Debate: Is it wrong for employers to 'stalk' potential employee's internet personas?
Side: No, it is not wrong.

It was an example. There are tons of pictures that people post and comments/status they can make that can have direct relationships to jobs.Yeah, they can do lots of things, but they don't so it is irrelevant.It's not that they cannot figure it out. But as a hiring manager, it is their job to use all the resources they have to make sure the person is the right fit for their job. Internet personas are in the public sphere, so they are not doing anything illegal to get the information. Jobs are always evolving, and why wouldn't hiring managers take advantage of all the resources they have at their disposal?You are wasting your time rejecting qualified employees that will do a good job. If they had actual correlation between bad facebook posts and poor job performance I would reconsider, but they don't.Slacking off was a bad example. But you made the argument that who a person is in their free time has no influence on who they are in the workplace. Employers often want to create communities, and ideally bonds that can extend outside of the workplace. As such, how does it make sense to bring someone in who you know engages in harmful behavior?They will also refuse people who engage in behavior that is fine but different than expected.That is not a guarantee. College admissions officers who do the same thing are not simply searching for unprofessional behavior, they want to learn more about who the applicant is as a person, not just on paper.In other words college admissions officers are not looking for people who will succeed in college.And yes, lets say they are looking for things like that. If something exists that could be a legitimate reason to not hire someone and the information regarding whether or not they have done that exists in the public sphere, why can't employers view that?What is the punishment to the company that rejects someone for something that isn't legitimate?I did not say that, at all. The central point of the note you pulled was that social media and who the person is on the internet is only one data point, and probably a small one. But it still is one, and is representative in part of who this person is to their friends, family, and how they behave.It isn't even enough to be considered a data point. It is a checkbox. "Did this person do something bad? No, ok hire them."and employers do tend to be a bit more forgiving than you thinkOh, so I am overreacting about them overreacting, so they should just do whatever they want.If everyone is posting stupid things, then employers can't overreact to everyoneEveryone does stupid things, not everyone posts them or gets discovered.They are people They have the ability to understand.Their job is to hire someone to work because they aren't able to do real work, there is no proof they understand.And if that is universally true, then the solution is to be more cautious about what you put into the public sphere. Employers are aware the privacy is important, and they are aware that you can control what you put out to the world.It is your personal time to do what you want. Do we really want people to live every moment thinking that it could affect a future job?By posting something that could get you fired/not hired to a public space and then to get upset when people view it is immensely hypocritical.Unless the post is completely benign and the hiring manager is overreacting.Ok, why? This one I think needs some backup, because you just made a claim that every single employer things that every single employee needs to be professional 100% of the time.A teacher was fired from her job because there was a picture of her holding a beer at a family party.That still doesn't quite answer why internet persona's should be off-limits. By that logic, are you against interviews at all? Should people be hired solely based on merit?Wait, you go to interviews not knowing it will affect your job? If merit is how well you will do your job, yeah.And even if they don't pay enough, say they have 2 candidates. Both have the same credentials, and one is a person who is generally responsible, nice, and would be a nice addition to the workplace, and the other is not. Who do you pick? Is it wrong to use those factors at all?The more likely scenario is that you have 2 candidates and one is more qualified, but doesn't have the same personality as the hiring manager, so they go to the internet posts to find a reason to disqualify them. Do you like that scenario?