I recently read an article about a girl scorned by her ex-boyfriend so she posted his picture all over the internet with various sayings attached to each one.

I feel for the guy, in a way, even though I don’t really know the whole story, because those pictures are now stuck out there in the Inter-web and will probably circulate for years to come.

It is almost impossible to take something away from the Internet after it has already been posted. While it may look like you’ve destroyed that NSFW picture off your Facebook page or that Tweet bashing your boss, it’s not really gone.

This concept is not new to those who have been using the internet and yet society keeps making the same mistakes! You’d think that teenage girls would know now not to post compromising things on their personal pages after seeing what’s happened with Miley Cyrus.

Once you push publish, it’s there even if you delete it off your computer and put it in the virtual trash, another server or host has that file that you so desperately want to leave behind in the trash. With all the tech-savvy people there are in the world, it won’t be hard for them to find that not-so-flattering picture of you in Cabo during Spring Break or for your prospective employeer to find the very angry YouTube video you made proclaiming your disgust for your previous employeer.

Once you push publish there is no back button to erase it’s virtual footprints. It’s out there, forever. While it may be buried, it can still be dug up and exposed for all the world to see.