2013

Was Aaron Swartz’s Data Activism Ethical?

 

“If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of every one, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me.” – Thomas Jefferson, 1813.

The Digital Competence of Leaders

 

Their status updates can spark investigations, as Netflix CEO Reed Hastings is learning the hard way. Their tweets can destroy reputations; ask former OMGPOP CEO Dan Porter. But their blogs can also be thought provoking, and their Facebook posts inspiring.

Where Have All the Essays Gone? Check the Standard Paper Repository

 

The television commercial begins with a man in a dusty office. He’s packing the contents of his bookshelf into a box.

Can There Be An Ethical Mashup?

 

What would it sound like if Beyoncé sang doom metal? You've probably never asked yourself that question. As it happens though, I'm a big fan of both Beyoncé and doom metal, and a few years back, I became unaccountably obsessed with finding out what would happen if you put them together. So I took the Garage Band software that came with my computer, plugged in an mp3 of Beyoncé’s song "Single Ladies," added an mp3 of Australian female doom metal duo Murkrat's "Plague Gestation" and…voila! I had created a work of genius (or something) for the world to admire.

Alexander Hamilton wouldn’t shy away from a fake Twitter account - so why should you?

 

In early February, Facebook reported that 76 million of their accounts were found to be fake last year. Just over 7 percent of Facebook accounts were duplicates or not held by real people, the company affirmed in a regulatory filing. And there’s a similar scenario with Twitter: over 27 percent of the top 10 Twitter accounts’ followers are fake, according to Status People, a social media management platform for businesses. Status People recently released a “fake follower check,” which allows any Twitter user to find out how many of their followers are counterfeit. Though Facebook and Twitter are some of the social media sites most affected by the underground economy of unauthentic profiles, other social networks, including YouTube and LinkedIn, are by no means immune.

Gary Bahadur, a social media security expert and author of Securing the Clicks: Network Security in the Age of Social Media, confirms that, “attackers use fake accounts, but they are a known risk.” Yet what Bahadur refers to as “attackers” are not necessarily malevolent hackers in the traditional sense of the word. Individuals with basic digital literacy can, and do, create make-believe social media profiles, as do multinational companies, the police, the military and the government.

Cases in point: the U.S. military currently employs Centcom to manage the progression of an “online persona management service,” which includes creating fake social media profiles. According to Commander Bill Speaks, a spokesman for the United States Central Command, one of 9 combatant commands in the United States military, “the [online persona management service] technology supports classified blogging activities on foreign-language websites to enable Centcom to counter violent extremist and enemy propaganda outside the US.”

Just as criminals use fake social media profiles to target victims, the police creates fake Facebook profiles to bust precisely these kinds of perpetrators. And just as fake social media profiles can be used to combat violence, so, too, can they be used to create propaganda. “For every strong statement about preserving liberty, freedom of expression and privacy on the global Internet, there exists a countervailing example of the United States attempting to undermine those same values,” writesRichard Esguerra, Development Director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

The U.S. government, too, is using fake profiles; just recently, the technology security firm HBGary developed software that can create multiple fake social media profiles, which can then perform actions such as detect public opinions against politicians, and then use the fake profiles to manipulate public opinion. Mitt Romney, for example, was recently accused of creating a fake Bill Clinton Twitter handle and then using it to tweet Pro-Romney affirmations.

The action that can be taken by social media channels to reduce the number of fake accounts is limited. “How do you police a half billion users?” asked Bahadur. “Major sites like YouTube, Twitter and Facebook can have some programmatic capabilities to block fake accounts, but most channels do not have such capabilities.”

As an individual user, there are ways to protect yourself from being fooled by fake social media accounts. USAToday, for example, advises that Twitter users should pay attention to the blue "verified" checkmark badge, which indicates that an account has been verified by Twitter. (However, even that isn’t a guarantee: in January 2012, Twitter briefly verified a fabricated account impersonating Wendi Deng, the wife of News Corporation mogul Rupert Murdoch). If you do find a fake account (be it yours or another user’s), each social network has steps to report a profile, and you can even ask the social network to remove it.

Some cases of fake social media accounts have gone to court. In December 2012, Rick D. Senft, the president of Passavant Memorial Homes, filed a lawsuit against LinkedIn, claiming that someone created an account using his name without his permission and posted his personal contact information.Senft, who argues that he keeps his personal information private, claims that LinkedIn “must tell him who put his name, personal cell phone and personal email on the site,” reports USAToday. LinkedIn is said not to be reacting to the legal action proactively.

In other cases, the social networks themselves take legal action. In April 2012, Twitter “filed a federal law suit against five spammers, including those who create fake Twitter followers,” the Telegraph reports. The following day, “several of the websites named in Twitter's suit -- TweetAttacks, TweetBuddy, and a site operated by Lucero -- were offline,” reports CNN.

But what lies at the core of fake social media profiles is a much older issue: the appeal of anonymity. In fact, pseudonyms lie at the heart of the United States Constitution. From Alexander Hamilton to James Madison to John Jay, between 1787 and 1788, numerous writers used pseudonyms to debate the design of the constitution in the press.

With the advent of new technology, anonymity and pseudonyms are now accessible to all. A few years ago, fake profiles dominated Internet relay chats, now it is Facebook and Twitter that are inundated by such make-believe accounts. “Social media just makes it so much easier to create fake profiles, gain trust and expand to a large network very quickly,” Bahadur said. What you yourself wouldn’t say or do, the fake profile can. Not only that, but by means of multiple profiles, you can multiply your influence, be it in favor of one opinion or by creating differing views with different profiles. Chances are, Alexander Hamilton and his contemporaries wouldn’t shy away from a fake Facebook profile or Twitter account were they alive today.

As an everyday Internet user, you can enter a forum, with a fake profile or with a real one. You can then discuss issues with other users, not knowing whether they are using pseudonyms or not. But in a world of fake profiles, what is the value of such information and subsequently generated opinion? Does the Internet inform, or misinform? Aren’t there more effective ways to generate and influence public opinion?

Nowadays, it is just as easy, or even easier, to spread more lies than the truth. No matter on which side of the spectrum you stand, just beware: the backlash can be instantaneous and harsh. And since you’re not the only one hiding behind a pseudonym, you might never know who your opponent is. But doesn’t that make the virtual debate all the more appealing?

 

Isabel Eva Bohrer  Learn more about Isabel Eva Bohrer at www.isabelevabohrer.com.

 

America Wages A New Kind of War

 

America is waging a new kind of war on battlefields at home and abroad: Cyber war.

Cyber war, once the futuristic fantasy of science fiction, is today a dark and dangerous reality. And there is no Geneva Convention to guide or constrain the combatants, either ethically or morally.

There are a variety of vulnerable targets at risk domestically in an escalating global combat that pits nation against nation, starting with computer against computer.

These include power grids, transportation hubs, financial operations and networks, computer-driven critical industries such as utilities, corporate intellectual property such as patents and proprietary software, military computer networks and anything else controlled, archived, monitored or powered by computers.

Though no blood is shed in cyber warfare, the damage can be catastrophic, and the threat to the U.S. grows daily. But the U.S. has been fighting back, defensively and aggressively.

As an aggressor, the U.S. reportedly teamed up with Israel to launch an attack in 2007 on Iran's nuclear program with a computer virus called Stuxnet. The cyber attack targeted a uranium enrichment facility causing a disruptive slowdown in operations.

Conversely, Iran is suspected of launching cyber attacks on U.S. banks and Saudi Arabian oil companies.

So far, cyber enemies of the U.S. have successfully penetrated or outflanked our defenses, despite counter measures.

In recent testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee, James Clapper, Director of National Intelligence, said, "It's hard to overemphasize the significance [of these threats.]"

The list of America's cyber enemies, according to Mr. Clapper, includes state-sponsored spies and hackers, criminal hackers and cyber terrorists.

Perhaps the most formidable combatant is a secret Chinese military unit based in Shanghai that was recently identified by Mandiant, an American computer security firm, as the source of espionage operations against 141 U.S. companies.

According to a Mandiant report, the Chinese government allegedly stole technology blueprints, proprietary manufacturing processes, test results, business plans, pricing documents, partnership agreements, emails and contact information.

In 2009, the U.S. created a new military command whose mission is to provide cyber security, principally for military networks. The commanding officer is a four-star general, reflecting the serious nature of the threat. But United States Cyber Command (USCYBERCOM) cannot protect attacks against all U.S. businesses, targets frequently attacked by Russian and Chinese cyber warriors.

"War is hell," said U.S. Civil War General William T. Sherman, who was a contributor to that idea. In Sherman's famous march to the sea through Georgia in 1864, his troops burned military and civilian targets, destroying infrastructure, industry, agriculture and most anything else that could be torched.

With the signing of the first Geneva Convention in 1864 by most European nations, war had the potential to be a little less hellish if the signatories lived up to their commitments.

The Conventions were expanded several times over the next 100 years or more, through 1949 and in 1977. The U.S. has signed on to all of them with the exception of two protocols added in 1977.

Designed for the “old-fashioned” wars that were fought on land, on sea and in the air, the Geneva Conventions did not envision cyber wars, which are fought computer against computer in cyberspace. Consequently, there are currently no agreements in place governing the conduct of cyber combat.

Included among the Geneva Conventions are rules governing:

• - The protection and rights of civilians.
• - The humane treatment of the wounded and sick.
• - The protection of medical personnel.
• - A ban on targeting hospitals and medical facilities and transport vehicles or ships.
• - A ban on torture
• - The humane treatment of prisoners of war.
• - Rules governing military forces occupying foreign countries.
• - A ban on targeting critical infrastructure elements such as nuclear plants and dams.

Rules were enforced through domestic legislation and courts, by an international tribunal established by the United Nations Security Council and by the International Criminal Court, provided the country accused of a violation was a participant in it.

The International Red Cross and Red Crescent monitored humanitarian aspects of the Conventions.

Cyber wars, by contrast, have no rules or conventions, written or unwritten, and consequently can be exceedingly disastrous for its casualties.

A Geneva Convention for cyber wars, signed by the principal combatants – China, the U.S., Russia, Iran and others – might agree to the following provisions:

• - The protection and rights of civilians -- meaning non-combatant individuals will not be targeted or attacked; not their computers or any mobile devices.
• - The protection of intellectual property – patents, proprietary software, blueprints, product formulas, etc.
• - A ban on targeting hospitals and medical facilities and transport vehicles or ships, and their digitized communication devices.
• - A ban on targeting critical infrastructure elements run by computers and vulnerable to attack, such as power grids, nuclear plants and dams.
• - A ban on targeting mass communication operations, such as print, broadcast and Internet sources.
• - A ban against targeting civilian aviation, including air traffic control centers and personnel.

Assuming all the above points would be agreed to, what would be left for the cyber warriors to fight? The answer is mostly military targets, which under the Geneva Conventions were the only legitimate targets of yesteryears’ wars.

Stateless terrorists waging an ongoing cyber war would, of course, not be inclined to sign the agreement. Nor would criminal hackers who steal data, identity, intellectual property and even cash, and individual hackers driven by malice or destructive impulses.

But for nation states who signed the cyber war conventions, enforcement protocols could be based on those used for signatories of the Geneva Convention.

Rather than rely, however, on the goodwill of nations that signed a treaty, experts say the U.S. needs better defenses and deterrents against this new kind of war.

A major deterrent to attack by nations is the threat of military retaliation against the attacking state, assuming the U.S. knows the source of the attack. Terrorist attacks most likely cannot be deterred by the threat of a direct retaliatory attack on the aggressor.

Without an international treaty spelling out the rules, requirements and restrictions of cyber warfare, much like the Geneva Conventions, all-out cyber war is possible and the attacks could be increasingly more destructive.

Meanwhile, newly appointed Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel recently called cyber warfare, "the greatest threat to our security – economic security, political security, diplomatic security, military security – that confronts us."

 

Marc Davis Marc Davis is a veteran journalist and published novelist. His reporting and writing has been published in numerous print and online publications including AOL, The Chicago Tribune, Forbes Online Media, The Journal of the American Bar Association, and many others. His latest novel, Bottom Line, was published in 2013.

Big Brother in the Workplace

 

Has the American workplace become an Orwellian fishbowl where Big Brother bosses watch our every move? So it seems.

Employer surveillance of employees has become rampant at many of America's top corporations and at smaller firms all the way down the ladder to the so-called mom-and-pop shops.

Snooping bosses can see your emails, outgoing and incoming. They can read their content, see the names and email addresses of who you've emailed, and who has emailed you.

Nosy bosses can also access software that captures every keystroke made on a computer keyboard to determine what a worker is writing. 

Your employer can also monitor computers to track website visits to see if an employee is frittering away valuable time playing games, watching porn, searching for another job, or browsing Facebook or You Tube, Twitter or other social media.

Beyond keeping tabs on worker Internet activity, employers have placed bugs in cubicles and in some cases on phones. Or an eye-in-the-sky camera may be silently observing worker conduct through the day.

Surveillance and spy ware technology keeps improving. It's readily available and relatively inexpensive, which accounts, in part, for its growing use in the workplace.

Employers who monitor their personnel claim it increases productivity and safety and reduces theft. They also argue that it protects proprietary information and various company secrets and is an invaluable tool for investigating workplace harassment and discrimination.

Blue-collar workers are also monitored. There may be a video camera in the break room, and a GPS tracking device on company trucks. Assembly line or factory workers may be observed through video cameras.

Laws governing the taping of phone conversations differ from state to state — some states require the consent of both parties to a conversation to give approval before the exchange may be taped or monitored.

Some states permit employees to sue for invasion of privacy, intrusion on seclusion and other violations of privacy protection. But if employees sign waivers or employment contracts that grant the employer certain surveillance permissions, there may not be legal remedy for the workers.

If an employer issues an employee handbook, areas and devices that are monitored may be indicated. Frequently, workers may also be asked to sign a waiver or similar document, granting spying rights to an employer and acknowledging that they're aware they’re being watched.

Employees who know they're being watched may be exemplars of good on-the-job behavior. But employees aware that they’re being spied on increases their stress levels, resentment and anger, and generally lowers workplace morale, according to a report dated September 29, 2013, from AOL.

Is such surveillance of workers legal? For the most part, yes.

Is it ethical? From my perspective, sneak peeking at workers is an ethical breach. But proponents of employee monitoring insist that it's necessary. Others hold that the act of spying inhabits an ethical no man's land.

Do spied-upon employees have legal remedy? In most cases, no.

Although there is only a small body of case law on worker privacy and no federal government regulations, as yet, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals has an email privacy case on its docket concerning email messages sent back and forth between a husband and wife. Still, without statutory protection, workers, when on the job, have little or no right to privacy.

Some progress is being made, however, toward protecting the social network privacy of employees and job applicants. In January of this year (2013) Illinois became the nation's third state to enact a law prohibiting employers from obtaining usernames and passwords of people using social networks.

But workers may not even be safe from employer snooping beyond the workplace. The employee handbook may spell out the circumstances by which an employee may be watched, and on what devices, when not working.

In some instances employers may look at a worker's medical records and or doctors’ notes. A worker's specific medical diagnoses may not be disclosed. But when an employee files a workman's compensation claim, or asks for a medical or family leave, or claims a disability, the employer may be legally permitted to request medical records.

Numerous cases of egregious spying on employees and its consequences both for the spy and the spied-upon have been reported in the media.

For example, the CEO of a publishing firm fired several employees who posted negative comments about the company on their Facebook pages. Obviously, workers' Facebook pages were being monitored.

In another case of alleged employer "spying,” Harvard was accused of an illegal look at faculty computer records to determine how an important document was leaked, and who was the leaker. The rules permit system administrators to access the records for maintenance purposes, to prevent damage and to ensure compliance with university rules. Some Harvard partisans said the alleged peek at the faculty computer records was "reasonable."

