
Now Czahor is back in the tech world (before going into politics, he co-founded Hipster, which was acquired by TechCrunch-owner AOL, and he also worked at The Honest Company) with an iOS app called Clear that could help people in similar situations. Granted, chances are you’ll never even be in the running for the job of Jeb Bush’s CTO or, I dunno, the new host of The Daily Show, but old Facebook or Twitter posts can still make you look bad, either when you’re looking for a new position or when you’re about to start the new job.
If you don’t want people to get mad at you for horrible stuff you said on Twitter, isn’t the best solution to avoid saying horrible stuff on Twitter?

So, uh, the algorithm might need a little work (who gets offended by puns?!?) but Czahor said it’s not just trying to catch the obvious F-bombs and N-words. The app is also looking for warning signs like references to racial groups or sexual orientation, and it also analyzes the general sentiment. (Next up: Analyzing blog posts and visual content.) Then you have the option to decide which posts (if any) you want to delete.
This is definitely an early-stage product (Czahor said he just wanted to see how people responded before he started thinking too seriously about things like business models), so besides smaller quibbles, the bigger question is: Do we really want people to erase their past like this? Put another way: If you don’t want people to get mad at you for horrible stuff you said on Twitter, isn’t the best solution to avoid saying horrible stuff on Twitter?
“I would agree that anything that’s obviously hateful or intolerant, you shouldn’t be able to hide in your past,” he said. “But if that exists in your heart, you won’t be able to hide it in your future.”
Anyway, Clear is taking advantage of deletion capabilities that already exist on these social networks — the app just makes it easier to find the stuff you might want to delete. Oh, and Clear won’t save you if other people find the controversial material first and take screenshots.
Anyway, I don’t plan to delete of those foul-mouthed tweets — somehow I’ve convinced myself that they’re charming or funny or whatever. But if this journalism thing falls through and I need to get a real job, I might have to reconsider …