Online safety/you can never be too careful..
Online safety - you can never be too careful.. and watch out for...hmm, what should i call it, "mission creep"?, as in correspondences that start out OK... and then get weird.
I've heard from two female friends in the last few months about this.
The first one: I recently heard from a designer I worked down the hall from at a big ad agency outside Wash,DC. in the late 70's. It's been almost 18 years since I saw her (I left the east coast, moved to Ca. in 'late '91).
(At this point in our lives, many of us are using this medium to check on friends from decades ago, and that can be a very interesting thing to do.)
She heard from a guy she knew in college, who had carried in his wallet a photo made at a party 40 years ago. She initially thought that was 'sweet'...(my immediate reaction was 'that's weird!'.)
Once he got a more current photo?, he started insulting her, asking 'how could she have allowed herself to deteriorate like that'.
Hey, we all age, and we all put on a few pounds, get *bleepin'* real!
She pretty quickly figured out what was going on, how strange the guy was, but I could tell from her email that it *seriously* rattled her, and she is a pretty strong minded person. She 'unfriended' him, and drop kicked all his additional emails.
But I think she should/could have had better instincts, right off the bat.
The second case, I heard from my boss, just today. I work at a film/digital photo and printing studio in San Rafael. One of our clients is an artist who also teaches alot of online courses, in watercolors. She apparently had a student in Florida who tried to 'escalate' the teaching relationship a bit...
Then, the next thing she knows, the guy is writing saying that he has left Florida, moved here, to San Rafael, and wants to...'get together'.
Sounds a bit weird?... I say 'definitely so!'
She's a bit freaked out by it all, and has already gotten some legal advice.
I guess the point of all this is... it's nice to be in touch w/ people, but definitely, definitely!, keep your guard up!
Similar experiences/ advice....?
I've heard from two female friends in the last few months about this.
The first one: I recently heard from a designer I worked down the hall from at a big ad agency outside Wash,DC. in the late 70's. It's been almost 18 years since I saw her (I left the east coast, moved to Ca. in 'late '91).
(At this point in our lives, many of us are using this medium to check on friends from decades ago, and that can be a very interesting thing to do.)
She heard from a guy she knew in college, who had carried in his wallet a photo made at a party 40 years ago. She initially thought that was 'sweet'...(my immediate reaction was 'that's weird!'.)
Once he got a more current photo?, he started insulting her, asking 'how could she have allowed herself to deteriorate like that'.
Hey, we all age, and we all put on a few pounds, get *bleepin'* real!
She pretty quickly figured out what was going on, how strange the guy was, but I could tell from her email that it *seriously* rattled her, and she is a pretty strong minded person. She 'unfriended' him, and drop kicked all his additional emails.
But I think she should/could have had better instincts, right off the bat.
The second case, I heard from my boss, just today. I work at a film/digital photo and printing studio in San Rafael. One of our clients is an artist who also teaches alot of online courses, in watercolors. She apparently had a student in Florida who tried to 'escalate' the teaching relationship a bit...
Then, the next thing she knows, the guy is writing saying that he has left Florida, moved here, to San Rafael, and wants to...'get together'.
Sounds a bit weird?... I say 'definitely so!'
She's a bit freaked out by it all, and has already gotten some legal advice.
I guess the point of all this is... it's nice to be in touch w/ people, but definitely, definitely!, keep your guard up!
Similar experiences/ advice....?