In Seattle several years ago, Boeing Co. was accused of secretly monitoring employees to protect its proprietary information, according to a November 18, 2007 report from Aero-News Network, an online publication reporting news of the aerospace industry.

Hewlett-Packard was fined $14.5 million some years ago for investigating leaks from its board of directors by allegedly secretly monitoring their emails and instant messaging, that was also reported on the article cited above by the Aero-News Network.

A Google search revealed many additional instances of employers violating worker privacy.

The solution to this situation may now be making its way through the U.S. House of Representatives in the form of a privacy protection bill. If enacted, the bill would provide some degree of protection to employees by restricting employer monitoring.

Privacy advocates are also working against excessive spying in the workplace including the not-for-profit Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC).

According to their web site, EPIC is a public interest research center in Washington, D.C., established in 1994 to focus public attention on emerging civil liberties issues and to protect privacy, the First Amendment and constitutional values.

How will it end?

As employer spying and the war against it continues,technology now also exists to monitor regions of the brain connected to pleasure, hunger, the flight-or-fight phenomenon and other states of mind. So the capability to read a person's thoughts, in a general sense, is now also available. Will the labor force of the future be wired to a device that monitors their most secret thoughts? Let's hope not.

But who watches the watchers?

In light of all the illegal misdeeds of so many corporations of late, perhaps the employees should be monitoring their employers, rather than vice versa.

 

Marc Davis Marc Davis is a veteran journalist and published novelist. His reporting and writing has been published in numerous print and online publications including AOL, The Chicago Tribune, Forbes Online Media, The Journal of the American Bar Association, and many others. His latest novel, Bottom Line, was published in 2013.

Bradley Manning and the Ethics of Secrecy

 

February 23, 2013 marked the 1000th day of Pfc. Bradley Manning’s incarceration. In May 2010, Manning was arrested for passing classified information to Wikileaks, a nonprofit organization that has gained notoriety for exposing a multitude of secrets from various governments and regimes. The materials Manning sent to Wikileaks included videos of the 2007 Baghdad airstrike and the 2009 airstrike in Granai, Afghanistan,  250,000 U.S. diplomatic cables, and 500,000 army reports, often referred to as the Iraq War Logs and the Afghan War Logs, respectively. The video of the Baghdad airstrike later was later condensed, edited and released by Wikileaks, in an effort to expose what both Manning and Wikileaks operatives saw as crimes against humanity. On February 28, Manning pleaded guilty to 10 of the 22 charges against him, including “misuse of classified material.” Among the charges, one of the most inauspicious is “aiding the enemy,” which could mean life in prison for Manning. Notably, he did not plead guilty to that charge. Manning also read from a 35-page statement, which claimed that he intended to spark domestic debate regarding military action in Iraq and Afghanistan. It was the first time Manning openly admitted to releasing the documents.

With Manning’s trial expected to commence in June, it seems poignant to explore the ethics of secrecy in an increasingly open world. With information becoming more readily available at the click of a mouse, can anything be kept secret? At best, Manning’s actions could be construed as a patriotic stand against an oppressive, war-mongering U.S. military-industrial complex. With little regard for his own future, Manning aired out some of the U.S. military’s dirty laundry for the world to see. But at worst, Manning’s idealistic crusade is a naïve grab for attention that has caused considerable harm to U.S. military operations overseas. How can we reconcile these two views? The path to what is right is paved with murky hypocrisies on both sides.

Whatever one’s views are on secrecy, it’s clear that Manning has proven that he is brave when faced with near-certain punitive action. In his statement, Manning described how he felt watching the video of the airstrike in Iraq, particularly with respect to the apparent disregard by American troops for the lives of innocent people. "I wanted the public to know that not everyone living in Iraq were targets to be neutralized," Manning said. Indeed, the details of the Baghdad airstrike video are deeply troubling. The video depicts an American helicopter assaulting a small group gathered in Baghdad. Among the men who were attacked on the ground, one was later revealed to be a journalist and two were Reuters employees. The men were carrying cameras that were mistaken for grenade launchers. A military review concluded that the Reuters employees were in the company of armed insurgents. Crew members can be heard referring to the innocents as “dead bastards,” and congratulating one anotheron their large kills. Later, a bus comes to retrieve the bodies of the dead. One U.S. gunner can be heard requesting to engage the bus, later revealed to be carrying two children. “Come on, let me shoot!” the soldier says gleefully, almost as if playing a video game. Permission is granted, and the bus takes on massive gunfire from the helicopter. Later, ground troops carry the injured children to be evacuated. Most officials, when questioned, dismiss the video as out of context. Though the 2009 Granai airstrike video has not been released, up to 147 Afghan civilians were estimated to have been killed in the assault, with the majority of the casualties being women and children.

The Obama administration contends that by releasing classified material, Manning put the lives of American soldiers in danger and strained diplomatic relations, a charge that should not be taken lightly. But not once has the president addressed the willful killing of civilians depicted in these videos. It would appear that American troops are straining quite a few relations between themselves and civilians. This “shoot first, ask questions later” mindset is directly harmful not only to our military overseas, but also to the American people. Every innocent civilian harmed overseas becomes a martyr, and a justifiable reason for tension and hostility among foreigners. There must be an ethical distinction between Manning’s release of the videos—which he argues ought to be public domain—and the irresponsible actions of soldiers who actively target unarmed people. It seems pertinent to ask, what is more harmful?

Obama has expressed concern that Afghan informants were named in the documents, which would put them in immediate danger. Former Defense Secretary Robert Gates expressed similar concerns in 2010, stating, “the battlefield consequences of the release of these documents are potentially severe and dangerous for our troops, our allies and Afghan partners, and may well damage our relationships and reputation in that key part of the world." The immense volume of Manning’s leak of classified material does suggest some irresponsibility on his part. If Manning did indeed intend for his leaks to stir a debate, wouldn’t the videos depicting the brutality of the Iraq and Afghanistan invasions alone suffice? What accounts for the astounding half million army reports allegedly leaked by Manning? And what of the quarter million diplomatic cables? By any account, this gratuitous amount of information has done far more than spur a debate. It’s set a precedent in the zeitgeist of American history. What exactly is the extent of the damage done to U.S. military operations in the long term? Has Manning truly aided the enemy, as prosecutors argue? This factor is the most damnable in Manning’s case, and it’s also one that is the most questionable.

Manning didn’t exercise much discretion when it came to protecting the names of informants. He merely deferred the responsibility onto Wikileaks’ founder, Julian Assange, and his cohorts. Because Wikileaks is outside of the bounds of U.S. jurisdiction, one could argue that this whistleblowing organization serves as a kind of independent watchdog. That’s a rosy thought. But an organization outside the realm of prosecution is a dangerous thing. What gives someone like Assange the kind of moral authority to decide which classified documents get published?  Assange claims that the release of classified information exposes war crimes. And there is certainly a case to be made for that. But where is this principled rigor when it comes to exercising discretion with the amount of classified documents published? There is a clear line between than exposing war crimes and simply wanting to shed an unfavorable light on the United States government.

Wikileaks operatives were careful to never confirm any dealings with Manning in an effort to prevent further incriminating the young soldier. However, Assange has called Manning “America’s foremost political prisoner.”  Is this the case? Manning has framed his crime in a political context—this much is true—but were there political motivations behind his incarceration? Nelson Mandela was imprisoned for 27 years because of his tireless work to end apartheid in Africa. One of the world’s most prominent political prisoners, Aung San Suu Kyi, was detained numerous times for enduringly long periods because of her attempts to seek democratic reforms in Myanmar. Could the same kind of reverence be given to Manning? Many have already ascribed him with this stature. Manning was among the many nominated this year for the Nobel Peace Prize. Activists have waged numerous campaigns demanding his release. If the zeal of political martyrdom has already been ascribed to Manning within the three years since his arrest, it wouldn’t be controversial to posit that a favorable light will be cast upon the Manning in the broad scope of history.

This series of leaks and the controversy that followed is ultimately a catastrophe of U.S. government’s own making. During the time of both the War on Terror and the Iraq War, the United States military gave the same kind of classified access that Manning had to thousands of other soldiers, putting many soldiers in a compromised place. At the very least, the U.S. government is culpable for putting Manning in the unfortunate position of having to choose between his principles and his country. A savvy legal team might argue that Manning’s actions were intended to expose atrocities, many of which blatantly violate the Geneva Convention. It certainly is pertinent to ask what the moral responsibility of military personnel who witness such atrocities might be. After all, the United States government has agreed to a specific set of combat terms. The Geneva Convention explicitly forbids the willful harming of civilians. And in the videos released by Manning, there is clear evidence of U.S. soldiers not only targeting civilians, but of the soldiers reveling in the deaths of civilians. After witnessing something like that, what was Manning’s ethical obligation?

Manning has set a precedent by which others can follow. Among the entire U.S. military, how many soldiers have been influenced by Manning’s actions? While Manning’s leak of classified information has certainly tarnished the reputation of the United States military, Manning himself may very well be the prime extrapolation of the idea that the U.S. possesses a superior moral fortitude, precisely because it is a nation that produces ethically bound, principled minds like that of Bradley Manning’s. The free and near limitless exchange of information that has been brought forth by the digital age is something of a liberating factor for oppressive constructs of the war machine. Whatever harm has come from the release of these documents, here is the silver lining: this series of leaks by Manning is evidence enough that secrecy is becoming a thing of the past, and that secrecy in the future may be completely implausible. Though government officials can double their efforts, they’ll have to contend with an expanding, morally conscious, techno-savvy generation that could soon possess the key to a dark infinity: access to the atrocious secrets of a once proud empire—redemption through transparency.

 

David Stockdale David Stockdale is a freelance writer from the Chicagoland area. His political columns and book reviews have been featured in AND Magazine. His fictional work has appeared in Electric Rather, The Commonline Journal, Midwest Literary Magazine and Go Read Your Lunch.  Two of his essays are featured in A Practical Guide to Digital Journalism Ethics. David can be reached at dstock3@gmail.com, and his URL is http://davidstockdale.tumblr.com/.

Can There Be An Ethical Mashup?

 

What would it sound like if Beyoncé sang doom metal? You've probably never asked yourself that question. As it happens though, I'm a big fan of both Beyoncé and doom metal, and a few years back, I became unaccountably obsessed with finding out what would happen if you put them together. So I took the Garage Band software that came with my computer, plugged in an mp3 of Beyoncé’s song "Single Ladies," added an mp3 of Australian female doom metal duo Murkrat's "Plague Gestation" and…voila! I had created a work of genius (or something) for the world to admire.

My Beyoncé/Murkrat hybrid monstrosity is a (very clumsy) example of a mashup — a song created by combining two or more different recordings. Depending on how you look at it, mashups have been around for a long time: the New York Times ran a piece dating them back to Charles Ives' 1906 sound collage "Central Park in the Dark." Most mashups today though are less highbrow. One example is this crazed mashup put together by Wax Audio of Iron Maiden and the Bollywood soundtrack for Dhoom2. One more example is this mashup, also created by Wax Audio, of the Bee Gees and Pink Floyd. The video is so arch that it's hard not to see it as a deliberate parody — both of the vapidity of the Bee Gees and of the pretensions of Pink Floyd.

Parodies, of course, have considerable legal protection under the First Amendment. Thus, in the case of Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, the Supreme Court ruled that a song by 2 Live Crew that used samples of Roy Orbison's "Pretty Woman" qualified for Constitutional protection because it was "clearly intended to ridicule the white-bread original and remind us that sexual congress with nameless streetwalkers is not necessarily the stuff of romance and is not necessarily without its consequences.”

As an essay at the law firm McBride Law, PC notes, though, most mashups aren't parodies. Instead they "involve straight-forward, albeit very creative, borrowing of another’s work." In other words, a mashup doesn't comment on works of art; it simply combines them. Copyright law as currently constituted is generally intended to protect original artists from just such borrowing. As a result, the essay at McBride Law concludes mashups are—in most cases—probably illegal.

Because of their quasi-legal — or flat-out illegal — status, mashups are almost never sold. Instead, they are usually made available for no charge, often essentially as free samples advertising a DJ’s set or performances. Or, in some cases, a person like me who doesn't DJ may simply make a mashup available because he or she likes to share music.

I may like sharing music, but the fact remains that I don't own the rights to Beyoncés' "Single Ladies," nor to Murkrat's "Plague Gestation," nor to the Carter Family snippet at the end of my mashup. The record companies that do hold the rights could, therefore, take legal action against me.

This does, in fact, occasionally happen to mashup artists. For example, the rights holders for deceased Nirvana singer and guitarist Kurt Cobain have been quite aggressive in demanding that his vocals not be used in mashups. Similarly, when DJ Danger Mouse put together The Grey Album — a full album length combination of The Beatles White Album and Jay-Z's Black Album — he received a cease and desist letter from the Beatles' label EMI took no further legal action though, perhaps in part because Paul McCartney publicly said he was a fan of Danger Mouse's work (as, for that matter, did Jay-Z). The Grey Album is still readily available online.

The fact that artists often seem happy to ignore or even support mashups of their work suggests that the ethics of mashups can be even more complicated than the legal issues surrounding them. There's no doubt that a mashup can promote the music it borrows — I bought the Dhoom 2 soundtrack after seeing the video of that Wax Audio mashup, and listening to The Grey Album now for the first time is making me realize that I really need to purchase more of Jay-Z’s music. Artists will sometimes even deliberately use mashups as promotional tools. In 2004, David Bowie offered a sports car to the mashup artist who best combined two of his songs.

While mashups may benefit the original artists, though, they don't necessarily do so — or, at least, they don't do so in a predictable and legally sanctioned way. There is no set means for mashed-up artists to receive a fee for their contribution to the mashups.

What would a legal, ethical mashup system look like? I'm not a lawyer, but it seems like the best approach would be to use a formula that has already been in use for decades — that established to deal with cover songs. Songwriters have a straightforward way to be recompensed for use of their work. As Jeff Price of the online music distribution site TuneCore explains:

First, if the songwriter (Dolly) has commercially released her song, anyone who wants may cover her song on their release as long as the songwriter is paid the "mechanical royalty" for each reproduction. In other words, once you release a song, you cannot stop anyone from covering it. However, anyone that covers your song MUST pay you the mechanical royalty rate. If they don’t, they have violated the law and you can sue them.

This system has advantages for both the songwriters and the cover artists who use their work. Songwriters, obviously, get paid. Cover artists, for their part, know exactly what rate they will pay for using a song, and do not have to worry about songwriters denying them rights. This can be a serious problem. 2 Live Crew, for example, initially tried to get the rights to "Pretty Woman" from Acuff-Rose, but — because they were sampling the track rather than covering it — they were refused. The current system, then, allows songwriters to be fairly recompensed for their work. But it also recognizes the interest of other artists, and of society, in making that old work available for new artistic purposes.

The Constitution actually says that copyright is meant "to promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries." In other words, legally—and I would argue, ethically—copyright is intended not to protect property rights, but rather to promote art and creativity. Making sure that artists don't get ripped off is an important part of providing them with the incentive to create. But so is creating a legal climate in which artists are able to innovate without fear of being sued.

Creating mashups without compensating the remixed artists may be unethical — but strangling a new, exciting, creative art form isn't ethical either. I don't think I've done anything immoral by making Beyoncé perform with Murkrat. But I do think that everyone involved in mashups — record companies, pop stars, doom goddesses and laptop tinkerers alike — would be in a better position ethically if we could figure out a way to make mashups legal.

 

Noah Berlatsky Noah Berlatsky edits the comics and culture website the Hooded Utilitarian and is a correspondent for the Atlantic. He is working on a book about the original Wonder Woman comics.

Catfish, Te'o and Deception

 

Fakery, misrepresentation, pretending to be someone you are not. It’s a phenomenon as old as recorded history.

