<p>Fake pictures and all? Seems kinda hard to me. </p>
<p>Unless someone's a total whackjob at your school, I wouldn't worry.</p>
<p>i really don't belive this. I mean come on. They have like 20000 ppl applying. And like facebook is private even if its not set to full private stuff. Like u have to share networks/ bunch of friends etc to see a profile.
Anyways if college adcoms going through privacy stuff, then Ha!!!!!!!!!!!
No way they gonna and allowed to do that.</p>
<p>ould be a fake1!!!!!!</p>
<p>Even if they do snoop around, at least you can set your profile to private..the most they could do is look at your default picture, but you can alter your settings so when they search your name, all they see is that question mark. =]</p>
<p>It's a myth that smart, ambitious kids who end up at top universities were perfect teenagers in high school.</p>
<p>Many of them drank. Many of them smoked. Many of them still got excellent grades and accomplished great things.</p>
<p>Get over it. We're teenagers, and we're going to break the rules - just like many of you adults did in your youth. </p>
<p>.. probably going to get bashed for this comment, but ignoring the fact that many many GOOD/SMART/AMBITIOUS teenagers drink/smoke is naive.</p>
<p>I never understood, frankly, the desire to broadcast your personal life to others on the internet. Its bizarre. You reap what you sow. Period.</p>
<p>I absolutely do not think it's fair game for admissions officers to hack privacy settings in order to get information on prospective students. Even if you're putting it out there, you're putting it out there under the assumption that only your friends can see it. Even if there's nothing illegal on there, most people don't set up their Facebook with the intention of creating an image of themselves that they'd like to project to adcoms - my Facebook doesn't have me doing anything illegal, just me being silly, but that's not really the image I want colleges taking of me.</p>
<p>That said, I don't think colleges do it for the vast majority of candidates - it might be when some rival student sends in an anonymous tip or when the field is severely narrowed, like for prestigious scholarship applicants.</p>
<p>Although come to think of it, getting paid to Facebook stalk would be pretty awesome... ;)</p>
<p>I really dont understand why everyone always makes such a big deal about this. Put your settings so that people who are not your friend cant see your profile. Simple as that.</p>
<p>From the WSJ article the OP linked to.</p>
<p>"Representatives of the sites say users can establish online privacy settings that let their pages be viewed only by invited friends. MySpace is part of News Corp., which owns The Wall Street Journal. Facebook is closely held.</p>
<p>But Kaplan and many high-school guidance counselors say students often dont restrict public access on social-networking sites and, in any case, damaging information can find a way to leak out.</p>
<p>David Hawkins, director of public policy and research for the National Association for College Admission Counseling, a professional organization, says schools dont have time to scour the Internet systematically to check out thousands of applicants.</p>
<p>But he says admissions officers at times receive anonymous tips, which may be from rival applicants, about embarrassing Facebook or MySpace material, such as a picture of a student drunk at an underage party.</p>
<p>In another recent study, Nora Ganim Barnes, director of the Center for Marketing Research at the University of Massachusetts at Dartmouth, found that 21 percent of colleges used social-networking sites for recruiting prospects and gathering information about applicants.</p>
<p>Its especially common when universities are awarding scholarships because it isnt hard to go online for a handful of finalists.</p>
<p>No one wants to be on the front page of the newspaper for giving a scholarship to a murderer, she says. Everybody is trying to protect their brands.</p>
<p>Thomas Griffin, director of undergraduate admissions at North Carolina State University in Raleigh, says the school will do an Internet search, including Facebook and other sites, if an application raises red flags, such as a suspension from school.</p>
<p>Griffin says several applicants a year have been rejected in part because of information on social-networking sites. In a recent case, the university researched a student who disclosed on his application that he had been disciplined for fighting. The school found a Facebook page with a picture of the applicant holding a gun."</p>
<p>Within the past week, about 20 people were brought into the office to explain what they were doing in certain pictures taken at a party. These pictures were found on a Facebook page of a student who attends a different school. Not a single person at my school put the pictures on their Facebook page, yet the pictures were still found. This goes to show you that you not only have to be careful of what goes on your pages but also on those of your friends.</p>
<p>Simple solution of course is to not do anything stupid, but we are teenagers.</p>
<p>adcoms defiantly do NOT have time to check our friends' pages.</p>
