Omnipresent Publicness : Social media natives and protective strategies on non-participation in online surveillance

Abstract

People’s perceptions of and experiences within online spaces are central to understanding implications of current online surveillance mechanisms. The aim of this study was to gain insight into how people accustomed to online spaces as part of social life negotiated social media as private and public spaces. This study drew on in-depth interviews with “social media natives” in Norway for this purpose. The interview data especially pinpointed two analytically separable, but currently empirically interchangeable, factors that were pivotal to the interviewees' negotiations of private and public space: the Internet’s lack of temporal and spatial boundaries and social media’s distributive logic. While the interviewees took these features of the online for granted, they explained feeling potentially surveilled by anyone, at any time, and thus acting accordingly. As social media that utilise people’s data for economic profit are increasingly providing spaces for people’s interactions, these feelings of uncertainty and surveillance prompts questions about the future role of prominent social media.