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its funny how the number of mdapp links for users has slowly decreased as the cycle has gone on.
sdn observation
- Thread starter jmillski
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Probably because from your link people can write mean comments about your app. This happened to me as I was hounded by one person pretending to be other people, etc... just because he/she found it amusing.
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the same way that lots of people are "premed" for only the first half of their college career.
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haha... I didn't lose my mdapps... i switched my sdn profile when i got my final acceptance letter. I don't care if people know what i got and where i got in... i just don't want to be tied to a undergrad gpa/mcat/etc anymore. I left my mdapps there for the next cycle of students...
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I think there are a couple of other reasons no one has mentioned yet:
1) people get lazy about updating. It's hard to remember "gee I should edit my mdapps" after all the excitement/misery.
2) people get paranoid. It's one thing to be like "psh no one would recognize my mdapps and if they did, who cares!" before/while you're applying. It's quite another to be waiting anxiously for schools to get back to you, freaking out about what you could be doing to help the process. You're gonna start wondering if maybe they know you're that SDN kid who is occasionally/often a tool, or if they think all SDN people are crazy in general, or if they looked at your facebook pictures...etc. People just start anonymizing like whoa as they try to find ONE thing they can control about this ridiculous process.
3) people get self-conscious. When you start your mdapps you're all full of self-importance and bluster, like "yeah that's right, I have a 3.8 and I'm applying to only ivies, suck it!". Well, clicking the "rejected" button is pretty depressing, and when you start feeling sorry for yourself in the process, you kinda don't want to be reminded of your rejections as you share them with the world.
There are probably more reasons, but those are the ones I can think of off the top of my head.
1) people get lazy about updating. It's hard to remember "gee I should edit my mdapps" after all the excitement/misery.
2) people get paranoid. It's one thing to be like "psh no one would recognize my mdapps and if they did, who cares!" before/while you're applying. It's quite another to be waiting anxiously for schools to get back to you, freaking out about what you could be doing to help the process. You're gonna start wondering if maybe they know you're that SDN kid who is occasionally/often a tool, or if they think all SDN people are crazy in general, or if they looked at your facebook pictures...etc. People just start anonymizing like whoa as they try to find ONE thing they can control about this ridiculous process.
3) people get self-conscious. When you start your mdapps you're all full of self-importance and bluster, like "yeah that's right, I have a 3.8 and I'm applying to only ivies, suck it!". Well, clicking the "rejected" button is pretty depressing, and when you start feeling sorry for yourself in the process, you kinda don't want to be reminded of your rejections as you share them with the world.
There are probably more reasons, but those are the ones I can think of off the top of my head.
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I think its also because its easier to identify you. One of my interviewers mentioned that she knew who I was on SDN (in a positive way). That was enough for me to take down my MDapps until the interview season was almost over...
I take mine up and put it down repeatedly b/c people think I'm trolling and I'm a little embarrassed about how my cycle is going lol
...and if I get into medical school I'll surely start a new sdn profile. I also am not going to tell anyone in med school where I did my undergrad
...and if I get into medical school I'll surely start a new sdn profile. I also am not going to tell anyone in med school where I did my undergrad
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its preety easy to single out your MCAT score
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I erased my MDapps for a month in the middle of the cycle because I was paranoid about anonymity, but then I decided that the benefit that other people get from it is probably worth more than any negative effect that putting it up might have, so I put it back up
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I know.
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I took mine down because I was getting really nasty comments & I didn't want to be identified by my peers by my stats. I'm pretty easy to single out so I'd like to start with a clean slate... I never really considered getting a new sdn profile tho. That might be extreme for me.
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a little bit of both. depends on the person I guess. I honestly don't believe adcoms or other school officials have the time to dig up dirt on all of the sdn applicants... but once you are in the cycle many would prefer schools don't easily know what other schools have picked them up or where else they are applying.
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Besides... internet integrity is kind of an oxymoron, and adcoms have the verified stuff on paper. Why consult sdn? To see if you asked for advice on which tie to wear at interview?
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Meh, I left mine up. If adcoms want to identify me by my posts, well, I don't think I've said anything too ridiculous.
Course, I havent gotten in anywhere yet, so who knows?
Course, I havent gotten in anywhere yet, so who knows?