<p>"It's a myth that smart, ambitious kids who end up at top universities were perfect teenagers in high school.</p>
<p>Many of them drank. Many of them smoked. Many of them still got excellent grades and accomplished great things."</p>
<p>oh yeah, i know a few guys like that... it's kinda crazy actually to think about.</p>
<p>i don't know if i agree with what some adcoms are doing, but i personally just try to keep a clean fb so.</p>
<p>Nothing is private. People take "screen shots", "screen grab" - whatever you want to call it - of your Facebook pages. For the non-tech-savvy folks - a screen shot is essentially a photo of what is on your computer screen. There's a Cornell blogger (he graduated,) but he's still blogging - called elliotback who has taken screen shots of Facebook pages and posts them on his blog. A long time ago, a Cornell freshman died from alcohol poisoning on vacation at UVA. He wrote a lot about drinking on his Facebook page. The page was taken off of Facebook at the request of the family, but not before elliotback took a screenshot of it and posted it on his blog. Administration and the family of the deceased asked him to remove it, but he refused. Facebook information can follow you into eternity. Actually... I just looked up elliotback's blog, and he is blogged about.... FACEBOOK! Facebook</a> Will Rat You Out by Cornell Blog</p>
<p>Reading this thread has made me thankful that the worst thing on my facebook page is which candidate I support for president.</p>
<p>I wonder how the adults here would feel if they were fired from their jobs because of opinions they have disclosed online (here, for instance.)</p>
<p>It's foolish to think that the only reason something bad could happen to students is because of their pictures. If adults don't work to protect teen's privacy, pretty soon they'll find that their privacy is being taken for granted, too. There are cameras in a lot of public places - I hope none of you ever do illegal things like rolling through stop signs or jay walking or who knows what else. But go ahead and keep lecturing about how much more life experience you have and how that justifies whatever privacy settings you want to sneak around.</p>
<p>
[quote]
I wonder how the adults here would feel if they were fired from their jobs because of opinions they have disclosed online (here, for instance.)</p>
<p>It's foolish to think that the only reason something bad could happen to students is because of their pictures. If adults don't work to protect teen's privacy, pretty soon they'll find that their privacy is being taken for granted, too. There are cameras in a lot of public places - I hope none of you ever do illegal things like rolling through stop signs or jay walking or who knows what else. But go ahead and keep lecturing about how much more life experience you have and how that justifies whatever privacy settings you want to sneak around.
[/quote]
</p>
<ol>
<li><p>Adults KNOW they can be fired for posting company-related information on a public website. So, if they do that, then they know they get what they deserve. </p></li>
<li><p>Who said pictures are the thing we fools worry about?</p></li>
<li><p>Adults DO work to protect their teens' privacy. Too bad if your parents don't protect yours.</p></li>
<li><p>Adults DO know that their privacy is NOT really private. DUH! That's why we caution against doing stupid things on social networking websites. </p></li>
<li><p>Adults know all about traffic cameras and the like. Again, DUH. Those of us who get tickets deserve them. No parents here are saying they're saints. </p></li>
<li><p>Oh, we do have more life experience than teens. They mere fact that you don't think so emphasizes your naivety. I don't think any one of us justifies sneaking around privacy settings. To the contrary, we condemn it. You're obviously misunderstanding some of the posts here or reading the hearsay as agreement.</p></li>
</ol>
<p>I think it's absurd that college's would stoop so low to check facebook profiles. Don't they have other things to worry about than that?</p>
<p>The aforementioned blogger posted this (which is an example of a screenshot, by the way).Charlie</a> Barrow: Facebook & Goldman Sachs by Cornell Blog</p>
<p>After Goldman Sachs UK sent the employee an e-mail that he is spending far too much time on Facebook, he writes on his Facebook page,
[quote]
Its a measure of how warped Ive become that, not only am I surprisingly proud of this, but in addition, the first thing I did was to post it here, and that losing my job worries me far less than losing facebook ever could.
[/quote]
Career</a> Advice: Dont Spend Half Your Work Day On Facebook And Then Brag About It</p>
<p>I see THOSE screenshots alright, but I'm skeptical that such a loophole can actually exist on facebook. </p>
<p>Wouldn't they know?</p>
<p>This theory is just stupid an ridiculous. Admissions officers do no have time to look applicants on facebook, nor do they feel the need to. They know facebook wont give them any useful information about the applicant. A picture of an applicant drinking isnt even going to affect their decision because they just care about how successful you are going to be with academics. plus everyone drinks in college...So theres no need to worry.</p>