Our love was so short, but the internet is forever

One of the things about having a website in your own name is that people from throughout your life can track you down, for better or worse. I guess whether that's a good thing or a bad thing depends partly on your karma so far, but I have to say that just about everybody who has used this website to get back in touch, after being out of touch for a long time, I've been glad to hear from.

Of course, like anyone who is paying attention, I realize there could be a downside to sharing so much of your life online. The other day the NYT ran a piece on youngsters whose web postings undermined a job search. And just today the Austin paper ran a story about a high school art teacher who might get fired for semi-naked photos posted to some website Flickr. (Update: the Flickr page for photog Celesta Danger describes Hoover as "my girlfriend," and features a link to Hoover's own Flickr page in which she describes Danger as having "the sweetest face... the way I see her." So the subtext of this whole thing is that Hoover is an out lesbian.)

To be sure, I realize that the books I've written and the stuff I've posted on this site mean I will never teach in a high school classroom again -- nor will I ever be able to pursue several other jobs. And I'm also careful that if I ever post anything about my day job, it never contains an identifiable reference to my current employer. (That said, I'm glad there were no such things as blogs when I worked for Sybase in the mid-90s, because I probably would have gotten myself in trouble real fast. As it was, I was part of a group of employees who called themselves the Troublemakers.)

So yeah, one of the reasons I have this site is to collect people from the past. And not just the good relationships. Hey, all you fuckers who bullied me when I was a kid -- show yourselves!

Tamara Hoover, internet, privacy