One of the first recorded instances in Western history and literature is in the book of Genesis, where Jacob, the younger son of the patriarch Isaac, disguises himself as his brother Esau so that he can receive the blessing that his blind, aged father intends for his older son. (It’s of more than incidental interest that Jacob undertakes this ruse at the urging and with the connivance of his and Esau’s mother, Rebekah.)

Reinventing oneself, making oneself anew, adopting a new identity—to escape creditors or punishment for crime, to get out of the shadow of an oppressive family or for any of myriad other reasons—has been virtually a part of America’s national identity from its beginning. “Go west, young man” was only partly about economic opportunity; it also was about the opportunity to define oneself anew, to escape the limitations of upbringing and static social categories.

But with the advent of fingerprinting, DNA testing and electronic databases that never forget anything, losing an old identity and adopting a new one has become more difficult in recent decades. And yet, in one area of the digital world, fakery, misrepresentation and masquerading flourish and, indeed, have never been easier.

Social media—online meeting places, dating sites, chat rooms—apparently abound in lies, some small, but some—like the hoax allegedly perpetrated on Notre Dame football star Manti Te’o—enormous, with the potential to cause grave harm, up to and including death.

Anyone who has taken advantage of an online dating service is familiar with the small lies: the woman who shaves a few years off her real age or says she is slender when in fact she used to be but hasn’t been for quite a while; the man who posts a photo of himself with a full head of hair when he actually has begun doing a Donald Trump-type combover to conceal the growing empty territory above his ears.

There are larger lies: the people who describe themselves as single or divorced when they’re not; the con men looking for a woman—any woman—with a nice income.

And then there are the lies that achieve a completely different dimension—like the one that, according to Notre Dame athletic director Jack Swarbrick, entrapped Te’o.

There are still too many unanswered questions about this bizarre episode—questions created in many instances by things that Te’o and his father and friends told the press—to be able to say with any certainty what really happened.

But while the notion of a virile, high-achieving young football hero becoming ensnared in a long-term relationship with a “girlfriend” whom he never sees and who dies at a dramatic moment in his life—while that notion may at first seem outlandish and, frankly, incredible, it turns out, on closer examination, not to be.

Swarbrick called attention during his press conference to the documentary film “Catfish,” which gave rise to the television show “Catfish,” and to the phenomenon of catfishing. After calling up and watching a couple of episodes of the TV show, I began to understand how Te’o—and maybe almost anyone—could become hooked by a catfisher.

One episode featured a young man named Jarrod Musselwhite, a 27-year-old divorced father who lives in Georgia and has been involved for 18 months in an online relationship with Abigail Johnson, a young woman who lives in Mississippi and whose online profile shows her as willowy, blonde and Barbie Doll-cute.

It becomes apparent early on that Jarrod is deeply, maybe even unhealthily, invested in this relationship. If “Abby” turns out to be as her picture shows her and as their phone and online conversations have shown her, Jarrod will have proven to his family, his acquaintances and, most important, to himself that he is not the perpetual loser, the outsider, he always has felt like.

When the show’s producers finally bring them together, Abigail turns out to be not willowy, blonde and Barbie Doll-cute. In fact, she is dark-haired, obese and deeply troubled, and her real name is Melissa.

Explaining her deception to an obviously dejected Jarrod, she says she knew that if she showed herself as she really looked, she would never have attracted any man’s interest—her experience of rejection throughout her school years and young adulthood had demonstrated that.

“Pretty much all of it was, you know, me—just not me,” she said. “Everything, all the emotions, you know—just a different face, I suppose.”

Those words were kind of an eerie echo of Swarbrick’s description of Te’o. “Every single thing about this…was real to Manti,” Swarbrick said. “There was no suspicion that it wasn’t, no belief that it might not be. And so the pain was real. The grief was real. The affection was real. And that’s the nature of this sad, cruel game.”

All this assumes, of course, that Te’o truly was a victim, and was not involved in creating the hoax of his “girlfriend.” The point is that it is not implausible to believe that he was a victim. The point is that this kind of hoax has been perpetrated many times already in the Internet age, sometimes with tragic consequences.

But, some people will say, what did Te’o need with an imaginary girlfriend? He was young, strong, good-looking, high-achieving and about to be very wealthy. He was no loser, no reject who had to troll dating sites or other Internet venues to find a date.

Who says? Who can say for any of us?

Te’o was like all of us: human and needy. Needy of love, both to receive and to give. Needy of connection. If in fact he did so, is there something reprehensible in his finding it through a voice on a telephone, through a picture and text messages? Is there something wrong with his daring to believe that a person with whom he felt he had established a connection would be genuine, and not simply part of an elaborate act of fakery? And to what purpose? To get a laugh at another’s expense?

The ethics of the Te’o case are really quite simple and require no heavy-duty philosophical analysis. For the media, the lesson is the most basic: If your mother says she loves you, check it out. Nothing is too obvious to merit skepticism. And particularly when a story involves the kind of coincidences the Te’o story did—grandmother and girlfriend dying within hours of each other in the midst of the football season—wonder whether this story isn’t just too good to be true.

As for the catfishers of the world, it is unethical and evil to play with the emotions of another person so crassly, so callously, as the catfisher in Te’o’s case allegedly played with his. Such people add to the world’s fund of cynicism and viciousness and unhappiness.

I don’t remember my Dante well enough to say in which circle it lies, but there is a special place in hell for such persons.

 

Don Wycliff Don Wycliff, a long time Chicago journalist and member of the Chicago Journalism Hall of Fame, has written extensively on ethics. He is newly appointed Board Member for the McCormick Foundation and has served as an Ethics Fellow for the Poynter Institute.

Chefs vs. Cell Phones

 

You’re on vacation, and you’ve just made it to that restaurant that you’ve heard so much about. You’ve anxiously awaited the well-known dish. It arrives, and all of your senses are enticed. The aroma is intoxicating, and it looks too good to eat. But before you dig in, do you pull out your phone and snap a quick picture of it? Do you change your status on Facebook or Twitter to something like, “Can’t wait to dig in to this! #delicious”?

It’s not a surprise if you answered “yes” to the above questions since, according to a Mobile Etiquette Survey for Intel Corp., one in five U.S. adults say they share something online while eating a meal. Ironically enough, that same survey also revealed that 81% of U.S. adults believe mobile manners are getting worse. And some chefs could not agree more.

Renowned Chef Grant Achatz, known for his molecular gastronomy at Chicago’s Alinea, says he cringes a bit when he sees diners that “snap the meal away," and he understands why celebrities “punch the paparazzi out when they get the chance.”

Michael Roux Jr., chef at Le Gavroche in Mayfair, London is on the same page as Achatz and says while it’s flattering, he finds it annoying.

“It’s disruptive for the people around them, and it spoils that person’s enjoyment of the meal,” Roux said.

Daniel Galmiche, of Vineyard restaurant in Berkshire, agrees. “Dining in a restaurant used to be a special, intimate experience, but that’s been lost somewhere along the way,” he said.

No cell phones, please

Many chefs have expressed that they are sick of the constant phone use during a dining experience. Chefs work hard to create a certain atmosphere and meal for their guests, and tweeting photos takes away from it.

This is exactly why RJ Cooper, owner of Rogue 24 in Washington D.C. has decided to ban cell phones and cameras from his restaurant.

“If everyone brings out their phones, it distracts from the experience,” Cooper said.

Chef Martin Burge from the two Michelin-starred Dining Room at Whatley Manor has also banned cameras after his patience with them finally broke when other customers started complaining.

“I couldn’t believe it when one diner got out an SLR camera, put the flash on and started taking pictures of the dishes from every angle. It was astonishingly brash,” Burge said.

And it isn’t just the picture taking that infuriates chefs and aggravates other diners, it’s the tweeting, the checking in at Four Square, the status updates on Facebook and so on. So much so that Graham Elliot, Master Chef Judge and owner at many popular Chicago dining establishments, kicked out food journalist Steve Dolinskyduring a meal at his restaurant, G.E.B. last April. Despite Dolinsky being a James Beard award-winning food writer and ABC 7 Chicago’s Hungry Hound, Elliot would not allow him tweeting during his meal.

“When he ate at Charlie Trotter’s and live tweeted through the whole meal how shitty it was, to me that’s so egregiously over the line that I absolutely will not have someone like that at my establishment,” Elliot told Eater when the news broke.

Between the tweets, the photos and even the phone conversations, it finally prompted Julie Liberty of Miami to create the Facebook page, “Ban Cell Phones From Restaurants” in February 2012.

“I myself would be embarrassed to take pictures of my food, but then, I’m also too embarrassed to have personal conversations in a public place on my cell,” Liberty said. “It seems like good manners got left behind with the old fashioned land line.”

A picture’s worth a thousand words

While a cell phone might ruffle some chef’s feathers, they can’t deny its link to business. More than 90 percent of smart phone users search for restaurants with their phones, and 70 percent say it’s important for restaurant menus to be mobile friendly.

Food blogger and photographer Bonjwing Lee’s professional life revolves around taking photos in restaurants. Lee was inspired to start taking photos of his food because of its beauty, creativity and artistic flare.

“I just wanted to remember what I ate,” Lee said.

And 30,000 photos later, Lee has documented what he’s eaten for years, some of which at the most renowned, sought-after restaurants in the world. Not only for himself, but he says these photos on his blog, the ulterior epicure, are a resource and an inspiration for chefs around the world that can’t get to these restaurant themselves.

Lee believes a lot of the reasoning is foolish as to why chefs won’t allow photos since it only takes a few seconds.

“I want to take a memory with me. If you won’t let me, I won’t go,” Lee said.

Lee, like many other diners, would simply not go to a restaurant that didn’t allow it. Photojournalist Karen Kring feels it’s not generous or hospitable to ban cell phones.

“Only a rare restaurant could pull off a cell cam ban without alienating patrons,” Kring said.

Besides feeling that it takes away from the meal and is distracting to other diners, chefs feel that these photos could be a misrepresentation of their food and even using their image without their consent. They want their food to be captured in the best way possible. But Kring says that is just the way it is.

“When creatives – chefs, artists – release our work to our patrons, into the world, it is out of our hands. It’s the nature of the beast,” Kring said.

Chef Sarabeth Levine of Sarabeth’s in New York City is part of the group of chefs that welcome pictures and feels the tweets and photos being posted is essentially free advertising. Tom Kitchin, of The Kitchin in Leith, appreciates the feedback.

“People are engaging more with food and that can never be a bad thing,” Kitchin said.

Taking photos and blogging about restaurants is how Eric Isaac helps small businesses that may have not otherwise been recognized and shares his experiences with others. The professional photography posts beautiful photos of his meals on his award-winning food blog, Snapfood.

“I’m not so great with words so most of my blog posts are succinct but filled with photographs,” Isaac said.

These photos are the way he tells the story and are essential to his blog.

“One can only describe a dish so much”, he said.

The consensus among food photographers and blogger is if you’re going to take a photo of your food, tweet, check-in, change your status, or one of the other plethora of reasons why people use it, be respectful. Bonjwing Lee says he is careful to make sure no other patrons or wait staff is in the photo, and he does it quickly. People standing on chairs to get the best shot, setting up tripods and constant shuttering are just a few of the things he’s witnessed while taking his own photos. Not using a flash, asking those you are dining with for permission and using discretion are a few things to keep in mind.

Eric Isaac’s advice is to remember why you’re there in the first place.

“At some point you just have to put down the phone and just enjoy the experience of being out to dinner, with real people, who are there with you at this moment.”

Kristen Kuchar is author of Mac n’ Cheese to the Rescue and writes about food, beer and culinary travel for a variety of publications.

 

Cyber-shills and the problem with authenticity

 

We are a culture hooked on the idea of authenticity. This is nothing new, but the Internet has altered the way we measure and define authenticity. But an obsession with equating crowd approval with dependability impacts the way we choose where to shop, what brands to favor, and any host of other consumer decisions.

This reliance on the opinions of digital others, of avatars we’ve never met, puts us in a fragile position. Since a basic Google search will reveal mistakes and misrepresentations, we assume that people are being honest because they can so easily be found out. If you say you did something or went somewhere, your credentials are often double-checked on the Internet. So in that way your physical self requires backup verification from the Internet. Yet the Internet allows for massive amounts of manipulation. When people primarily interact through digital avatars, it allows the kind of identity jujitsu shown on MTV’s “Catfish,” which examines what happens when people to pretend to be something that they aren’t online.

Baz Lurhmann’s “The Great Gatsby” film adaptation arrived in theaters this spring, and Lurhmann’s version is set in a Day-Glo approximation of Fitzgerald’s 1920s. But transpose Gatsby’s setting to today, and he wouldn’t make his fortune schlepping bootlegged alcohol from drugstore counters. Now, Gatsby might be a malevolent hacker, a denizen of the dark side of the Internet, siphoning money from dubious schemes that include cyber-shilling operations. Gatsby mutated his personality and backstory with the tools at his disposal – imagine what he would have done with the Internet.

When Fitzgerald wrote “a new world, material without being real, where poor ghosts, breathing dreams like air, drifted fortuitously about,” he could’ve been talking about the shady climate of cyber-shilling businesses. Where recommendations and affirmative content drift into existence after the poor ghosts of Late Capitalism churn whatever they’re being paid to say onto websites.

And what is cyber-shilling? It’s the act of endorsing a product for money, regardless of quality. It’s the digital snake oil business. And it’s booming.

We look online to validate our choices now, seeking comfort in the wisdom of crowdsurfed opinion. But businesses are taking advantage of the obsession with following the wisdom of the crowd and creating their own false crowds to follow. And with the rise of review-centric consumer sites and social media, businesses now have a robust array of platforms onto which they can disseminate endorsements they paid for without making it obvious that the positive reviews are planted.

Cyber-shills: the new century’s snake oil peddlers

Sifting through dung to find well-researched, authentic information is often difficult for consumers. Online shoppers often confront how difficult it is to verify honest reviews and endorsements. Even expertly written testimonials cloaked in thorough facades of legitimacy can be empty shills, typed from the dank rooms of cash-strapped freelancers. These false endorsements are very different than obvious spam, which is still a problem that websites must endure – the type of spam that promises thousands of dollars a day working from home, that type of thing – because deceptive shills expertly simulate authenticity and confound consumers.

Buying reviews is big business, since people want to check out products that others have already given a stamp of approval. And if you can’t get that stamp organically, it’s smart business to put it on there yourself. Bing Lui, a data-mining expert at the University of Illinois-Chicago, told the New York Times that many five-star reviews are created, and he estimated that one-third of consumer reviews you see online are fraudulent.

The Guardian investigated the scourge of fake reviews and uncovered “almost an industrial scale” to the shilling business. Websites like Freelancer.com provide a marketplace where organizations that want fake reviews written pick from eager bidders. The Guardian spoke to a prolific shill from Bangladesh who says he gets approached by numerous western companies, and has so much work he subcontracts it out to other workers in Bangladesh and India.

The proliferation of paid endorsements tarnishes crowd review sites like Yelp and diminishes potential for trustworthy consumer advice online, even from individuals whose connections to the products they endorse are not immediately apparent.

False endorsements extend far beyond a few written reviews – some companies apply a sort of “scorched earth” campaign to boost their digital profile. Researchers at UC Santa Barbara looked at the practice of “crowd-turfing,” a portmanteau between crowd-sourcing and astro-turfing that describes how some companies employ shills to blanket certain corners of the Internet with positive content about their products. The researchers examined how fake endorsements occurred on the popular Chinese social network Sina Weibo, which most closely resembles Twitter in setup. There are three main ways to spam Weibo: sending users instant messages, sending a tweet-style status update, or posting to a message forum. And while sending an instant message seems more blatantly spammy than anything else, the other two types of behavior can be passed off as genuine enthusiasm for a product.

What the researchers found underscores how rampant and insidious this shilling behavior is online – and many companies with shills on U.S. sites employ an international workforce comprised of low-paid workers.

