Variations on Aude

Thing 3 is about branding, and names, and being consistent across platforms. But it is also about online presence, and how much to share on the World Wide Web.

Let's start with the name: on Twitter and on my blog I use variations of my first name, which is Aude. I like my name: it's important, it's who I am, it's what I'm called. And let me tell you: I have read too many fantasy or legend-type of stories not to know that in other times, a name was almost magical... Anyway, I also like puns, so I try to play on English words sounding a bit like my name, for example ode or awed. As a result, I am @Audesome on Twitter and this blog is "Did you say ode? The meeting of new information technologies and librarianship, it is quite something [or literally translated from the French: it is all a poem]" On Twitter my full name appears, here it is just my first name (but the link to my Twitter account is at the bottom!)

Now for the visual brand: I have my little sheep on both Twitter and my blog. For the background, here I have tree leaves on green and I just realised there are leaves on my Twitter background as well! Along with blue sky and a little cloud.

Conclusion: I do not have a strictly consistent online presence, but there are connections. And at the moment, that suits me fine!

But beware, we have come to audience participation time. These questions are for you, reader:  what do you think my blog says about my personal brand? If you know me, would you say it reflects who I am?

After all this branding thinking, it was time for some fun: I typed my full name in Google. What came up first was, still, after all those years, the blog I did for Université Paris Descartes about my Erasmus experience! And then were my tweets in French... That's when I thought: "Hang on, is this because I am on google.fr?" So next I tried Google UK. The search results were only slightly different: first came my Twitter account, then Lanyard (the social conference directory) and finally my university blog.

So what have I learnt from this? On one hand, my Facebook account does not appear easily: I must have set the privacy settings well, because my use of Facebook is personal and I want to keep it that way. On the other hand, I wanted to use Twitter for professional purposes and if someone out there is looking for me, they will (hehe).

What Thing 3 also made me think about, though, is privacy. How much do I want people to find me online? How much can they learn about me using this blog, Twitter or other traces I have left? Is this a good thing?