Talk:Lauren Murphy

Hi Lauren,

I really like how you chose to talk not only about your Facebook persona, but your Instagram account as well, and how they relate to one another. I think it’s really interesting how you talk about the ways you craft your content to the different audience on both. That said, I felt like you could have dove a little deeper with the Instagram content. While I do find all of what you say about your presence on Instagram to be valid, I want to know more about your personal feelings. I understand that your presence has changed, and how you went from catering to a primarily “friends based audience” to one where you can show your photography skills, but how do you feel about this? Why did you do this? I want to know not only what you do, but why and how it relates to you and your internal thoughts.

In terms of how you analyze your identity on Facebook however, I find myself feeling a deeper understanding of you. I know we have had personal conversations about how you use Facebook (particularly the lists feature) and I feel like what you write here really embodies what we have talked about. I am intrigued by how you talk about not wanting to say anything remotely controversial, and also how you feel like the posts friends share with you show your more real “quirky side.” I guess I feel the same way, but I never really thought about it…. Friends don’t seem to think as hard about keeping the online persona that one tries to present, and are therefore more likely to share something that has to do with the person’s sense of humor or quirky interests. Good point!

I also love the way that you use pictures to illustrate your points. The juxtaposition of the 2 phases of your online life that you discuss really help to illustrate the ways that your presence has changed and add a really good layer to your article.

Overall I think you do a really good job of analyzing your online presence, well done!

-Mara

P.S. super jelly of your online friendship with Pauly R… :P

_______

Hi Lauren,

It’s so interesting how you maintain these two completely separate online identities! It seems like so much work for both Instagram and Facebook, but I guess that’s why you don’t post much on Facebook. I also love that you added Instagram as another aspect of your online identity; it gives more context to your analysis of your Facebook profile and how you curate all your content based on your audiences. (And now I finally understand why some people do the ellipsis thing on Instagram captions!)

For Facebook, I’ve rarely used the Lists feature because it’s a lot of maintenance. I’m still a little confused how you really decide who goes on the No list, because for me, I usually have at least one mutual friend with my Facebook friends. You seem to only use Facebook Lists for family/friends of parents, so I’m curious - what about coworkers, bosses, etc.? Do you separate them from close friends and family as well?

My only other feedback was that sometimes I was a little confused about the first-person/third-person thing and had to read it twice - there’s Lauren Murphy, Explauren, and then there’s also the “I” who’s actually writing the piece. I’m assuming the “I” is you in real life? The switching confusion for me happened when you go from first person to third person at the beginning and end, and in the Lauren Murphy Audience paragraph.

Overall, it’s clear you’ve really thought about your different online audiences and how they affect what you post. Great job!

-Alissa Chan