Cyber-shills have infiltrated many different platforms for consumer-based reviews, including social media. The practice is prevalent on Twitter, and even Twitter users without particularly robust follower counts can sign up to promote products they’ve never used for a price. Celebrity endorsements wield even higher profits for the famous, and though tweets trumping the benefits of certain products may seem more meretricious than truly valuable, organizations keep springing up to provide connections between willing shills and businesses with products that need at least a veneer of crowd support.

Stopping Cyber Shills

Cyber-shilling is an unsavory practice, but it’s not a huge ethical departure for advertising and marketing culture. It’s an extension of the desire to jump on the zeitgeist and sugarcoat attempts to imbue products with an aura of grassroots support – and when that support isn’t present, it’s invented.

The FTC is taking note of how easy it is to plant endorsements, and have updated their guidelines to prevent this type of behavior. The updated guidelines stress the importance of disclosure and include a section focusing on paid celebrity endorsements on social media like Twitter. But these guidelines are not always followed, particularly by celebrities paid to promote products.

A group of researchers at Cornell published a study that rooted out what they call “opinion spam” – another term for fictitious reviews planted to boost digital standing. They developed a classifier to detect deceptive opinion spam that was 90 percent accurate, according to their work. The average consumer is unlikely to take the time to apply their findings – which outed many reviews on popular sites like TripAdvisor as the work of shills – the fact that people are developing ways to detect the problem means websites like TripAdvisor may have the tools they need to substantially reduce the problem.

Preying on people who hold the naive idea that social media connotes authenticity is certainly not an honest practice, but other practices are equally worthy of scrutiny. After all, U.S. courts will prosecute you for paying for fake reviews, and sites like Yelp and Amazon penalize users they suspect of hiring or being shills. Yelp even publicly “named and shamed” certain businesses soliciting false positive reviews.

However, despite efforts to curb the practice, it’s not going anywhere. One glance at popular services marketplace Fiverr illustrates how open people are about their desire to shill. “I will create a video testimony positively reviewing your business, website, or product for $5” reads one ad currently gracing the website’s front page – from one of the website’s top sellers. And her comment list reveals over 600 pleased clients.

What does the next generation of cyber-shills look like?

The most problematic element of cyber-shilling is how effectively shills disguise themselves as “real” opinions. The individuals who solicit fake reviewing gigs on sites like Fiverr are especially valuable because they take pains to make their shilling look authentic – they appear far more trustworthy than spambots, and have real photos and the ability to elaborate on products in an authentic-sounding way.

However, less thoroughly deceptive forms of shilling can also blur the lines between content and advertisements online in a way that harms consumers and netizens.

For instance, although many people understand how targeted ads work, it’s not fair to assume that everyone who uses sites like Facebook understand that the ads they’re seeing aren’t random. The banner ads on Facebook are targeted, but there’s no blatant notice that that is the case. Obviously, the potential deception that an ad just randomly appeared is less egregious than the lie of a review that appears genuine but is actually a shill, but the practice of targeting ads still reeks of manipulation.

Another common online marketing tool online that’s not quite as sneaky as straight-up shilling but often blurs the line between appropriate advertising and unscrupulous tactic is the advertorial. Many advertisers pay for sponsored content on websites, which is fine – as long as an article is clearly marked as affiliated with a company, there’s no reason why that company can’t pay to put up a content-based advertisement. But some advertorials are disguised too well under the veneer of an editorial. And with recent updates to Facebook that make visual content more prominent, advertisements are becoming a more organic-looking element to the website, which makes it harder to tell if what you’re looking at is a picture from a friend or from an organization you follow, or if it is a targeted ad.

While individuals can profit from work as shills for businesses and organizations, people can also employ devious tactics to build their personal brands. While most people do not have the resources or inclination to pay others to write about them positively online, there’s a cottage industry of service cropping up to amplify perceived social influence. These services offer opportunities to purchase more Twitter followers and Instagram followers – an example of how individuals also attempt to circumvent organic loyalty-building to quickly establish a positive online reputation. Sometimes people use services that bulk up their followers with bots, but other sites have a cadre of people who are willing to follow you for a price. Either way, it’s a problematic method of obtaining heightened Twitter legitimacy because it erodes the value of having many Twitter followers in the first place – if you can simply buy them, then they’re not valuable for social capital.

The original form of cyber-shilling – writing fake reviews – is just the beginning when it comes to unscrupulous marketing behavior online. While the scourge of fake ads continues to be a problem, the rise of social media as a forum for paid endorsements and the concurrent growth of social media as a platform for integrated ad content also threaten to undermine the aura of authenticity we ascribe these mediums. This type of behavior is not likely to go away anytime soon unless major changes are made to existing laws or people become much less gullible.

 

Kate Knibbs Kate Knibbs is a writer and web culture journalist from the southwest side of Chicago. She probably spends too much time on the Internet.

Cyberloafing, BYOD, and the ethics of using technology devices at work

 

Employer policies regarding personal use of employer-owned phones and computers aren’t all flexible enough to apply to employee-owned phones and other Internet-connected devices. Usage of employee-owned devices at work raises ethical issues, regardless of employer policies.

Until recently, employers were able to use filtering software to block websites that might be offensive (e.g. pornography), as well as those that few employees would have a legitimate need to use for business (e.g. eBay). That practice no longer has the ability to help employees focus if employees can use their own devices to circumvent it.

One of the latest workplace fads is called BYOD (“bring your own device”). This worker-initiated movement is despised by IT departments because it presents security and support problems. Yet, managers at many companies embrace the BYOD movement because it reduces costs and increases productivity and employee satisfaction, according to a survey by ISACA (formerly known as the Information Systems Audit and Control Association).

Good Technology’s “State of BYOD Report” shows that about half of employers pay a partial subsidy for employee-owned hardware and/or service, but still pay less than they would by issuing devices to employees and paying the full service cost. A Forrester study confirms that, “More than half of US information workers pay for their smartphones and monthly plans, and three quarters pick the smartphone they want rather than accept IT’s choice.”

Employees gain productivity by using familiar operating systems on their phones, tablets or laptops. Their devices are often customized for their convenience and they already know how to use them.

The BYOD trend is not limited to the private sector. Government Technology magazine reports that state governments are experimenting with it too.

Personal devices and the illusion of privacy

In a typical cubicle environment, employees have little privacy. Their phone conversations are easily overheard and they can’t see the cubicle openings while they face a monitor. According to the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, employers have a legal right to monitor an employee’s Internet and email usage. Telephone call monitoring is often legal, and cell phone calls and texts may be monitored when using company-issued equipment.

Employees who are allowed to use their own devices appear to have privacy. They can send and receive personal messages and look for other jobs while they appear to be working. However, while analyzing a case in California, CNN senior legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin said that if an employer pays any portion of the cost of the phone or service, employee texts can be viewed by employers. The best employee handbooks directly address this issue. Good Technology’s report says that 77 percent of employers modified their policies to accommodate BYOD, while the rest believed that their policies already covered it.

The ethical questions

Is making calls or sending text messages from your cell phone at work wrong? Is using your own wireless device to shop or check the performances of the players on your fantasy football team ethical? If these types of activities aren’t wrong, when are you abusing the privilege?

Employers with the most rigid policies allow taking and making personal phone calls in emergency situations. Employers with the most liberal policies prohibit viewing pornography or engaging in any behavior or activity that could be interpreted as sexual harassment. Inoffensive non-work-related usage of technology devices can be divided into two categories: personal business and play, also called “cyberloafing.”

Most employers understand the need for salaried employees to conduct a limited amount of personal business on work time, especially tasks that can only be accomplished during business hours. Banking online, making a dentist appointment and perhaps shopping for Christmas presents could be considered personal business. Watching funny cat videos, browsing Facebook and playing Free Cell are examples of cyberloafing.

Without rationalization, professionals who conduct essential personal business at work and offset that time by working extra hours, taking business calls during non-working hours or answering e-mails and text messages on their own time are behaving ethically. However, that applies only if the employer sanctions the behavior. Cyberloafing presents a greater ethical challenge.

The scope of cyberloafing and BYOD

Salary.com conducts an annual survey that collects employment-related data. The 2012 survey found that 64 percent of employees use the Internet daily for non-work-related reasons. A little more than half of workers admitted to at least two hours per week of personal usage.

Many employees admit to shopping online from work. Half of the workers surveyed by Harris Interactive for CareerBuilder.com said they would shop for Christmas presents online during the just-completed season. The ISACA 2012 IT Risk/Reward Barometer revealed that employees using BYOD products spent 12 hours shopping online, while those with employer-provided hardware only spent nine hours.

Robert Half Technology studied the other side of the same coin and found that two-thirds of employers allow at least some amount of online shopping, while the other third specifically blocks e-commerce sites.

A Nielsen/NetRatings report in 2004 revealed that 92% of online stock trading was done at work. A 2005 survey by America Online and Salary.com, found that employees admitted to spending an average of more than 25 percent of their paid hours engaged in non-work activity. Personal use of the Internet was cited by almost half of respondents. Many of the other personal activities were also enabled by technology.

These and other studies show that the youngest employees are most likely to use their own devices at work and to practice cyberloafing. For instance, Nielsen’s Social Media Report 2012 says that more than half of people in the 25-34 age bracket use social media in the office.

Some studies show that moderate amounts of cyberloafing improve productivity. Employers with permissive policies cite those as a partial explanation for those policies. Other studies say cyberloafing costs American businesses, with an older study pegging the figure at $759 billion per year.

Why cyberloafing occurs

Several studies have analyzed cyberloafing and other forms of slacking. Vivien Lim, a professor at the National University of Singapore, is a veteran researcher of the practice. One of her studies concludes that cyberloafing is a form of revenge by employees who feel mistreated.

Dr. Jerald Greenberg, a professor, has devoted much of his career to studying organizational ethics and justice. In one of his studies, he examined employee theft rates at manufacturing plants where workers suffered through a temporary pay cut. Theft increased significantly during the period of reduced pay.

Half of the workers polled for the Ethics Resource Center’s 2011 National Business Ethics Survey believed that doing less work to offset cuts in pay or benefits was ethically justifiable.

For his recent dissertation at the University of South Florida, Kevin Askew researched, “The Relationship between Cyberloafing and Task Performance and an Examination of the Theory of Planned Behavior as a Model of Cyberloafing.” He examined many previous studies and conducted his own. One of his findings is “cyberloafing on a cellphone – but not on a desktop – appears to be related to job dissatisfaction.” He also cited studies that show that lack of sleep reduces self-control.

Salary.com’s survey asked people why they engaged in play at work. Four of the answer choices each resonated with about a third of employees: insufficient challenge, long hours, lack of employer-provided incentive and general dissatisfaction. These factors caused almost half of those surveyed to admit to job-hunting from the workplace.

Addiction is also a factor in cyberloafing. Specific websites, games and favorite devices all have a compelling pull. I know a woman who half-seriously refers to her Android tablet as her husband. I observed her receiving and answering a question from her boss late on a Saturday evening.

Employer policies and strategies

1. Janice Lawrence, Director of the Business Ethics Program at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, suggests that the appropriate time for conducting personal business on employer time is during breaks. State laws that mandate paid break time vary in duration and timing. Lawrence advises, “The company needs to make these policies clear so that employees know the limits to such ‘free time’ or personal tasks and any limits to use of personal devices.” She also notes that materials the employer “finds repugnant or against its ethical codes,” such as child pornography, should never be visible in the workplace.

Comprehensive employer policies on Internet usage in the workplace are essential, according to ContentWatch CEO Russ Warner, business efficiency and performance consultant Andrew Jensen and the law firm, DLA Piper Jensen explains, “Coaching your employees on the appropriate use of technology at work tends to be very effective, and it eliminates the extreme resentment that often arises as the result of an employer enforcing a group discipline policy.”

ISACA found that almost half of employees were unaware of their employers’ policies. A conclusion in one the association’s reports is, “This environment points to a strong need for clear communication of organization policies as well as education around possible security precautions employees who BYOD can take.”

Organizations with mostly hourly paid employees generally have very different policies than those with mostly salaried employees. Vail Resorts and Masterson's Food & Drink, Inc., both in the hospitality industry; specifically ban using cell phones and entertainment devices while on the clock. Outside Unlimited, a landscaping company, explicitly limits cell phone and Internet use to company business. The company informs its workers that it has the right to monitor their usage. Its handbook states, “Personal cell phones are prohibited from use except during your lunch break.”

Shannon Reising, a human resources supervisor at Ann’s House of Nuts manufacturing facility in North Carolina, takes a cut-and-dried approach, which seems appropriate for a company that makes trail mix. A few managers and executives at Ann’s House carry cellular phones, but those are partly subsidized by the company and are subject to company policy. Reising says, “Employees are allowed to use their personal tech devices during company-sponsored breaks and meal periods. Employees who use devices that connect to the Internet, whether by a hard line or wirelessly cannot use our Internet access. Period.” She asserts, “Anyone caught on my floor with a personal technological device (except for as discussed above) will be terminated immediately.”

Reising stresses the importance of having and communicating policy. Ann’s House has clear and specific policies. Reising demands 40 hours of work for 40 hours of pay, a practice that would be hard to dispute as ethical and fair. Even though Reising considers her comments to be work-related, she practiced the highest ethical standards by making them after business hours.

Companies with mostly salaried employees are much more liberal in allowing personal use of technology. Kenexa, a human resources consulting firm owned by IBM, embraces it. Kenexa CEO Rudy Karsan is at the opposite extreme of Shannon Reising. He encourages cyberloafing. He was quoted in an article, “We're really blending our lives together with work. I applaud it and hope we never lose that.”

I think the reason many employers allow cyberloafing is self-interest. Employers have much to gain by blurring the distinction between work and play.

A call for culture change

The cited studies and surveys show that cyberloafing is either allowed by employers or it is an offsetting behavior against perceived employer abuses. As the number of hours worked by employees is the core issue, the relevant form of abuse is pressuring employees into routinely working excessive hours. The work environment, dedication, ambition, unemployment rate and fear conspire to compel workers to comply. Increased productivity is the euphemism for this abuse, and it is a big contributor to the high unemployment rate in the U.S. Profitable businesses that maintain a corporate culture in which the average workweek is much more than 40 hours are behaving unethically.

Cyberloafing is a form of theft, which is also wrong, unless employees actually work 40 hours per week (or more) and the employer sanctions the activity. Employers that allow or encourage cyberloafing are trying to turn two wrongs into a right by creating a happier work place that masks their abuse.

 

John Henshell John Henshell is a freelance writer/editor/communications consultant who adds value to his clients’ words through adept use of diction, syntax, context, and images. He can be contacted at johnnhenshell@comcast.net.

Deceptive Entertainment: The Ethics of Video Manipulation in the Online Arena

 

In his 1896 book "In the South Seas", Robert Louis Stevenson famously concluded that, “The picture of an event (on the old melodramatic principle that ‘the camera cannot lie, Joseph,’) would appear strong proof of its occurrence.” I wonder what Mr. Stevenson would make of the dancing Pepsi Next baby or the pronouncements of the E*TRADE stock-selling wunderkind.

In the last decade there has been a proliferation of images that can no longer be called approximations of actual events. Over the years, providers of visual media have struggled to earn the public’s trust and endow visual images with credibility. In today’s atmosphere of distorted video and slick computer animations, however, commercials and videos no longer need to caution “do not try this at home” because today’s audiences could never hope to re-create the physical world that digital technology offers up. Modern consumers are regularly bombarded with images that stretch the fabric of reality to the breaking point. Companies are eagerly lined up to channel new digital technologies that alter images to provide maximum excitement, increased entertainment value and higher impact.

But should they be?

There are many ways in which a corporation or individual can alter video: by adding or subtracting content; through the composition of several images into one; by depiction of events with audio or video that are created artificially; and through animations. Modern digital video producers have added another component to their well-stocked bag of tricks — the creation of video that appears amateur, but is really a well-thought-out commercial endeavor aimed at convincing consumers they are viewing a production of their peers.

