Saturday, February 11, 2012

Facebook: Take This Lollipop, Little Girl

One of my advertising students recently shared this YouTube video with me and I felt compelled to write about it. (Others appear to be driven to do likewise as it has gone viral.)

As this video opens, you see a scruffy man log into his Facebook profile ... only it is very obvious that he is not the man shown in the profile picture. Rather than the clean-cut, All American guy pictured, we are shown a nervous, shifty, sweating guy who has trouble written all over his face.

He stalks through the profile of one of his "friends" ... someone who obviously accepted his friend request without really knowing who this guy was.

Through a number of Google searches, he successfully figures out where she lives. Then, we follow him to his car and through his journey to her house ... alternately shifting between a focused, composed man and a man out of control and consumed by rage.

The video leaves you with a sense of dread, wondering what will happen to her when he enters her home ... and just how well you know all of your Facebook friends.

Maybe it's time we all take a look at who we have allowed to access the personal details of our lives.

2 comments:

  1. Wow, this video is going to give me nightmares - fantastic campaign that hopefully speaks to parents and kids alike.

    Being a male, I didn't realize how often females get solicited to over social networking. On my first semester of grad school my theory professor started discussing how he recently found out his 16 yr old daughter found it normal to have friend requests and creepy messages from random guys on the internet. He was partially upset because she never told him about this in the past, however he was proud that she had been doing the right thing by ignoring the advancements altogether. This started a discussion among the female students - turns out every one of them had multiple similar experiences in the past. I cannot imagine how 13 yr old girls would handle this.

    Thanks for the post!

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  2. Yikes! I didn't realize that Facebook stalking was so prevalent. Since most of us are visual learners, I can see how a young lady could be captivated by the images on that person's Facebook profile. I'm thankful that this video raises this issue to a higher level.

    Thanks for your comments!

    ReplyDelete

Sue Northey - Find me on Bloggers.com