Public Persona

I've been privacy-conscious for many years, perhaps owing in part to a bad experience I had in the days of the early ARPANET, in which someone abused a piece of personal data I'd left online.

Later, when the web came online, I held back as many others rushed to place every detail about themselves, their homes, and their families into the public view. With identity theft and phishing so common these days, I’m glad I’ve been shy.

Still, one can't live in the modern world without online connections. So I've tried to strike a balance. I think of my web site as revealing my “public persona.” When considering whether I might want to put something on the web, I ask myself if it is a proper part of my public persona, or whether they should be retained instead as part of my private persona. People differ in where they draw the line on this, but It's a thought exercise I think everyone should go through.

What you'll find here are records of my publicly visible projects and my achievements, as well as a repository of my public writings. If you find something missing, drop me a line and strike up a personal conversation.
  —Kent Pitman