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The importance of keeping your gob shut on the internet

Ah teh internets. Home of more pictures of fluffy kittens than one could shake an email inviting me to "make your manhood amaze" at. Repository of news, opinion and information. And also a home for self indulgent whiners to bang on about how nobody understands them omg, or possibly share a few details which they may, in time, come to regret.

I've always held an uneasy line on this. Mrs Coastalblog is avowedly anti dispersal of personal information online, so naturally I respect her wishes and refer to her only occasionally, and in the vaguest of terms. Looking back through the archives I note that as time has worn on and your humble correspondent has had a few more of the corners knocked off him coastalblog also has veered more towards the impersonal, ad hominen attacks on ashley cole and a general background level of snark notwithstanding. This in part is due to the fact that back in the good old days(holy shit, 2003!) this organ was read by only a few close friends, whereas as now it's consumed by literally five or six other people, and also due to a growing unease at the growing acceptability of leading your entire life in public. Twitter was the final straw for me, 'm aware that, same as the rest of the internet it's a tool, use responibly etc, but the simple fact of the matter is that people's exhibitionist tendencies are only encouraged by the thought that others may be reading them, and as a terribly, terribly english person I find the whole concept just too awful for words. So yes, things occur, but I don't think here's a suitable place to bring them up.

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