ABSTRACT
Sabine Trepte, University of Hohenheim, and Mary Beth Oliver, Penn State College of Communications
Being permanently online and permanently connected (POPC) offers many chances to experience virtue, wisdom, and truthfulness. However, individuals are increasingly worried about how the information they share is handled by others. They are concerned about their privacy. POPC experiences are intense, pervasive, and permanent. Hence, the calculus of striving for meaningfulness on the one hand and privacy on the other is crucially intensified in states of POPC. In this chapter, authors analyze how the search for meaningfulness and the need for privacy may be at conflict and how both are weighed against each other, and they discuss future avenues to marry both needs.
