Comments on: Should You Clean Up Your Facebook?

By: Bigfoot53

Bigfoot53 — Tue, 25 Aug 2015 22:23:00 +0000

In reply to Nevale. I think in the long run it would be better to blow it off and NEVER join social media sites. I mean REALLY! Why make it easy for BIG BROTHER?

By: Bigfoot53

Bigfoot53 — Tue, 25 Aug 2015 22:18:19 +0000

In reply to Evil HR Lady. Wowe! I am soo very stunned and horrified I can almost not think to respond about this subject. I am a Social Worker and have been a business manager. I have handeled millions of dollars of merchandise,Union and non union employees. Worked for some pretty shady nursing home companies and what really shocks me is the SICK need of people or companies to give a hoot about what I do on my own time. So I may, (may) own a gun, hunt, ride a motorcycle, fish, drink, go to church, be gay, like football,be fundamentalist Christian, Jewish, homophob, Democrate,Nazi, it does not matter as long as I can do the job.

By: Nevale

Nevale — Wed, 17 Jun 2015 23:21:57 +0000

I do not have a Facebook account at all. I guess I just never felt the need to bother with it. However, I remember on a few interviews how they would ask me if I had an account (if so what was it). I would answer no I do not but, the look from them I would get was one of confusion or they would look at me as if I was hiding something. I will be graduating college pretty soon (I am a 30 something) and am worried that not having an account will start to count against me. Could someone give me their input on this, please? I am still sitting on the fence and have weighed pros and cons of getting one, it seems like everyone in my extended family has one and that is how they keep up with each other so they are kind of one sided. I’m still not sure though. Help!

By: Lior Tal

Lior Tal — Mon, 05 May 2014 15:43:02 +0000

In reply to Naomi.

Hi Naomi,
Thanks for the feedback. There are 2 points I’d like to make. One, the technology we developed at RepNup to detect and to flag text and images related to alcohol, violence, inappropriate language and so on is not because WE decided that you should remove it but rather because surveys have shown that recruiters and employers are negatively affected when seeing such content on candidate’s social media.
Two, all RepNup is doing is flag out the items which might harm your reputation. We do not decide for you what to keep, what to remove and what to change privacy for. It is your decision.
Personally, I think that if they know that a potential employer might not hire them (rightfully or not) because of such content, most job seekers will change their social media content. At the end of the day, when you need to get a job and pay the bills, many people will do much more than fix their social media content to win a job.

By: Vicki

Vicki — Sat, 03 May 2014 06:56:46 +0000

In reply to Kara. Yup. "Drat" and "Darn". And W00t (I was hit with that one too).

By: Vicki

Vicki — Sat, 03 May 2014 06:54:23 +0000

In reply to Evil HR Lady.

I ran mine, looked at it, and said “my goodness, this algorithm doesn’t like anything.”

Added my MBTI® Certification to my LinkedIn profile. W00t! (Suspicious status)

https://www.facebook.com/584282890/posts/10152222114797891 (Suspicious photo)

Horned owls actually look a lot like Maine Coon cats when you see them sitting on a branch at dusk. hoHOOHoohoo (meow) (Suspicious link)

Also, never use the word Hell (even to share a status from Clients from Hell) or damn, darn, WTH… and never mention alcohol not ever.

If a recruiter, HR rep, or manager is as puritanical as RepNUp, I don’t want to work there.

By: Evil HR Lady

Evil HR Lady — Wed, 09 Apr 2014 09:24:23 +0000

In reply to samccrory.

Well, I can see the reason behind all of those. It can’t detect meaning, just key words ( I suppose) and too many WTF and Kills could make you look “suspecious.” (They said they were correcting that, by the way!)

I agree–I think it’s not terribly helpful for the responsible adult who isn’t posting pictures of themselves using marijuana. And those people who are doing that, are probably too stupid to run the report.

By: Evil HR Lady

Evil HR Lady — Wed, 09 Apr 2014 09:22:16 +0000

In reply to Kara.