While the Radio Television Digital News Association’s (RTDNA) Code of Ethics clearly states, “Professional electronic journalists should not manipulate images or sounds in any way that is misleading,” the Advertising Self-Regulatory Council (ASRC) doesn’t have a similar guideline. Should it? Should online advertisers be held to the same ethical standards as electronic journalists or can today’s production companies consider the sky the limit under the guise that advertising is an artistic endeavor?

An example of professionals posing as amateur, grass-roots consumers can be found in the grainy, home-shot look of a popular YouTube video, “Bike Hero,” that featured the popular “Guitar Hero” video game played with a BMX bike. The video was allegedly posted by “Kevin” from the demographically average town of Fort Wayne, Ind., complete with a comment from the poster that exclaimed, “Can’t believe how many times it took to make this work, but it was a lot!” While that statement may have been true in the technical sense, as no professional video is ever shot straight through on the first try, it leads you to believe that Kevin and his friends (called the Brierwood Vandals in the post) really struggled to create their homemade clip — that it was a true labor of love. In actuality, the piece was shot by the professional production team Droga5 in North Hollywood. When the video was discovered to be the brainchild of media giant Activision, the chief creative officer, Brad Jakeman, was queried about the deceptive nature of the clip. He was confident — arrogant even — in his response, saying, “It’s not meant to be deceptive. It’s meant to be fun.” He further argued that he and his team expected people to figure out that it was something “in the marketing realm” and that, in itself, would generate conversation. He was correct. The “Bike Hero” clip was the fifth most watched YouTube video in 2008.

In another work of corporate viral marketing, the “Amazing Ball Girl Catch” video appears to be a newsreel clip shot during a Triple-A baseball game between the Tacoma Rainiers and the Fresno Grizzlies. It captures the incredible catch of a foul drive by a ball girl who scales the outfield wall in spectacular, super-hero-like form to catch the ball.

This video was released to YouTube and garnered millions of views in an incredibly short time. While it seems like an authentic video news clip, it is, in fact, a commercial for the sports drink giant, Gatorade. If you look closely, you can see a bottle of the drink near the ball girl’s chair when she sits after the catch.

Purportedly, Gatorade sought out the advertising agency Element 79 to produce the clip and then shelved it, along with its relationship with the agency, shortly thereafter. They adamantly claim they never intended to use the video, yet somehow the clip was “leaked” to YouTube. Gatorade representative Jill Kinney remarks, “We were not planning to release the ball girl video, however, now that it’s out there, we’re thrilled with the response it’s getting.” Gatorade and Element 79 both deny having knowledge of who posted the clip. 

The best part of the deal for Gatorade is the fact that they reaped double exposure from this “oops” moment: once when the clip first emerged and wowed viewers with its amazing content and again when people discovered the ruse and online conversation that ensued across social media channels. Sounds less like a mistake and more like a savvy marketing move, doesn’t it?

Companies hiding their credentials behind faux user-generated content are trying to capture the momentum being spawned by companies like Frito-Layand Chevrolet as they adopt true amateur content for their big television spots such as Super Bowl commercials. The strategy of using crowdsourced advertising comes in response to consumers’ affinity for products and services that they have been introduced to by word of mouth. Rated as the number one reason for buying a product in 20 to 50 percent of all purchases, word of mouth is a powerful marketing tool. Interestingly, the second most important factor in determining whether a consumer will make a purchase based on a word-of-mouth recommendation is the identity of the message sender. It must be a trusted source — ideally a user of the product or service. This is why the “Bike Hero” fake amateur video is so seductive. Players of “Guitar Hero” and similar games would definitely find trust in the “recommendation” of what appears to be an average guy enamored of the game enough to spend time making a video about it.

 Joseph Turow, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s Annenberg School for Communication correctly points out that it is not easy to separate amateur from professional work. “Someone posting on message boards or blogs may be representing a company. Is that an amateur?” The answer is no. The problem is the same one posed by “Bike Hero,” “Amazing Ball Catch Girl” and similar videos: transparency. 

So who benefits from this kind of deception? In an article titled, “You Didn’t Make the Harlem Shake Go Viral — Corporations Did,” MIT engineer and energy tech company owner Kevin Ashton shows how companies cashed in on “free” advertising based on the meme “the Harlem Shake” that went viral when some teenagers released their version of Albert Boyce’s drunken dance at Harlem’s Rucker Park basketball court. As the craze for Harlem Shake videos exploded, many of the imitations were not created by enterprising youths looking to express their creativity, but rather large enterprises like advertising agencies, the Miami Heat and Sports Illustrated. One of the most successful Harlem Shake knock-offs featured Time Warner-owned Maker Studios staff. Their promotion of the video through YouTube and Twitter channels led to record label owners, deejays and others further promoting it across social media. Who was the ultimate winner in this cascading marketing ploy? Google, of course, whose increasing YouTube views and ad revenue helped make investors like Fidelity, T. Rowe Price and JPMorgan Chase happy enough to want to do the Harlem Shake.

All of this visual sleight-of-hand smacks of a new kind of astroturfing. Astroturfing, for the uninitiated, is an insidious, relatively recent practice that gives a message the appearance of coming from a disinterested party when it is, in fact, created by an entity that is very much interested in the message’s reach: an advertiser, a corporation or even a political party. While the FTC requires the endorsements of reviewers or bloggers that create such messages in return for payment (either monetary or in-kind) to be disclosed, there is no disclosure yet required on adverts that merely give the appearance of being consumer-created.

Besides capitalizing on consumers’ attraction to home-grown video, savvy video marketers are busy creating advantages in other ways. Among notable emerging trends in video in the 21st century is the ability to more rapidly “engage, educate and entertain” for the purpose of selling an idea or product. To many, this means an increase in digital manipulation to the point of fantastical proportions, like that seen in the Pepsi Next and E*TRADE commercials.

So what’s the problem with a few talking babies? It depends on what the producer is trying to achieve through manipulation. If they’re just trying to enhance the creative nature of the video or amp up the entertainment value, then perhaps a little digital enhancement is not such a bad thing. After all, everyone knows the E*TRADE babies aren’t really discussing the finer points of stock trading. However, if a company sets out to portray a video as a truthful depiction of an event but uses manipulated images to “fool” the public, then there is a deeper, less ethical overtone.

Video holds special credibility with audiences, since it is recorded in real time and not just heard or photographed. Since the Christian Holy Bible first chronicled the parable of Doubting Thomas, we’ve lived by the mantra “Seeing is believing.” So do audiences really believe that the 8-month-old Pepsi baby is blissing out on an electric guitar? Probably not. The real issue is that digital technology allows advertisers to craft scenes that would be impossible to create in the real world. This technique extends beyond the realm of absurdly hyper-talented toddlers in ways that make the incredible, credible. Constant exposure to over-the-top scenes in some way dilutes our ability to perceive real from faux, and keeps us from skepticism in cases in which video producers are trying to deliberately mislead us.

Take J. Lo’s trip back to her humble Bronx beginnings in her commercial for the Fiat 500. While “Jenny from the Block” was filmed driving her subcompact Fiat around the streets of Los Angeles, a digital production studio was hired to make it seem like she was cruising through one of the poorest areas of New York City. Her voiceover purrs, “This is my world. This place inspires me. They may be just streets to you, but to me they’re a playground.” The New York street scenes J. Lo passes by have a gritty, down-to-earth vibe that fairly bursts with vibrant culture — an impression Fiat very much wants to convey. There’s the requisite boy drumming on overturned pails, some graffiti artists practicing their skills, casual hoops-playing and even some hip-hop and double-dutch jump rope moves thrown in for realism. The advertiser wants you to believe that with all her fame and fortune, Ms. Lopez still longs for, and returns to, the modest comforts of a lower-middle-class life. Sadly, the trip Fiat takes us on is a compilation of disparate scenes separated not just by socioeconomics, but miles and miles of countryside. Yet through the wonders of digital technology, Ms. Lopez didn’t have to leave the sunny streets of LA to convince us she’d returned to the Bronx for a little drive down Memory Lane. This distorted version dupes viewers into believing that Ms. Lopez risked her safety (or didn’t think it was unsafe) to return to her hometown that, in reality, is crime-ridden and less than idyllic. This little lie allowed the producer to associate the product, Fiat, with both success and humility at the same time — a powerful marketing mix.

And that’s all well and good — if only it were true.

Fiat owner Chrysler Group LLC acknowledged the undisclosed switch, but defended it by saying, "The commercial tells the story of how the simple elements of our upbringing can help explain who we are, where we’re going and serve as a source of inspiration to achieve our goals in life. One does not need to be in a specific location to be inspired or continue to be inspired.” While true, the entire premise of the Fiat commercial hinges on J. Lo’s implied love of her old neighborhood. A place which, as of this writing, she’s set foot in approximately one time since she shot to fame 26 years ago, and only after her phony commercial was exposed and vilified in the media.

Video producers, corporations and individuals should be held accountable for their productions. Transparency is the cornerstone to any truthful marketing campaign and the key to not only advertisers, but also media venues like Google, YouTube, Vine and Twitter being able to maintain a credible image with consumers. Entertaining videos can still achieve viral status even when they are released as part of a known marketing venture. After all, the popularity of the Super Bowl commercials confirms this every year.

A recent study tracking entertaining ads’ effectiveness on consumer buying habits showed, “Entertainment evoked before the consumer is aware of the brand being advertised slightly reduces purchase intent … Conversely, entertainment evoked after the consumer sees the brand increases purchase intent.” This strongly demonstrates that a little transparency of authorship might be a good thing for consumers and advertisers alike.

Ultimately, the ASRC should formulate regulations to define what constitutes truth-in-advertising for online video. Certainly, releasing professionally produced clips under the guise of amateur videos should not be considered ethical — lying never is. Online entities such as YouTube, Google and other social media should have strict guidelines and penalties for falsifying authorship and should work to encourage transparency across platforms. And while the Pepsi Next baby may just brighten your day (and get you to consider a Pepsi Next the next time you’re thirsty for soda), commercials like the J. Lo Fiat spot should be required to make full disclosure in a way similar to those commercials that post, in small print, “professional driver” when a suburban dad drives like Mario Andretti through the grocery store parking lot.

 

Nikki Williams Bestselling author based in Houston, Texas. She writes about fact and fiction and the realms between, and her nonfiction work appears in both online and print publications around the world. Follow her on Twitter @williamsbnikki or at gottabeewriting.com

Digital Disconnect: How Capitalism is Turning the Internet Against Democracy by Robert McChesney

 

Digital Disconnect: How Capitalism is Turning the Internet Against Democracy by Robert McChesney

The book under review offers persuasive political economic analysis of the Internet, and its complex (and ongoing) inter-relationship with capitalism and democracy in the United States. Placing his work under the rubric of political economy, McChesney charts a detailed analysis of the alliances and interplay between private/public institutions, policy and legislative debates, government, and media conglomerates that have shaped the evolving Internet architecture. In fact, McChesney’s main task in the book is to show the workings of the complex relationship of the Internet to actually existing capitalism, and how this relationship has far-reaching consequences for democracy.

The seven chapters in the book are detailed and tightly argued, and draw upon a range of policy as well as internal memos and documents from governmental, journalistic, and corporate sources to illustrate the intricate web of relations between and across the Internet, capitalism, and democracy. The writing draws upon several theoretical and popular publications on the Internet, capitalism, and democracy, and presents the arguments in simple and lucid language. The first chapter provides an overview of a range of writings on the Internet that can be grouped under two camps: celebrants and skeptics. According to McChesney, while both camps offer interesting perspectives on the Internet—the celebrants point to the emergence of the wired society a revolutionary development, the skeptics offer a contra view that suggests that digital media and the Internet is leading to increase in loneliness and social anomie—they ignore how really existing capitalism has come to define the horizon of social life. In short, McChesney indicates that both camps lack a political economy context that would help illuminate how the structures of the Internet are shaped by capitalism. What is needed, McChesney notes, is a critical examination of the notions like “free” markets that have become a sort of quasi-mythical metaphors in journalistic writing as well as scholarly literature. To this end, McChesney provides compelling arguments that urge that we consider capitalism as the third rail of Internet scholarship. 

The second and third chapters provide a powerful account of workings of political economy. McChesney presents substantial data to debunk the dominant argument that “free” markets as a panacea for the socio-economic inequities. The political economic analysis reveals how capitalism in the name of economic growth perpetuates economic inequality and social instability among the poor and lower middle class Americans, and that the digital revolution being shaped by capitalist interests does not reinvigorate democracy, rather usurped by corporations who seek to privatize social life. The sections on labor and inequality, monopoly, advertising, technology and growth, government and markets make persuasive arguments about commonsense assumptions that equating capitalism with democracy.

In chapter three, McChesney employs the political economy of communication (PEC) framework to examine how corporations dominate media, Internet, journalism, and commercial entertainment industries. It is here that McChesney offers a basic exposition of the PEC that enables a reader not familiar with the theoretical background to understand several key conceptual ideas that underpin the analytic framework. There is an interesting discussion on the foundation of journalism and broadcasting (partisan press, a public good, commercial endeavor) in United States that traces significant developments later appropriated by “markets” and commercial interests. Both chapters present key analytic arguments backed up by substantial data and history to illustrate the overarching argument of the book.

Chapters four and five explicate the relationship between capitalism and the Internet, and how the noncommercial beginning of the Internet and web was turned into commercial and privatized enterprise. McChesney maintains that his argument is against the capitalist development of the Internet, and not capitalism per se. Chapter four is a historical discussion of the origins of the Internet, the subsequent policy changes, rise of the Internet Service Providers from monopoly to cartels, rise of digital piracy, threats to free speech and privacy, etc. In chapter five, McChesney examines the monopoly of several Internet and telecommunication firms, their relationships with the military, U.S. government, and national security agencies, and the threats posed to individual liberty and democracy vis-à-vis discussions of Homeland Security, the Patriot Act, and the 2010 WikiLeaks.

In chapter six, McChesney discusses how the Internet and digital media has impacted the field of journalism by placing his overall arguments beyond the positive and negative binaries that seem to inform assessments of journalism. The PEC perspective is employed to examine the role of traditional and digital journalism (as a public good) in United States. Through a persuasive discussion of the digital forms of journalism spawned by the Internet, the encroachment of market and private interests on traditional journalism, McChesney notes that much of journalism on the Internet lacks original reporting; rather previously published information is repackaged as news. A few old media firms (New York Times) utilize the practices of digital journalism to produce original news reporting and analysis. According to McChesney, the capitalism-Internet nexus is a key feature that is driving online journalism business model. The online digital journalism models (Huffington Post) focus on entertainment, celebrities, and sex, even though their main task is to generate news content. These sites rely on volunteer labor, and aggregate content from other media. The author indicates that nonprofit activist groups like NGOs have become involved in online reporting that raises troubling questions about the boundaries of journalism. McChesney notes that although the recent initiatives by foundations to reinvigorate online journalism are commendable, they run the risk of diluting the integrity of journalism. McChesney argues that journalism is a public good and needs to be shielded from private and government interests. The author discusses some nonprofit forms of journalism in the United States (MinnPost, Voices of San Diego, ProPublica) that are producing original reporting and analyses. In closing, McChesney argues for a heterogeneous system of democratic journalism—public, community, and student media—that are based on nonprofit competition, and driven by a government subsidy system. The author proposes the concept of citizen news voucher, where “every American adult gets a $200 voucher she can use to donate money to any nonprofit news medium of her choice. She will indicate her choice on her tax return. If she does not file a tax return, a simple form will be available to use. She can split her $200 among several different qualifying nonprofit media. This program would be purely voluntary, like the tax reform check-offs for funding elections or protecting wildlife” (p. 212). The concluding chapter draws upon McChesney’s involvement in media reform, and situates his overall arguments of the book in terms of some concrete proposals for the policymaker as well as the general audience. He discusses his proposals at length and offers some compelling arguments (need for large public investments, net neutrality, and online privacy) for reinvigorating journalism as a public good in the age of the Internet.

