion when posting about your whereabouts and sharing location details, avoiding careless posts and comments that can have negative backlash; avoiding cyberbullying and other online scams that can give them access to your social feeds. 

Many people don't realize that recruiters from potential schools and employers are searching the internet for information about candidates as part of the application process.  We watched a video called Digital Baggage that, although it was funny, showed how important your digital footprint can be when you are applying for a job.  

    Another assignment we completed in class included creating a LinkedIn page.  Professor 

Calderwood described it as a Facebook for professionals.  It allows you to create a professional profile where others in your network can access your employment experience, educational history and allows for endorsements and testimonials from others in your network.  

We were assigned a partner to work with and were given a social media platform to research and provide 5 pros and 5 cons.  My partner Peter Zsolt and I were assigned Twitter.  The details of that presentation can be viewed here. 

The final assignment for the class was to present our first App Smackdown.  We had to choose an App that is related to our field of study and describe its purpose and features to the class.  I am a criminal justice major and the application that I chose was MyPd.  This App was designed to provide an additional form of communication between the local police department and the community it serves. Some of its features include submitting anonymous tips, commending an officer, directions to the local precinct, access to the sex offender registry list and many others.  The problem with this App is that it is still limited with regard the number of precincts that are participating in my area.  There is an option to request your precinct to assist with getting additional participation. This App is free to download. 

Our reading this week for class was from Untangling the Web by Steve Dembo and Adam Bellow. 

The first chapter discusses content curation based on users specific needs.  They explain that curation started as a means to organize one's own resources while having some benefit to others in the process. Curation tools have evolved significantly and it all comes down to determining what you want to save and how or with whom you want to share it that will help you choose your ideal platform match. 

The first curation tool that they discuss is Symbaloo.  It aims to provide a concise layout of icons that provide one click access to your favorite sites.  The interface within Symbaloo is called a webmix.  Each webmix is comprised of 60 tiles laid out in a 10X6 grid.  You click on an empty tile to populate it with a website.  Symbaloo provides an inviting interface that looks friendlier particularly with people who may be intimidated by technology. The dashboard is ideal for using across multiple platforms. They have Apps for both iOs and Android. 

The second curation tool described in the first chapter is Diigo.  This curation site relies on social bookmarking rather than experts to determine what is important and worth knowing.  The significance of bookmarks is based on individual activity increases.  It uses the value of Folksonomies (aka tagging).  This site's primary purpose is to store your bookmarks (favorites) online.  It provides a central repository that you can access from anywhere.  Your Diigo library will has a chronological list of the items you have elected to share along with tags, notes, descriptions and highlighted content.  Diigo also allows you to organize groups and share content with members. Diigo is accessible through mobile apps and browser extensions.

The third curation tool discussed was EduClipper which was founded by one of the authors, Adam Bellow.  It was designed specifically with teachers and students in mind.  It has a layout similar to Pinterest. It allows educators and students to find, collect and share web content quickly.  It allows users to clip content from anywhere on the web, create auto-citations and tag the content with labels aligned K-12 areas of study.  Teachers and students can register for free and use the tool independent of each other.  Teachers have control of how open or closed the students' networks are. It is a geat tool for creating student digital portfolios and can expand the way a student is assessed. 

With so much information being shared on a daily basis, curation tools are a necessity.  I had really never tried any beyond Pinterest but am now much more informed of different methods of organizing research.