Digital etiquette

Richard Nicholls, The Future Foundation, on personal policing of the social space and the rise of the super-highway code…

A communication culture seriously re-formatted by the internet and all its works is re-ordering day-to-day human relations. So much formality has gone; so much language has been compressed to its vowel-free essentials; so many critiques (about absolutely anything) can be logged; so many images can be tagged; so many indiscretions laid bare; so many things can be said/sent/posted/blogged – and not easily retrieved.

Nobody has, along the way, promulgated a new good practice handbook; the internet has no government and no church and no department of moral philosophy. But the consumer-citizen is recognising just how much self-awareness is required in cyberspace (where everyone can indeed hear you scream) and how much value can be had in both virtue and discipline.

All over the world people are recognising the wisdom of footprint management  – and of just where and when to leave a comment, interrupt someone else, spread gossip, leave details about oneself, engage in multiple conversations at the same time…

Footprint management: A sharp priority for the 10s decade consumer

Awareness of the ineradicative permanence of what we say online encourages a culture of digital housekeeping. In order to manage the infinite lifespan of certain communications such as ill-advised emails, misjudged comments, perhaps unsavoury body-part photos and more broadly every tracked detail of our past online activities, the need to sweep our digital footprint is a lifestyle priority.

Pruning our personal profiles, for instance, is already a habit for those keen to keep presenting themselves in the most attractive or positive light. It is some  40% of 16-24s, according to nVision  –  the most active social networking group age – who agree that “I have in the past posted messages/updates on a social networking site that which I later wish I had not posted“.

Footprint management stimulates product innovation

Facebook’s “Tag Suggestions” is designed to make the process of tagging/sharing photos both quicker and easier for its users. But the idea caused some concern among consumers worried about privacy as the company failed to notify users clearly that the service was being rolled out across the network. Elsewhere, nVision Research confirms that over 50% of consumers agree they would be interested in a service that deliberately did not store personal information about their purchasing  something which seems to suggest that there is an expectation that the services concerned should adopt the role of the online maid and anticipate the need for what we might call prunability.

A service, called Vanish, designed by scientists at the University of Washington, helps with the task of deleting information. The service effectively puts an expiry date on personal data released online; after a certain period, data becomes unreadable (un-lockable with encryption software owned only by the data owner). With such tools the management of online past personas and histories becomes controllable. As the internet moves forward into its next generation of features and functions, we predict that both consumer appetite and expectation will grow within this whole field.

The dangers of over-connectedness

The more connected we are / the greater the number of simultaneous conversations we sustain, the harder it is to hide our feelings (and our activities). This can result in moments of extreme control-loss and interpersonal insensitivity and can thus intensify the appeal of cyber-oases, organised escapes from the ubiquity of the internet, greater caution all round.

Over 50% of British consumers sometimes feel the need to escape from the constant intrusion of phone calls, emails, texts, etc.

Some venues and services force a form of Digital Etiquette into play, making a service from the very idea. Mountain Sky Guest Ranch in Montana takes advantage of the area’s lack of cellphone reception. Located within more than 8,000 acres of beautiful, rugged countryside, the ranch prides itself on helping families power-down and reconnect with loved ones. Situated on Naka Yai, a private island just north of Phuket, Six Senses Destination Spa bans laptops, mobile phones and BlackBerrys from all public areas.

For those individuals who have perhaps already suffered the human consequences of digital overload, the Center for Internet and Online Addiction offers, by 2010, treatment for the following conditions: Cybersex/Cyberporn, Online Affairs, Online Gaming, Online Gambling, Compulsive Surfing and eBay Addiction. Similarly ReSTART, an Internet Addiction Recovery Program, also based in the US, offers a retreat of 45 days or more for adults suffering from Internet and video game addiction. In China and South Korea internet addiction is considered a major health problem  –  the former has over 300 treatment centres and the latter offers treatment in over 200 separate centres.

A less drastic option for managing digital distress comes in the guise of a browser tool designed by US app developers Quikrr. The Facebook rehab tool is a plug-in for the Chrome web browser, which allows users to set limits on how much time they would like to spend on Facebook (as well as featuring a timer showing how many minutes remain). An email addiction tool is also available.

The shape of things to come

The more digitally sophisticated we become, the greater our awareness of all the pitfalls a rich digital life can entail. We can expect that as our experience of online communications grows across the world, the general human approach to social networking communications will become more considered. More thinking before you post, as it were. More tweaked online representations of our selves. More questioning of how appropriate are the details we leave behind in transparent forums. More discretion and less generosity of spread in our comments and our visual imageries.

That personal details can stay visible and trackable for eons is an issue that will continue to cause concern and is poised to intensify as the amount of personal data recorded online mounts ceaselessly. The danger of a whole new meaning of the phrase identity theft should mobilise millions into pursuing new forms of control, new forms of restraint: neither pursuing too much detail about other people nor offering too much about ourselves. This will be the case for as long as we recognise that the power to delete / to sweep our footprint remains highly limited. Who owns a tweeted message: she who sends it or he who receives it? The essentially libertarian, open-system that the internet has been since its birth has invited millions to lower their guard and embrace creative informality and useful data storage. But if new devices and services allow us to hoover our past and be only the person we choose to be in front of others, will we procure them? Yes.

A fully accepted code of online conduct is not yet widespread – just as there is no universal rule about talking out loud on a mobile phone in a clothes store or a coffee shop, no rule about emailing a former boyfriend out of the cyber-blue ten years after, no rule about tweeting inanities just because you have an imprisoned audience. It can be assumed that rules will gradually emerge just in the same way as we all once learned not to jump the queue or talk over others or bore friends with a pictorial history of our recent holiday in Mallorca along with some extra photos of the twins’ graduation ceremony. Often it is the collective will to avoid being bored or irritated which will press rules into place.

For more, contact Richard Nicholls at the Future Foundation on 020 3008 6103/ richardn@futurefoundation.net