 

Sanjay Asthana Middle Tennessee State University

Do Cloud Ethics Exist?

 

Cloud computing has been widely beneficial for sharing information and creating globally interconnected networks. It allows companies and consumers to access software and information that is stored remotely on a server, saving businesses the expense of having to install the software on every computer for every employee. While cloud computing has revolutionized the way in which global corporations operate, it has also jeopardized consumers’ digital privacy.

Let’s put it this way: if you have ever used a Google application like Google Docs or Google Sites, you’ve stored information via the cloud. That information is being housed in an off-site location on a remote server where users are able to access it from any internet-enabled device. Since that information is no longer solely accessible from your computer, it is likely able to be accessed by others. The problem lies in who could be accessing this information and what they are doing with it.

On Jan. 28, the Microsoft Innovation and Policy Center in Washington D.C. held a conference regarding the challenges of cloud computing in the digital age. Douglas Gansler, Maryland’s Attorney General, spoke at the event, and addressed the issue by announcing his new national digital privacy initiative, “Privacy in the Digital Age.” The initiative will create a specific unit within his office that will work to protect the privacy of online users.

“This is the biggest consumer protection issue of the 21^st century,” Gansler said. “To us, [the cloud] is very new as a problem … the technology is just so far ahead of the laws.”

Gansler, who is the current president of the National Association of Attorneys General, discussed the ways in which cloud computing gives companies access to consumers’ private information. For example, when consumers purchase items online and subsequently see advertisements for products similar to the one they purchased, that is a result of cloud companies selling consumer’s purchasing information.

Gansler questioned the ethics of cloud computing: “If these companies can look at my Gmail, how is that different than listening to my phone calls? It’s really not,” he said.

Gansler’s initiative will place digital privacy security groups in Attorneys General offices to ensure that cloud computing companies are following state and federal consumer protection laws. The initiative will also focus on geo-location tracking and cyberbullying. According to Gansler, the interdivisional privacy protection unit has reached out to Facebook in attempt to form a coalition that would enable the site to remove negative content— specifically cyber bullying—directed toward minors. Though Gansler understands that Internet companies will try to “hide behind the First Amendment,” and acknowledges that while certain “threats” are protected, he hopes that the proposed union with Facebook is successful.

Brendon Lynch, Microsoft’s Chief Privacy Officer, moderated a panel of experts who also spoke and answered questions regarding cloud computing at the conference as well.

Deborah Peel, M.D., the founder and chair of the Patient Privacy Rights Foundation, was the first on the panel to speak. She said, “We define privacy as the right to control your information as an individual. And with the cloud, that’s being taken away from us.”

Peel founded PPR in 2004 and it has been the leading advocate for consumer healthcare privacy ever since. She explained that while cloud computing has the potential to benefit the healthcare field, it has to be approached through an individual perspective rather than a corporate outlook.

“We think that decisions about privacy should be made by individuals, not by policy. We need to figure out how to do privacy in a meaningful way, with technology,” she said. “We have ethics in medicine, why can’t we have corporations and people be guided by ethics when the laws haven’t caught up?”

Urs Gasser, the executive director of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University, views transparency as the most prominent challenge for cloud computing. He raised questions regarding the consumers’ expectations of privacy, where data is being stored, what the technology is really doing with the data.

“How do we draft the appropriate laws and implements to safeguard cloud computing? In short, we don’t know enough about the cloud and privacy,” Gasser added.

Gasser used the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) as an example. FERPA is a federal law that grants students access to their education records and gives them some control over what is disclosed. However, since FERPA was written in 1974, without knowledge of the cloud, Gasser questions whether there should be new regulations as to how to follow the act.

Though Paul Ohm, a senior policy advisor for the Federal Trade Commission, is a proponent of the cloud, he still has concerns as to how companies are using consumer information. Specifically, he mentioned business models that collect consumer information now to sell for a profit in the future. “I would let your customers know at the outset if you’re going to monetize their data,” he warned.

Ohm also explained that since cloud computing has become so ubiquitous, all Internet users need to be aware of where they’re entering and storing their information.

“The efficiencies of the move to the cloud are hard to quarrel with,” Ohm said. “The inability to embrace the cloud or big data is a brand of dishonor, it means you’re not advancing.”

Ohm said that in order to embrace privacy, companies using cloud computing need to be held accountable to common rules and regulations that have repercussions. He explained that traditionally the people who were analyzing consumer data were universities and large companies who adhered to certain standards. Now, however, anyone with a computer can be a human researcher.

For Ohm, company cost reduction and advanced productivity are two reasons why he argues for the cloud, despite its apparent flaws. “If I had a magic wand and I could rework the Internet, I’d keep the cloud,” he said.

However, as for Gansler, he has a different outlook: “I wish we lived in a world that didn’t have all these computers,” he said, “it’d just be more simple.”

Though consumer privacy and protection laws haven’t yet caught up with the technology of the cloud, they are in the works. With initiatives like Gansler’s and with ongoing expert discussion, it is only a matter of time before privacy regulations are federally protected.

 

Emma Kantrowitz Emma Kantrowitz is a senior journalism major at the University of Maryland. She is currently an editorial assistant at the American Journalism Review and a reporting intern at the McClatchy Washington Bureau. She can be reached at kantroem@terpmail.umd.edu.

Do Not Track

 

Advertisers may be watching our every move on the Internet. And privacy advocates want it to stop.

Whatever we seek, buy, sell or click online is diligently tracked and used to accumulate huge databases reflecting our preferences, pastimes and proclivities for everything from books to clothing, to our general spending levels and specific buying habits.

Our random browsing is also tracked – the sites we visit, the games we may play, how much time per day we spend online.

With this information in hand, advertisers can target us with sales messages customized for maximum appeal. And if it doesn’t seem we're a good prospect – based on tracking data – for some service or product, those advertisers can exclude us from their solicitations, thereby saving their money, time and effort.

Currently, there are no "Do Not Track" laws on federal books. Nor is there a "Do Not Track" registry, similar to the "Do Not Call" registry established in 2008 by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act.

But privacy advocates are now at work attempting to persuade the U.S. government to enact legislation enabling Internet users to issue a legal and enforceable "Do Not Track" request to all the advertisers that continue to monitor consumer Internet use. Included among the most vigorous of privacy advocates -- activist and lobbying institutions -- are the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), the Electronic Privacy Information Center, and the Privacy Rights Clearing House.

Beyond issues of privacy are the constant and often-unpleasant bombardment of advertising targeted to specific consumer cohorts – pop-up ads on the Internet, direct mail ads in the mail and ads directed at smart phones and iPads.

Privacy advocates scored a major victory when Microsoft recently launched its new and widely used Internet Explorer 10 browser, which includes a “Do Not Track” default. The feature automatically sets up the anti-tracking request for users. Mozilla's Firefox browser already offers this feature.

Nevertheless, the anti-do not track battle continues. At least nine members of Congress oppose the Do Not Track trend. They sent a strongly-worded letter to the Federal Trade Commission challenging a global organization called the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) which is attempting to establish international agreements on do not track protocols.

The lawmakers claim that the do not track option to safeguard consumer privacy could impede "the flow of data at the heart of the Internet's success."

Other opponents of the do not track movement include the Direct Marketing Association (DMA), an industry organization representing advertisers who use the Internet to sell their goods and services.

"There is a strong concern that the W3C is not the right forum to be making this decision,” said Rachel Thomas, vice president of government affairs for the DMA. "The attempt to set policy is entirely outside their area of expertise," she said.

Joining the legislators and the DMA as allies against the do not track movement is the Association of National Advertisers (ANA). The organization represents the interests of some 450 companies with 10,000 or more brands that combined spend more than $250 billion in advertising and marketing.

A letter from the board of this 97-year-old organization to Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and two additional senior executives vigorously criticized the firm's decision to make do not track the default option on Internet Explorer 10. The do not track default denies computer users a choice, claims the ANA.

Among the companies complaining about the do not track option were Dell, I.B.M., Intel, Verizon, Visa and Wal-Mart.

Expanding on their anti-do not track argument, the letter from the ANA said, "Microsoft's action is wrong. The entire media ecosystem has condemned this action. In the face of this opposition and the reality of the harm that your actions could create, it is time to realign with the broader business community by providing choice through a default of 'off' on your browser's 'do not track' setting."

With Microsoft's do not track option in effect, as much as 43 percent of U.S. browsers will be excluded from data collection, the letter claimed.

However, Microsoft rejected advertisers' objections. The company's chief privacy officer, Brendon Lynch, said in an e-mail statement, "Consumers want and expect strong privacy protection to be built into Microsoft products and services."

Beyond the privacy issues involved in the do not track dispute are aspects of the so-called Internet barter system, which means Internet users allow advertisers to track their activity in return for free access to various sites. The ultimate resolution of the do not track dispute will impact the diversity of the Internet.

Under the current arrangement, Internet users who permit tracking, either deliberately or by default, allow the acquisition of information on the sites they visit. In return, websites can offer free availability of information (the Wiki sites, for example), access to music, games, as well as social networks such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, among the most frequently visited social media sites.

Sites that attract fewer viewers may nevertheless profit by this Internet barter system because of the specialized information they provide for highly-targeted ads.

Without this advertising, the Internet becomes "less diverse, less economically successful, and frankly less interesting," said Mike Zaneis, general counsel for the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB). The IAB consists of more than 500 major U.S. media and technology companies which sell 86 percent of online advertising. The IAB represents US based companies, many with global interests including the evaluation of recommendations made by the government or consumer advocacy groups.

Generally, privacy advocates seemed not to be persuaded by Mr. Zaneis' argument. The presence of third-party advertising and links on a website, they say, may be accumulating data that a website visitor may not want to have tracked.

"While many advertisers do support privacy, there is clearly a rogue element of advertising networks that wants to subvert the process. Or so it seems to me," said Jon D. Leibowitz, chairman of the FTC, and recipient of the anti- do not track letter sent by the nine legislators mentioned above.

The White House has also weighed in on the controversy. In February 2012, the Obama administration issued a request for legislation creating what was called a "privacy bill of rights." Proposed by the U.S. Department of Commerce, the call for the new law came after two previous years of study of privacy and online consumer data by the government agency.

Commerce Secretary John Bryson endorsed the idea as "an important step toward fostering a culture of trust and respect of privacy."

Under the proposed legislation, enforceable codes of conduct would be enacted into law, and consumers would be allowed to access their personal data, make corrections, and be assured that their data would be secure.

Consumer groups and privacy proponents fear that advertisers and Web firms may have too much influence on legislative debate in advance of a vote, persuading lawmakers to water down restraints or vote against the Do Not Track proposal.

Some industry leaders, including Yahoo, want to regulate themselves, rather than be monitored by government. But while some legislators may support industry self-regulation, others oppose it.

"Voluntary, self-regulatory efforts aren’t a substitute for laws that keep consumers information safe from prying eyes," said U.S. Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass).

One example of self-regulation is Google Chrome 23, which has installed a Do Not Track option on its latest version. But critics say it's not easy to implement. When consumers finally activate the Do Not Track choice, a prompt asserts that the user may still not be protected. Sites may continue to collect data on consumer Internet use, and while targeted advertising may stop, non-customized advertising would continue to be sent to the user.

As of now, no laws have been passed protecting consumer privacy on the Internet, and the debate on tracking continues.

Ultimately, the resolution of this issue will be market-driven. Consumers will decide if they prefer to keep their Internet activity private or allow it to be tracked by advertisers. But will users of Internet browsers with the Do Not Track default setting know that they can turn it off? Many will not, say advertisers.

 

Marc Davis Marc Davis is a veteran journalist and published novelist. His reporting and writing has been published in numerous print and online publications including AOL, The Chicago Tribune, Forbes Online Media, The Journal of the American Bar Association, and many others. His latest novel, Bottom Line, was published in 2013.

Is Big Business the Biggest Threat to Consumer Privacy?

 

The public generally blames obscure, faceless and nameless online hackers for breaching online accounts and distributing personal data. However, these small-time criminals are barely making a dent in the unauthorized access and dissemination of personal consumer information. The biggest threat to consumer privacy is not rogue hackers and seedy, scam artists, but legitimate companies on the Dow Jones, NASDAQ, and Standard & Poor’s indices.

From Internet providers to credit card companies, from banks to mortgage and insurance companies, Fortune 500 companies are collecting, buying, selling and sharing consumer information at a dizzying rate.

According to an article in the New York Times, Acxiom Corporation, a data broker in Little Rock, Ark., has the world’s largest database of information, tracking more than 500 million consumers worldwide. With 23,000 servers, it collects such consumer information as education level, age, sex, race, height and weight, in addition to marital and political status and buying habits.

Acxiom sells this information to a diverse list of clients, which include Toyota, Ford, Macy’s, Wells Fargo and E*Trade. And apparently, there’s money to be made in the selling of consumer information: The company reported sales of $1.13 billion in 2011.

And while Acxiom stands out for being the largest and most prosperous data broker, the company is far from being the only organization that profits from selling online consumer data. On December 18, 2012, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) issued orders to Acxiom and eight other data brokers (Corelogic, Datalogix, eBureau, ID Analytics, Intelius, Peekyou, Rapleaf and Recorded Future), asking them to provide information regarding how they collect and use consumer data, and the extent to which consumers have the option to view their own data or choose against having it sold.

However, the FTC only requested the information so that it could analyze the industry’s privacy practices and make recommendations. That’s the limit of the Commission’s powers, as the FTC states, “There are no current laws requiring data brokers to maintain the privacy of consumer data unless they use that data for credit, employment, insurance, housing or other similar purposes.”

And while data brokers like Acxiom can presumably skirt the law since their data collection does not meet the stipulations for legal prosecution, some companies have actually violated specific parts of the law and have been prosecuted for their actions.

In October 2012, Equifax, one of the largest credit reporting agencies in the country, paid $1.6 million to settle a case brought by the FTC. Between 2008 and 2010, Equifax sold 17,000 prescreened lists of consumers who were late on their mortgage payments to third-party companies. Those third-party companies then marketed loan modification and debt relief services to these consumers. One of the companies, Direct Lending Source, resold the data to fraudulent companies that secured large upfront fees for loans that were never modified.

But Equifax was not alone. Last year, the FTC also went after the two biggest Internet juggernauts. In August 2012, Google agreed to pay $22.5 million, the largest FTC fine in history, and the first ever fine for violating its Internet privacy order. Google bypassed or overrode the privacy settings on Apple’s Safari browser on iPhones and iPads. As a result, even if users blocked tracking features, Google’s cookies– small files stored on the computer that allow the company to keep a record of browsing history - allowed the company to monitor their movements without their knowledge and against their consent.

The same week, the FTC reached a settlement with Facebook. Although no fine was levied, the company agreed to 20 years of FTC privacy audits in response to charges that it promised its users privacy, then allowed their data to be used and shared without their permission. In this instance, the FTC could not impose a fine because it was making an agreement; the Commission can only fine companies for breaking agreements. Facebook also agreed to give consumers “clear and prominent notice” and to “obtain their express consent before sharing information beyond their privacy settings.”

Facebook’s notoriously deceptive privacy issues led Scholars and Rogues, an unconventional political blog, to crown the company “the most congenitally dishonest company in America.” This title is based, in part, on the fact that whenever the company adds new features – which is quite often – the settings change; and in particular, the privacy settings default to allowed status. In addition, all Facebook users are automatically assigned a Facebook email account, and frequently the user’s preferred address is hidden and replaced with the Facebook email address.

But even if consumers close their Facebook accounts and vow to never perform another Google search, they’re not taking significant steps to protect their privacy – unless they keep their money hidden in a mattress and pay cash for all of their transactions. Otherwise, they’re subject to banks and credit card companies that also collect and sell personal data. Wells Fargo, Citi and Discover are just three of the financial institutions poised to share almost a billion dollars this year by selling consumer shopping data.

