For the first generation to grow up on Facebook, online identities hold both promise and pitfall

"Despite suggestions that young people are losing interest in the platform, its 1.5 billion users still puts Facebook at the centre of social media. The site was launched in 2004, and so those meeting Facebook’s minimum age requirement of 13 will, in 2017, be the first generation for whom Facebook has always existed.

We are now able to reflect on the long-term use of Facebook, which has enjoyed unrivalled longevity and growth. Those who joined in their early teens are now in their twenties and have “grown up” on Facebook, documenting their life through text, images, videos, and geo-location data such as “check-ins”. We spent two years interviewing these twenty-somethings to explore how they had documented their experiences of growing up on Facebook." Read more

Sian Lincoln & Brady Robards The Conversation 8 Nov 2016