Do we share too much online?
Within days of being freed, 16-year-old Hannah Anderson turned to Ask.fm and answered questions from the public like “Why didn’t you run?” and “Are you glad Dimaggio is dead?”
Social media gets even more personal. NPR host Scott Simon tweeted live updates from his dying mother’s hospital room to more than 1 million Twitter followers. Day-to-day, we see our friends post about heartbreak and hardship.
We sat down with Stephanie Greene, CEO of FG creative and social media guru, who weighs in on Hannah Anderson’s public tell “almost” all.
“The questions she didn’t want to answer, she didn’t answer. She handles it the way private citizens would with a camera in her face. ‘I’m not going to talk about that.’ She handles herself very well and wasn’t too personal,” Greene said.
Greene tells us what’s behind the “TMI” trend.
“Everybody wants to be heard and wants to have an opinion people agree with or that makes them more popular,” Greene said.
She added reality TV teaches us more is more.
“This has let everyone else feel empowered and entitled to say what they have to say,” Greene said.
Greene thinks this trend is just that, a trend, saying the Facebook universe polices itself when posts get too personal.
“If you put something out there too personal or too one-sided, we’ve seen people will hit you back as fast as anything. ‘You’re wrong, or that’s a hoax,'” she said.
Greene said, bottom line, sharing on social media can be therapeutic.
“She took control of it and I think that takes a lot of power away from the bad guys. They want to do these things to get the glory. She took it back and said there is no glory for this guy. There is glory in I’m going to move forward and we’re going to be ok,” Greene said.