Mark Zuckerberg, whether we like it or not, is the young king of social media. He founded Facebook in his college dorm room fourteen years ago and since then two billion people have connected to the social network he created. The business model he used is based on the changing concepts of privacy and mass self-promotion, which has brought unprecedented changes in the way internet users think. Today, a large percentage of users worldwide “share” their lives on more than one social network, questioning their conscience.
The scandal of the breach of the accounts of millions of Facebook users brought to the surface what we all knew but no one dared to say openly. That of course, nothing is private when shared publicly. On the contrary, if we look at it differently, displaying personal data on any social network on our own initiative constitutes consent to the rules of media display and not a violation. The need for self-promotion that the norm of the time dictates has led many internet users to share every personal aspect of their lives publicly, revising in several cases their moral judgment, even reaching the point of deviation. In real life, for example, we would not share our personal moments with just anyone. On the internet, however, we will not only do so but will also accompany it with appropriate photographic material. What is surprising is the fact that we are so willing to share this material online that we will never think about the consequences until it is too late. So where does our responsibility begin and end when our personal data is “in the air”? Is the medium itself to blame or do we also share the responsibility that, while we know the risks, we are not careful enough?
Zuckerberg publicly apologized for the disruption he caused, stating that he failed to protect millions of users. The truth is that the mistake was not only his, since users themselves could have protected themselves by being more selective in the content they share, not only on Facebook but also on all social networks of course. Let’s not forget that each social network provides the space to share our content, without obliging us to its type. This is purely our responsibility, so we should operate based on conscience what is right and what is wrong to share and not simply for self-promotion. It is noteworthy that after the incident, Facebook shares gradually experienced a greater boom, leading us to the conclusion that users prefer to forget rather than comply. Maybe we don’t want to protect our privacy after all and that’s why we expect others to do it for us?