Banks compile customer information – where they shop, what they buy, and how much they spend – and then send targeted “deals” from retailers to the consumers who fit the retailer’s profile. According to CNN, if the consumer decides to cash in on the deal, the issuing bank can receive 10 percent to 15 percent of the purchase price of the product.

In most of these instances, there are no legal implications. But what are the ethical issues of major companies collecting and selling consumer information for profit, especially since it is usually done without the consumer’s knowledge or consent?

There are obvious privacy and security issues, since this information can include everything from names, addressees and phone numbers to credit card numbers and other financial information.

Do companies have an ethical obligation to protect the sensitive data of their clients and customers? In the case of Equifax, shouldn’t the company at least investigate the organizations that they are selling data to? And shouldn’t consumers have the right to decline having their information sold?

While almost most companies provide some sort of privacy policy, it’s usually a long and convoluted document full of legalese. Recently, Capital One sent an email informing their customers that they could opt out of the company’s marketing efforts. Although the notification came electronically, cardholders could only opt out by placing a phone call to the company. The customer service rep at Capital One stated that cardholders could choose to opt out of third-party advertisements, but they could not choose to opt out of Capital One’s targeted marketing, since it is a part of the cardholder agreement.

Some people may consider Internet tracking and targeted marketing harmless. But Beth Given, in her article, Internet Privacy: A Contradiction in Terms?, lists several potentially detrimental scenarios, including targeting economically distressed people with payday loans, children who lack the mature judgment of (most) adults, marketing bogus cures to those with serious medication problems, and engaging in discriminatory marketing. Discriminatory pricing means that some consumers are offered products and services at higher prices than others.

Echoing the last sentiment, Congressman Edward Markey of Massachusetts, co-chairman of the House Bipartisan Congressional Privacy Caucus, is also concerned that consumers may be categorized as desirable or undesirable without their informed consent. He has also expressed concern over the vulnerability of children being tracked and targeted.

Perhaps the most insidious tactics include the “evercookies,” or “supercookies” that are stored on a user’s computer and are almost impossible to delete, since they are stored in numerous locations. As a result, even after performing a thorough cleaning, just one missed cookie can repopulate the other locations.

While there’s no ethical gray area regarding evercookies and supercookies, since they are designed to avoid detection, and subsequently, deletion, the pros and cons of collecting and selling consumer data for a profit are hotly debated by marketers and online privacy groups.

What cannot be debated is the right of consumers to control their privacy. And an online environment shouldn’t change that fact. If a data broker opened a consumer’s physical mailbox and sifted through the contents, there would be no question that this behavior was out of line. Likewise, if a broker somehow tapped into a phone line and listened to a private conversation to help “understand the consumer’s habits,” this would also be unacceptable.

The same rules should apply in a digital environment. However, as a wise, anonymous Internet observer once noted, “If you’re not paying for it, you’re not the customer; you’re the product being sold.”

 

 

Terri Williams Terri Williams writes for a variety of clients including USA Today, Yahoo, U.S. News & World Report, The Houston Chronicle, Investopedia, and Robert Half. She has a Bachelor of Arts in English from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Follow her on Twitter @Territoryone.

Pricing, Fairness and Digital Data

 

The Internet has been praised as being “The Great Equalizer,” for leveling the playing field by providing a platform for the free exchange of information, and for being a global marketplace without borders that provides consumers with unprecedented levels of choices. However, in the eyes of some retailers, it appears that all consumers are not created equal.

Several major companies are compiling consumer information, including geographical and income data, to determine what price they will offer each potential customer. And these price discrimination practices are raising ethical red flags with consumer advocacy and consumer privacy groups.

At issue: Is it wrong for companies to sell the same online products to different consumers at different prices?

Price discrepancies are not a new phenomenon. For example, some restaurants have a lunch menu and a dinner menu. The lunchtime prices are generally lower, although the customer usually gets the same amount of food during both time periods. Many movie theatres have matinee pricing, although they are showing the same films. Some automobile oil change centers offer discounts to women on certain days, while some restaurants allow kids to eat for free when their parents accompany them. And many retailers offer discounts to senior citizens and military veterans.

These practices are perfectly acceptable to most people. So what makes online pricing different? How and why does online price discrimination qualify as an ethical issue?

The answer may lie in the fact that the price differentials listed above are clearly stated by the establishment and generally understood by the public. In addition, the discounts apply to everyone who meets the stipulation. Therefore, every person who comes into a specific restaurant or goes to a movie theatre during the stated time frame will receive a discount. Every woman who goes to the auto care center on a certain day, and every senior citizen and military veteran who goes to the specified store is qualified for, and receives preferential pricing.

This is vastly different from an online retailer who decides to offer the same product to two different people at a different price based on the consumers’ financial status or zip codes, especially when consumers aren’t aware that they are being sold the same products at a higher price.

According to a Wall Street Journal investigation which resulted in an article titled, “Websites Vary Prices, Deals Based on Users’ Information,” Staples, Home Depot, Lowe’s, Discover Financial Services and Rosetta Stone are some of the companies that vary their prices and product offers depending on consumer information.

Staples uses consumers’ IP addresses to determine their zip code. And 86 percent of the time, the company shows an 8 percent higher price for the same item if the user lives further than 20 miles from a competitor’s store. However, the Journal also notes that the areas that receive discounts have a higher income level than those who don’t. In response, Staples admitted that prices vary by location as a result of “many factors.”

Lowe’s offers location-based pricing as well. For example, a refrigerator that sells for $449 in Los Angeles, Chicago and Ashburn, Va., is $50 more in seven of the other cities used in the Wall Street Journal’s test.

Rosetta Stone, which sells foreign language software, offers discounts close to 20 percent for certain U.S. and Canadian consumers, but not to online consumers in Argentina and the U.K.

And in another Wall Street Journal article, online travel site Orbitz discovered that consumers who own Mac computers tend to spend almost 30 percent more per night on hotel rooms than consumers who own PCs. As a result, when a Mac user and a PC user visit Orbitz’s website, even if they type in the same search information, the Mac user will be shown travel options that are at least 11 percent higher.

Officials at Orbitz responded that Mac users could choose to sort results by price, and also noted that the prices themselves were not different—Mac users were just shown the higher priced options first.

We can expect this trend to grow, based on the type of information provided by companies like Forrester Research, which recently released a report that showed iPhone users are more likely to research, compare and purchase products on their mobile devices.

So what are the implications of this type of price discrimination? Critics are concerned that companies will use consumer information to help them target their ideal customers. Businesses already have the ability to track a consumer’s location based on the IP address. And according to Daily Finance, businesses can also identify the type of device used by the consumer and also track purchases that customers make on their website.

Companies can also purchase consumer information from data brokers like Acxiom Corporation, which collects such information as education level, marital status and political affiliation, in addition to other personal data such as age, race and sex.

But is it fair for online retailers to penalize consumers because they reside in the “wrong” area or have an undesirable zip code? And is this a slippery slope to excluding consumers if they didn’t attend college, or if they’re considered too old? Will Republican retailers refuse to offer deals to consumers identified as Democrats? Will gay retailers offer higher prices to conservative Christians?

In any event, it appears that the Internet—The Great Equalizer— may be the next battlefield in the war for equality.

 

Terri Williams Terri Williams writes for a variety of clients including USA Today, Yahoo, U.S. News & World Report, The Houston Chronicle, Investopedia, and Robert Half. She has a Bachelor of Arts in English from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Follow her on Twitter @Territoryone.

Geolocation Tracking: Your Cell Phone Footprint is Bigger Than You Think

 

Recent revelations by Edward Snowden have turned an international spotlight on the U.S. government’s cell phone surveillance capabilities. However, this issue was gaining steam long before the 29-year-old IT contractor’s allegations of overstepped boundaries. Ethical questions regarding cell phone surveillance by the government, marketers, and even other mobile phone owners — especially geographic location tracking — have been hotly debated for several years.

In August 2012, PBS NewsHour reported that New York Times technology reporter David Pogue lost his iPhone and solicited help from his 1.4 million Twitter followers to find it. Using “Find My iPhone,” a geolocation app, Pogue discovered the phone was in the backyard of a house in Seat Pleasant, Maryland.

He shared this information with his Twitter base, and he and his followers posted maps and photos of the home. A policeman — who was a follower of Pogue’s — went to the suspected location and found the phone in the backyard. The home’s owner was implicated in the phone’s theft, but Pogue did not press charges.

Pogue says turning on the Find My iPhone app is optional, and it also requires a password, so no one else can turn the service on. When PBS asked about invading the homeowner’s privacy, Pogue replied, “I’m not so worried about his privacy. He stole the phone.” True enough, the phone was found in the thief’s backyard. But suppose the thief would have disposed of it in a neighbor’s trashcan. Was Pogue acting irresponsibly to have launched such an invasive campaign without knowing for sure that he was targeting the right person?

Also in August 2012, an article in Forbes magazine detailed the controversial work of Mirco Musolesi, a researcher at the University of Birmingham in the U.K. Musolesi has devised an algorithm that uses GPS data, telephone numbers, text information and prior calling history to predict an individual’s future movement. In other words, by studying a person’s mobility patterns, Musolesi can accurately predict future GPS coordinates. In this way, Musolesi thinks he can help identify where criminal activity will occur. And he wants to work with law enforcement agencies in the U.K. to test his theory, using anonymous data from suspects on bail who have been electronically tagged.

However, this plan also involves monitoring the cell phone activities of the subjects’ unsuspecting friends as well. Although potential criminals can disable their phone’s tracking capabilities, Musolesi says this will not hinder his algorithm from tracking them since cell tower information can also be used. “If you have a very fine-grain network, you can identify the street and block and house,” he tells Forbes.

While an algorithm may accurately predict future locations, trying to predict the location of future criminal activity is another matter entirely. According to Evgeny Morozov, author of “The Net Delusion,” predictive policing may result in an increase in racial profiling, a decrease in the need to prove probable cause and an increase in dependence on statistics over other ways of conducting police work. The algorithm also raises privacy issues regarding suspects and their friends.

While Musolesi’s algorithm is designed to prevent criminal activity, some geolocation tracking efforts have been accused of possibly nurturing criminals. In March 2012, the “Girls Around Me” app debuted and quickly earned the nickname, “The Stalker App.” The Foursquare web service awarded virtual prizes to people who used their smartphone’s GPS location software to “check in” at various establishments. This information was fed to the Girls Around Me app, and when men clicked on the app’s icon, they were supplied with a map detailing the location of females who were in very close proximity.

For each female, the app also included a photo, name, address, age and martial status. After John Brownlee, Deputy Director of the Cult of Mac website, published a story warning consumers about the app, it was pulled from the iOS app store. But Brownlee warns the app may not be dead. In an interview with Cult of Mac, Brownlee states that the app’s developer denied it was a stalking app, but rather a tool to help men “avoid ugly women.”

However, Brownlee walked readers through the app to demonstrate how much personal information was revealed. If a user clicked on a girl’s photo, the app loaded her full-screen Facebook profile picture, and also listed her last location and the approximate time she was there. According to Brownlee, “Zoe’s Facebook profile also reveals that she is 24 years old, went to Stoneham High School, attended Bunker Hill Community College, likes to travel, her favorite book is “Gone With The Wind,” her favorite musician is Tori Ames and she’s a liberal.”

Her birthday and the names of her family members are also displayed. From looking at her pictures, Brownlee can deduce that she’s a partier who likes to take photos with a variety of different guys, her favorite drink is a frosty margarita, sometimes she drinks until she gets drunk, and she recently went to Rome.

Armed with this information, Brownlee says any guy could walk up to “Zoe,” ask if she remembers him from Stoneham High School, inquire about her brother Mike, offer to buy her frosty margarita and then talk about what a great time he had in Rome last summer. Brownlee concludes by saying that if somehow the routine doesn’t work with Zoe, the app offers the same type of information for several other girls at his current location.

On one hand, Girls Around Me is merely taking public information and merging it together — which isn’t a crime. However, are the subjects aware that their public information is being used in such a way? Granted, they have the responsibility to control their privacy settings on Facebook and other social media sites. But is Girls Around Me exploiting them by neatly compiling all of their personal data and placing it in the hands of people who may not have the best intentions?

Of course, no article with the keywords, “tracking,” “people,” and “data,” would be complete without a blurb about retailers and advertisers. And in November 2011, New York Senator Charles Schumer issued a press release warning consumers that JC Penney and Home Depot were considering using technology to automatically track the location of shoppers through their cell phones. The “FootPath technology,” developed by British company Path Intelligence, uses antennas set up throughout the store to monitor signals from personal cell phones. Retailers in Europe and Australia already use FootPath technology, but after Schumer’s press release gained considerable media attention, the U.S. retailers decided against implementing the plan.

An outraged Schumer says, “A shopper’s personal cell phone should not be used … as a tracking device by retailers who are seeking to determine holiday shopping patterns.” Schumer warns that if the tracking system and phone company were hacked, the consumers’ personal information could be compromised.

Cell phone tracking has also been hotly debated in court cases. As recently as May 2013, NBC News reported that U.S. Magistrate Gary Brown wrote an opinion defending the government’s use of geolocation trackers — even without a warrant — to find suspects. Brown’s 30-page opinion involves the case of a New York doctor who illegally distributed oxycodone and could not be found when an arrest warrant was issued for him. DEA agents requested a search warrant for the doctor and Brown felt there was probable cause to use the suspect’s cell phone GPS to locate and apprehend him. The doctor’s cell phone location led to his arrest, and in response to critics who questioned whether this constituted an invasion of privacy, Brown wrote that, with or without a warrant, “Cell phone users who fail to turn off their cell phones do not exhibit an expectation of privacy and such expectation would not be reasonable in any event.”

However, using cell phone locations without a warrant to find and/or apprehend criminals is an ethical issue, according to Amie Stepanovich, director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center Domestic Surveillance Project in an interview with NBC News. “It’s not practical or reasonable to require individuals to turn off their cell phone to prevent law enforcement from accessing a stream of location data,” Stepanovich, says.

In each of these instances — with the exception of the lost mobile phone — users are being tracked without their knowledge or consent. This, in itself, is an ethical issue and, even in those instances where a “greater good” is being served (such as the apprehension of a criminal), do the means justify the end? The Constitution guarantees due process, legal representation and attorney-client privileges, but are the Fourth Amendment rights of suspects violated through cell phone tracking?

While many people may consider geolocation tracking to be harmless, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia provides a cautionary statement regarding its effects:

“A person who knows all of another’s travels can deduce whether he is a weekly church goer, a heavy drinker, a regular at the gym, an unfaithful husband, an outpatient receiving medical treatment, an associate of particular individuals or political groups — and not just one such fact about a person, but all such facts.”

 

Terri Williams Terri Williams writes for a variety of clients including USA Today, Yahoo, U.S. News & World Report, The Houston Chronicle, Investopedia, and Robert Half. She has a Bachelor of Arts in English from the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Follow her on Twitter @Territoryone.

The New Job Requirement: The Ethics of Monitoring Your Employees' Social Media

 

The advent of social media is rapidly changing the way we live and relate to each other and those changes have crept into the relationship between the employer and the employees. The tweets, Facebook posts, and other social media that people publish to or share with the public can expose employers to backlash from the public and sour the relationship between the employer and employee. Even the cook at Burger King can cause outrage by posting a photo of himself standing on exposed lettuce that garners national attention and thus causing a major headache for the corporate. What might have been intended as just a prank, became a nightmare for the store and its employees, as the store’s location made national headlines likely deterring customers and costing the company potential dollars and jobs. Behavior like this cannot be tolerated, but are there any ethical limits for ethically minded businesses? Ethically conscious businesses want to allow employees to properly and cordially express themselves, but the employee’s right to self-expression does not surpass the business’s right to be free of employee’s reckless social media behavior that can irreparably damage the business, brand or bottom line.

