Recently named Miss New Jersey, Amy Polumbo, was blackmailed over images on her facebook account. Images of people biting her breasts, drinking, and all sorts of wild and crazy things that we’ve all experienced at any party in college. A few weeks after her becoming Miss NJ, packages of photos taken from her facebook profile were sent to pageant officials demanding that she loses her new glory or the images would be published.
This just goes to show you that we young entrepreneurs should be careful about the sort of images we use on our social network accounts (facebook and MySpace). I’ll admit it, I do have images of me drinking and partying on both of my accounts, but those are things that I am not trying to hide. Yes, from time to time I do drink and I do party.
However, there is a line that should be drawn. And that line must be made at your own discretion based upon multiple factors: the business that you’re in, the image that you want to portray to the world, and the people that you are involved with / associated with your business.
Say, for instance, you run a vegan/vegetarian online network and your entire business is based upon teaching people how “not” eating meat improves your health and longevity. Now what do you think would happen if there was an image on your profile of you eating a big t-bone steak with a blood-dripping burger?
You would lose all credibility. Your business would lose it’s reputation. And everything that you created up to this point would be destroyed. As an entrepreneur — someone who is in charge of a business and has an image to protect; be smart and make sure that images/content that can tarnish your character/business aren’t publicly accessible.
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I actually only use MYspace for business. And, while my mag is in the business of entertainment — I do not have any personal pics of me doing anything questionable. I really don’t feel its professional. I use this as a tool for marketing — not getting more drinking buddies. I agree that you should never put anything too personal on your blog or web page. Think like a customer or sponsor. What would they want to see?
David… someone bit your breasts? haha jk!
I’ll also add that this type of bad publicity is creating an opportunities for potential facebook/myspace competitors.