Well, I certainly wouldn’t hire anyone who admits to a degree in Human Resources! 🙂

The other ones I can see the reason for the flag. Better to be oversensitive than under sensitive, but i’m not sure the tool is super helpful. Funny, but not super helpful.

By: Kara

Kara — Tue, 08 Apr 2014 20:34:54 +0000

I did this, and it took nearly two weeks to get my report back. Most of my posts that it said were suspicious were politically themed, but some of the others ranged from:
“Okay, I’m all caught up on Game of Thrones. Since season 4 doesn’t start till next year, I may have to kill time by reading the series. I hear the little blonde twit king dies at some point, and I’m not sure I can wait till next year for that to happen..”

“Final grades have posted, I’m officially graduated. Bachelor of Science in Business with a concentration in Human Resource Management. w00t.”

“Dear Obnoxious Woman Sitting Beside Me in Starbucks, Your ringtone is annoying. So is the volume at which you choose to speak to the people who are calling you. Additionally, who needs to wear that much perfume, at 3pm, while wearing tennis shoes and sweats. I can’t even smell the coffee, which is half the reason I’m here. Go away. Sincerely, Trying to Work and Hoping Your Laptop Dies Soon”

It also tagged a comment I posted on a picture of my daughter playing a game of Jenga. I was asked how high my kids could stack them, and replied, “Lol amazingly high…Lizzie is actually really freakin good, if you’ll believe that…” So apparently RepNUp thinks I’m a pot head now. Another comment I made on a picture someone posted of me when I didn’t want a picture taken was, “Drat…next time i must do a better job of hiding…” Sooo…’drat’ is a bad word?

All in all, it reviewed a little over four years of my Facebook usage and came up with 24 posts, 5 comments, 19 shares, and 3 images that were ‘suspicious.’ Zero ‘likes,’ because I avoid trying to like things, so I guess that’s good. I suppose it could be useful to some, but the time it takes to get the report back and their really tight qualifications for ‘suspicious’ material would deter some.

By: Lior Tal

Lior Tal — Fri, 04 Apr 2014 14:42:01 +0000

Hi everyone, my name is Lior Tal and I am one of the co-founders of the RepNup service. First, thank you all for trying the service and/or commenting on it. Some of the feedback helped us as we are still in beta testing.
Second, I apologize to everyone who did not get their report yet. We did not anticipate such load of users and we are doing our best to upgrade our processing capabilities to finish reports ASAP.
Third, our service is not trying to determine what is right and what is wrong. We try to detect and point out things that might be viewed negatively by a potential employer, by current employer, by a potential date or by a college admission officer (for college applicants).
Our analysis is based on machine learning algorithms that profile a user based on what they write, comment, like and share and how their profile compares to the rest of the population. This allows us to detect tendencies of users and their strength compared with others.
We further use advanced computer vision technologies to detect suspected images that relate to alcohol, violence, sex, drugs etc.
We based our decision to provide user with information based on many surveys and researches about what potential employers and current employers, recruiters, dates and others might think of a user when they review his/her social media activities.
For example, a survey from http://www.jobvite.com in 2014 found that 65% of recruiters are negatively affected when seeing profanity on candidate’s social media. This is why the service flags when detecting words such as WTH, WTF, stupid etc. after calculating that in the context of the text, they might have negative impact.
According to the same survey 47% of recruiters are negatively affected by reference of alcohol.
Now, the important point, again, is that we provide a list of potentially (“Suspicious” and thanks samccrory for the correction) reputation damaging items. Each user has the right and should decide for himself/herself what is right for him to keep, remove or change privacy settings so only friends or other groups can see. At the end of the day, every user needs to decide what they want others to think of them.
Lastly, I’d welcome any comments, requests and recommendations. My email address is liort@RepNup.net. And, if there’s anyone who needs their social reputation report ASAP because they are seeking new employment or applying to college (or event if they are dating) and want it ASAP, please email me personally and I’ll do my best to see that your reports are urgently handled.
Evil HR Lady, thank you for allowing me to comment on your blog.