Panopticon and Facebook

If you have a Facebook you have surrendered a certain amount of privacy/anonymity/individuality in order to socially collaborate on certain interests in your life. You are allowing access to the interests you display on the Internet. In the Panopticon you are constantly in view and could at all times be being watched. In the Panopticon there is nowhere to hide. With Facebook you can make specific choices on what you choose to hide from the public. If you don’t want people to see that you like a certain thing you don’t have to “Like” it. It is a surrender of a certain amount of freedom but you can have control of how much freedom you choose to surrender. Influences of the Panopticon are definitely visible in the heart and design of Facebook. Advertisers as well as the company have control over everything that is posted on the site and with that they are able to track our every move and respond in a way that benefits them. By collecting that data they have an influence on Facebook users by being very specific with what is advertised. There is a sense of control being held over us but we have surrendered to that control. We have the choice of how much is invested into the creation of our Facebook identity. It’s not a prison because we can escape it, at least for now. I guess it somewhat depends how far people will soon go to avoid feeling lonely.