Last Tuesday the Preston Social returned to the New Continental for the monthly discussion based around social media.

This time around, the topic was based around transparency and how we present ourselves online – taking in the concepts of online openness, reputation management and making information publicly available.

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Leading the conversation were journalist Daniel Bentley, lecturer in online reputation Tom Stables and John Walker, who moderated the evening. Daniel began with his presentation ‘Public Identity – Make Love Not Warcraft’.

He began by raising the issue that people commonly raise privacy concerns on the internet – Daniel argues that we should instead be raising publicness concerns. Over the course of his presentation he took in anonymity, sharing location, and building trust.

Especially important for a journalist, Daniel pointed out that publicness, sharing, disclosure and honesty all build trust with an audience, and encouraged attendees to be as open as possible. He then displayed his own website, which clearly displays contact details, photos and where he’s been checking in.

Finishing with a slide that focused on his disclosure on his blog, Daniel started the debate in earnest. A lively conversation ensued, with many people taking issue with his policy of full disclosure – some raising the concerns that may be felt by an employer, or people working in the public sector for whom online personal views are a minefield.

Tom Stables continued the discussion, bringing in elements of his work teaching reputation management and talking about how some people feel uneasy and worried about their information being freely available on the web.

In contrast to Daniel’s presentation, Tom also said that there was “online Tom” who only disclosed certain information (citing the names of his children as one aspect he never revealed online) and “offline Tom” who was slightly different.

You can take a look at all the tweets from the night by checking the hashtag #prestonsocial, and I’ve embedded Daniel’s presentation below.

Daniel Bentley @ Preston Social – Make love not Warcraft