Tech Blog

[#1]

I don’t think it matters what you do for a living, you really should keep tabs on your online reputation. What are people saying about you, what is being attributed to you, what links in other sites link to you. Myself I have a slew of search feeds that I keep in my RSS reader to track all these things, but Google has just unveiled an additional tool to help keep track of your identity online: Me, Myself and I: Helping to manage your identity on the web.

I’m not saying that everyone should be paranoid or anything, sometimes people say really nice things about you online, the point is that since a) the Internet is forever and b) employers (current and potential) regularly use social media to check on employees you need to know what the buzz online says about you.

Both Mashable and Gizmodo lend additional insight to this new Google feature (which I thought was odd to be launched on the public policy blog), but here’s the skinny. Head over to your Google Dashboard and look for the “Me on the Web” section. You can check the info there to see if it’s correct and set up alerts to email you when you (or your email addresses) are mentioned online. Personally, I wish there was an RSS option for these alerts, but since RSS readers are a pretty geeky fringe online, I can understand the omission.

That’s it. Couple simple steps and you’ll have another tool to keep up on what people say about you online.