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I take mine up and put it down repeatedly b/c people think I'm trolling and I'm a little embarrassed about how my cycle is going lol
...and if I get into medical school I'll surely start a new sdn profile. I also am not going to tell anyone in med school where I did my undergrad
Aww come on you need to have a bit more confidence. That MCAT pretty much erases ur undergrad wherever u did it. U applied to tough schools, don't worry, just have faith and u'll do well.
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You are also one of the more famous people around these forums...so I can see why she would recognize you. For the rest of us, I would assume that wouldn't be a problem.....
The easiest path to anonymity on SDN is to not have a profile picture/avatar/whatever it's called. I mentally associate each username with its picture, and if there isn't one, then I often easily forget them. On the flip side, just show me the picture, and I can probably tell you what the username associated with that picture is. It's why I'm picture-less even after being a member for two years--I'd rather be lost and forgotten here, my words drifting away in the ocean of prose, poetry, and drivel.
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I thought people could make posters have to get their permission.
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Man, we got some paranoid people in here! No avatars for the sake of being less memorable, starting a new sdn profile when you begin med school , deleting mdapps profiles...
adcoms are on this site, I'm sure they browse their own school's secondary threads. If something big pops up like an applicant bashing the school, harassing someone else, or saying they got an interview but already have acceptances to their top 3 schools lined up...I'm sure they would be just a little bit curious. If your mdapps is all there and complete, it would be easy to identify you. What they do with the extra information is totally up to them. It's not that they're actively looking to match every sdn-user to an applicant name...
Anyways, I took mine off my sdn profile because I didn't want people judging me based on my success/failure/numbers/activities etc.
, starting a new sdn profile when you begin med school , deleting mdapps profiles...adcoms are on this site, I'm sure they browse their own school's secondary threads. If something big pops up like an applicant bashing the school, harassing someone else, or saying they got an interview but already have acceptances to their top 3 schools lined up...I'm sure they would be just a little bit curious. If your mdapps is all there and complete, it would be easy to identify you. What they do with the extra information is totally up to them. It's not that they're actively looking to match every sdn-user to an applicant name...
Anyways, I took mine off my sdn profile because I didn't want people judging me based on my success/failure/numbers/activities etc.
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Haha that is so true.
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I am a bit paranoid about being identified by anyone (thus no MDapps). I don't go too overboard with it though. I figure if someone wants to bother going through 1,300+ of my posts to piece together my identity they deserve the satisfaction of knowing my true identity.
Plus, someone would have to be one of my biggest fans to do that. So then I might actually have something relevant to post in the SDN Hookup thread.
Either that or they'e a serial killer.
Plus, someone would have to be one of my biggest fans to do that. So then I might actually have something relevant to post in the SDN Hookup thread.
Either that or they'e a serial killer.
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Haha, I totally removed my MDApps from my profile because I got paranoid. I didn't realize a lot of other people had done that, though.
I didn't realize a lot of other people had done that, though.
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I think you're one of the few people I would want to meet in person on SDN, so I am jealous of that interviewer
.I am a bit paranoid about being identified by anyone (thus no MDapps). I don't go too overboard with it though. I figure if someone wants to bother going through 1,300+ of my posts to piece together my identity they deserve the satisfaction of knowing my true identity.
Plus, someone would have to be one of my biggest fans to do that. So then I might actually have something relevant to post in the SDN Hookup thread.
Either that or they'e a serial killer.
With Premeds, it could go either way...
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I am one of those, if you figure out who I am, go ahead... it is rather easy to figure out who I am based on my mdapps, and I did everything short of putting my name and social security number on mdapps... are people really that paranoid of being identified? I dunno, I just try not to do anything stupid online, and as a result, I really have nothing to hide.
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Seriously.
I've also noticed that if someone changes their avatar, it takes me a while to remember who they are.
haha same here! we should just not log in for the next few months and see what happens (yeah right).
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Was this a student interview?
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It was a faculty member
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owow..
Man, we got some paranoid people in here! No avatars for the sake of being less memorable
adcoms are on this site, I'm sure they browse their own school's secondary threads. If something big pops up like an applicant bashing the school, harassing someone else, or saying they got an interview but already have acceptances to their top 3 schools lined up...I'm sure they would be just a little bit curious. If your mdapps is all there and complete, it would be easy to identify you. What they do with the extra information is totally up to them. It's not that they're actively looking to match every sdn-user to an applicant name...
Anyways, I took mine off my sdn profile because I didn't want people judging me based on my success/failure/numbers/activities etc.
great point. honestly, all you have to google is "schoolx secondary" and the sdn thread pops up. im sure committees know about SDN by now, and it would be wayy too easy to piece together who is who if they have a link to a filled mdapps..
..even if you didnt do anything stupid online, it cant be a good idea to let a school know where else you are applying
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owow..
great point. honestly, all you have to google is "schoolx secondary" and the sdn thread pops up. im sure committees know about SDN by now, and it would be wayy too easy to piece together who is who if they have a link to a filled mdapps..
I think in general it's a good idea to behave in public forums/on the internet as you would want other people to see you. If you want to be inappropriate or crazy bash a school, at least do it where it won't be recorded and archived forever.
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oh i definitely agree.. im always on my best behavior
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oh i definitely agree.. im always on my best behavior
I try to be. But hey effort counts, right?
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I agree a lot with this. What are people doing/saying that they're so worried about being linked to?
I think a lot of us are under the impression that the general public is a lot more interested in us than actually true. Honestly I'm sure most people don't give a flip who we are.
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Vihasadas was famous the second his MCAT was scored
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that's what she said
but i'm sure adcom are interested in those applying to their school/ppl who they are considering accepting, so snooping around threads $ mdapps isnt too out of the question, is it?
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Oh dear...I contemplated posting an mdapps link with a profile. Maybe I should take it down before the cycle even begins for '10??
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Yeah definitely. I made a joke about it (we got along really well), and then we talked for a good 15 mins about SDN. It turned out to be a great interview, but the jury is still out on the school. It made me realize, however, that in case future interviewers weren't so positive, I should take down my MDapps.
Anyway, because I'm a mod maybe I'm more recognizable, but the point is that it *is* possible to pick out some people based on their MDapps. It would be really hard to do that just by post-history, but MDapps can have a lot of uniquely identifying information in it.
I mean, I never really tried to hide my identity, and if someone really wants to find out, it wouldn't be too hard to identify me. But at the same time I don't want to make it too easy.
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I think if someone makes decent posts, being identified is not a problem. It can even help in some circumstances. The only problem I see is the unknown factor - for example, you may reveal that you don't believe in this or that religion (or that you are in a particular denomination) and it may hurt you, even though you did not say anything offensive. It is possible that for some this may be a positive attribute, in terms of "diversity" for the class.
One of the things that I have contemplated is the donation aspect on SDN. Once you donate, then you are fully known by name, location, etc. That would mean that at least the SDN administration will know who you are (that might include some adcoms) and perhaps the mods will know too. This is why it is always in your best interest to try and not be really rude. It should work better than constantly switching avatars. For me, if someone says something that's either ridiculous or offensive enough, I don't need an avatar to remember that person. Same applies to users who give sound advice, like L2D (who has no avatar).
And in terms of record, even a simple thing as getting a license to carry a handgun will be known to medschools, all because of the background check
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This is something that you do not have to worry about.
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Not true in all states... Most med school background checks look for criminal records and listings in sex offender databases. A government background check might find that, but not the ones med schools or even most jobs look at. I've had many done for school and work and anytime you have a check, you have a right to see the report...just look at where they searched and you should be able to figure out what they can and cannot find.
I wouldn't say anything on here that I wouldn't gladly say to anyone's face, including an adcom or interviewer. Sure maybe a few comments where my emotions get out (usually because of a ridiculous statement by one of you, haha), but that's just me. Most people who matter know who I am on here anyway and I couldn't care less. Unless you're pretending to be someone you're not on here, there shouldn't be anything to be afraid of if someone goes through the trouble of identifying you by your posts or MDapps. For my part, I don't put up an MDapps because it's not the general public's business to know what my stats are. I pick and choose who I tell. Also, I don't need commentary on what I've done by naive premeds (thankfully not the majority of you on here) who are trying to compare their circumstances to mine.
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I am not really worried since I haven't really said anything on SDN that I wouldn't say during a face-to-face conversation. It just gives one more reason to be reasonable here.