Free speech is an important right, but speech in the age of social media can also cause irreparable, permanent harm when embarrassing photos, statuses and tweets circulate across the Internet. For this reason, employees are often told that, as an employee, they represent that employer at all times. Employees may be required to maintain a professional demeanor during and after business hours, as employers are increasingly monitoring their online activities. Technology research firm, Gartner found that the practice is quickly growing and that by 2015, more than 60 percent of employers will use social media to monitor employees. Several products are becoming available to employers for the monitoring of employees’ sites as well as public relations firms now offering such services.

With these new dangers, ethical businesses must ask themselves to what extent is it proper to discipline or even terminate an otherwise successful employee because of their social media behavior? Where does the line between business and none-of-your-business lie?

The ethical guidelines are being defined by employers and courts, as the popularity of social media continues to grow and cases of alleged employee misconduct become public.

Gene Morphis, CFO - Can’t hurt the bottom line and definitely cannot break the law

The impact of social media’s new power over businesses can strike the entry-level Walmart employee, as well as the CFO of any given company.

When Gene Morphis, the CFO of women's clothing and accessories mega-retailer Francesca’s was terminated from his position in May 2012, the Internet was abuzz with the first national news story of a C-level executive, a middle-aged man, being let go from a successful, publicity-traded company for misuse of social media.

As it turns out, Twitter usage isn’t just for teens and 20-somethings anymore.

Morphis, who had been with the company since October 2010, was terminated after he had "improperly communicated company information through social media," the company said.

While Morphis may be among the first in his unique position as a top-level professional to garner national attention for a social media related firing, the issue is becoming a growing problem for a number of employees and employers. Morphis’ case brought light to the fact that many companies in an effort to define and discipline such behaviors, are resorting to enacting social media policies that may be considered illegal—often unbeknownst to them,

What right do employers have to monitor their employees’ social media use? While free speech rights can be argued, the problem mostly comes when activity has potential to hurt the company’s bottom line.

In the case of Mr. Morphis, his commenting on company financial meetings made his employer vulnerable to prosecution under insider trading laws. Less than 140 words, sent out to some-400 followers, put the large-scale business at major risk.

Lindsay Stone - Some things violate the unspoken rule #1: do not bring shame to the employer

Clearly, when a CFO breaks the law and exposes the employer to criminal and civil liability, an employer has no ethical obligation protecting their right to expression. But there are other examples of ill-advised social media activity that, although legal, hurt the employer’s financial bottom line as a result of public outrage.

In November 2012, Lindsay Stone was released from her position at a non-profit organization after Facebook photos of her disrespecting the Tomb of the Unknown Solider became national news.

In the photos Stone is seen posing next to an official Arlington National Cemetery “Silence and Respect” sign, displaying her middle finger and pretending to shout. The incident had no relationship to her employer until outraged viewers researched her place of employment and rallied thousands to lead an Internet rally for her to be fired. Within days, the company succumbed to the pressure and announced the termination of Stone, as well as her accomplice who took the photo.

As distasteful as the act may be, posting the photos was well within her First Amendment rights and had no direct relation to the employment responsibilities of the woman. The incident raises an important question: Is taking such action against an employee, when the act doesn’t directly affect the business, ethical? The short answer appears to be that in this particular instance, it was ethical, since Lindsay Stone took the chance that there could be public outrage when she posed for the picture and posted it, or allowed herself to be tagged in it, and that there could be sufficient public outrage to cause her termination. Businesses cannot be held responsible for an employee that commits an act that causes reasonable and foreseeable public outrage and harm to the business, should the public become aware of it. Had Stone’s act been defensible, reasonable or wise, her employer would have had a much tougher decision to make after balancing her right to self-expression versus the public backlash and potential for damage. But that’s just the thing, if Stone’s act had been defensible, reasonable or wise, we wouldn’t be talking about her because no one would have been outraged.

Grayer Areas for Employers

Some areas of this issue are not gray and clearly require terminating the employee. When an employee crosses an ethical line and commits an outrageous act and publishes it on Twitter to the detriment of the employer, an employer does not owe any ethical duty to their employee aside from the bare minimum afforded by law, such as a final paycheck. An employee that viciously bites the employer’s feeding hand cannot complain that they were owed the right to free speech.

However, some cases are closer and fall into a grayer area, such as provisions of Costco’s employee handbook and the “Like” button that a deputy sheriff allegedly clicked.

In September, the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) issued its first decision regarding employer policies on social media. In that decision, the Board found that mega-discount retailer, Costco Corp., enforced a social media policy that was in violation of the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA). The board found that a policy within Costco’s employee handbook said that any statement an employee shared electronically, in a message board or discussion group that was found to "damage the Company, defame any individual or damage any person's reputation" was susceptible to discipline, possibly including termination, and this was a violation of the employees’ rights.” While previous judgments by the board upheld Costco’s policy and others like it, the Sept. 7 decision found that the policy could potentially lead employees to determine that it "would reasonably conclude that the rule requires them to refrain from engaging in certain protected communications (i.e., those that are critical of [Costco] or its agents)."

Costco has since been required to modify the policy, but what ethical principles should guide them? Free speech is fundamental to our society, but so are businesses that are free from damage to the brand from within; “don’t bite the hand that feeds you” is an adage that reflects an ethic of respect for the entity that provides your paycheck.

When the employer is a public official and doesn’t have a motive to make a profit, we can examine even more clearly the dimensions of this ethic. In 2009, Virginia sheriff's deputy Daniel Ray Carter Jr. was terminated from his position after it was discovered that he used the “like” function on the Facebook page of the direct political opponent of his supervisor. His employer, the sheriff, may not have a direct profit line to tend to, but he does have the right to expect not to be undermined by his own staff during an election. Carter has the right to voice his opinion in other ways that will always be protected, like voting and donating money, but whether or not expressing views against his employer through social media, has since become a legal contest that has courted the involvement of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU).

Carter contested the case in court, arguing that the termination violated his rights under the First Amendment, an opinion that many employees believe protect them. But in 2012, the judge struck the claim down. "Liking a Facebook page is insufficient speech to merit constitutional protection," Judge Raymond A. Jackson curiously reasoned in his May ruling, because it doesn't "involve actual statements."

The ACLU filed an appeal in August 2012 . "The judge is wrong in the sense that the Facebook button actually says the word 'like,' so there are actually words being used," said Aden Fine, a senior staff attorney with the ACLU told CNN. "And there's a thumbs-up symbol, which most people understand means they, literally, like something."

Whatever the law may say, something does not feel ethically right about requiring a boss to employ a person that is trying to get that same boss terminated. However, the guiding principle for the employer should not have anything to do with their difference of opinion, rather, the betrayal and insubordination committed by the sheriff’s deputy. The sheriff’s deputy is biting the hand that feeds him, so to speak, and in a tightly regulated and militaristic workplace like a police department, such an act of open defiance may be tantamount to insubordination in some instances.

However, we must be careful to allow that same deputy to report misconduct and speak the truth without fear of retribution. Carter’s case illustrates the gray area that is increasingly troubling many employers and employees, and has even caught the attention of some lawmakers.

Recently an increasing number of employers and colleges began requiring candidates to supply their social media passwords as a part of the interview process began making national headlines, raising the question of where the appropriate line is between necessary disclosure and invasion of privacy. The issue gained enough legislative momentum that in 2012, a new law was signed in California and New Jersey banning employers from requesting social media passwords from employees or potential hires.

In March 2010, two U.S. senators, New York Senator Charles Schumer and Connecticut Senator Richard Blumenthal, asked the Department of Justice to review whether the growing practice violated any federal law and announced plans to draft legislation that would fill any gaps in the law. In Maryland, where some high school athletes were required to watch as administrations log into their personal Facebook pages and review their activities, have already enacted such legislation.

"It's an invasion of privacy for private employers to insist on looking at people's private Facebook pages as a condition of employment or consideration in an application process," writes Catherine Crump, an ACLU attorney. "People are entitled to their private lives."

In October, the ACLU came one step closer to forcing the issue by further defining their guidelines stating that, “overly broad” policies, such as those of Costco Corp., are unlawful. However, until any such federal legislation is passed, just how much privacy employees are entitled to remains largely undefined.

Drawing the line

Although social media exposes each company with any number of employees to the potential for public scorn as a result of an employee’s off-duty conduct, the Society for Human Resource Management surveyed 470 businesses in 2012 and found that only about 40 percent of them had any sort of formal social media policy in place. Additionally, of the companies that reported having a policy in place, about one-third reported having taken a disciplinary action against an employee. Not only must businesses include clear guidelines regarding off-duty conduct as it relates to the ubiquitous and immortal nature of the Internet, they should also consider each case individually and with an eye towards the needs of the business versus the needs of the employees to express themselves. In the end, the financial bottom line is the entire purpose of business. Employees should consider whether or not their actions present a risk of damage to the earning potential of their employer.

As for Mr. Morphis, he may not be employed by Francesca’s. But he doesn’t appear to be down on social media. While he has never publicly addressed his firing, he has remained active on Facebook as well as Twitter, where he holds the kitschy handle: @theoldcfo. Additionally, he has maintained a presence as an occasional blogger and e-book author. In July 2012, two months after his termination, he wrote on his personal blog “I’m a Kindle author (albeit barely, my book ‘Jobs Over Fifty, the Guide to New Employment for the Experienced Worker,’ has yet to hit the best sellers list. But there is still hope).”

In an age where news and gossip can spread like wildfire, the effects of social media on employer law and employee expectations remain to be seen. While free speech advocates maintain the monitoring of social media activity is a violation of First Amendment rights, employers contend that the growing use of electronic communications leave trade secrets and company reputations more vulnerable than ever. When an employee publishes something on social media that either hurts the employer’s business or undermines that employer’s authority, the employee has done harm to the person or people writing the paycheck. The employer’s decision to terminate an embarrassing employee should not stem from a difference of opinions, because opinions are what make a democracy. The decision should stem from the ethical principle of doing no harm to your own business or purpose, not to mention the livelihoods the other employees.

 

Dee Anna David-Ortega Dee Anna David-Ortega is an independent editorial and marketing professional based in Los Angeles. Her work has appeared on USA Today, Livestrong.com, SF Gate, AZ Central and others. Contact her at deeannadavid@gmail.com.

Cyberloafing, BYOD, and the ethics of using technology devices at work

 

Employer policies regarding personal use of employer-owned phones and computers aren’t all flexible enough to apply to employee-owned phones and other Internet-connected devices. Usage of employee-owned devices at work raises ethical issues, regardless of employer policies.

Until recently, employers were able to use filtering software to block websites that might be offensive (e.g. pornography), as well as those that few employees would have a legitimate need to use for business (e.g. eBay). That practice no longer has the ability to help employees focus if employees can use their own devices to circumvent it.

One of the latest workplace fads is called BYOD (“bring your own device”). This worker-initiated movement is despised by IT departments because it presents security and support problems. Yet, managers at many companies embrace the BYOD movement because it reduces costs and increases productivity and employee satisfaction, according to a survey by ISACA (formerly known as the Information Systems Audit and Control Association).

Good Technology’s “State of BYOD Report” shows that about half of employers pay a partial subsidy for employee-owned hardware and/or service, but still pay less than they would by issuing devices to employees and paying the full service cost. A Forrester study confirms that, “More than half of US information workers pay for their smartphones and monthly plans, and three quarters pick the smartphone they want rather than accept IT’s choice.”

Employees gain productivity by using familiar operating systems on their phones, tablets or laptops. Their devices are often customized for their convenience and they already know how to use them.

The BYOD trend is not limited to the private sector. Government Technology magazine reports that state governments are experimenting with it too.

Personal devices and the illusion of privacy

In a typical cubicle environment, employees have little privacy. Their phone conversations are easily overheard and they can’t see the cubicle openings while they face a monitor. According to the Privacy Rights Clearinghouse, employers have a legal right to monitor an employee’s Internet and email usage. Telephone call monitoring is often legal, and cell phone calls and texts may be monitored when using company-issued equipment.

Employees who are allowed to use their own devices appear to have privacy. They can send and receive personal messages and look for other jobs while they appear to be working. However, while analyzing a case in California, CNN senior legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin said that if an employer pays any portion of the cost of the phone or service, employee texts can be viewed by employers. The best employee handbooks directly address this issue. Good Technology’s report says that 77 percent of employers modified their policies to accommodate BYOD, while the rest believed that their policies already covered it.

The ethical questions

Is making calls or sending text messages from your cell phone at work wrong? Is using your own wireless device to shop or check the performances of the players on your fantasy football team ethical? If these types of activities aren’t wrong, when are you abusing the privilege?

Employers with the most rigid policies allow taking and making personal phone calls in emergency situations. Employers with the most liberal policies prohibit viewing pornography or engaging in any behavior or activity that could be interpreted as sexual harassment. Inoffensive non-work-related usage of technology devices can be divided into two categories: personal business and play, also called “cyberloafing.”

Most employers understand the need for salaried employees to conduct a limited amount of personal business on work time, especially tasks that can only be accomplished during business hours. Banking online, making a dentist appointment and perhaps shopping for Christmas presents could be considered personal business. Watching funny cat videos, browsing Facebook and playing Free Cell are examples of cyberloafing.

Without rationalization, professionals who conduct essential personal business at work and offset that time by working extra hours, taking business calls during non-working hours or answering e-mails and text messages on their own time are behaving ethically. However, that applies only if the employer sanctions the behavior. Cyberloafing presents a greater ethical challenge.

The scope of cyberloafing and BYOD

Salary.com conducts an annual survey that collects employment-related data. The 2012 survey found that 64 percent of employees use the Internet daily for non-work-related reasons. A little more than half of workers admitted to at least two hours per week of personal usage.

Many employees admit to shopping online from work. Half of the workers surveyed by Harris Interactive for CareerBuilder.com said they would shop for Christmas presents online during the just-completed season. The ISACA 2012 IT Risk/Reward Barometer revealed that employees using BYOD products spent 12 hours shopping online, while those with employer-provided hardware only spent nine hours.

Robert Half Technology studied the other side of the same coin and found that two-thirds of employers allow at least some amount of online shopping, while the other third specifically blocks e-commerce sites.

A Nielsen/NetRatings report in 2004 revealed that 92% of online stock trading was done at work. A 2005 survey by America Online and Salary.com, found that employees admitted to spending an average of more than 25 percent of their paid hours engaged in non-work activity. Personal use of the Internet was cited by almost half of respondents. Many of the other personal activities were also enabled by technology.

These and other studies show that the youngest employees are most likely to use their own devices at work and to practice cyberloafing. For instance, Nielsen’s Social Media Report 2012 says that more than half of people in the 25-34 age bracket use social media in the office.

Some studies show that moderate amounts of cyberloafing improve productivity. Employers with permissive policies cite those as a partial explanation for those policies. Other studies say cyberloafing costs American businesses, with an older study pegging the figure at $759 billion per year.

Why cyberloafing occurs

Several studies have analyzed cyberloafing and other forms of slacking. Vivien Lim, a professor at the National University of Singapore, is a veteran researcher of the practice. One of her studies concludes that cyberloafing is a form of revenge by employees who feel mistreated.

Dr. Jerald Greenberg, a professor, has devoted much of his career to studying organizational ethics and justice. In one of his studies, he examined employee theft rates at manufacturing plants where workers suffered through a temporary pay cut. Theft increased significantly during the period of reduced pay.

Half of the workers polled for the Ethics Resource Center’s 2011 National Business Ethics Survey believed that doing less work to offset cuts in pay or benefits was ethically justifiable.

For his recent dissertation at the University of South Florida, Kevin Askew researched, “The Relationship between Cyberloafing and Task Performance and an Examination of the Theory of Planned Behavior as a Model of Cyberloafing.” He examined many previous studies and conducted his own. One of his findings is “cyberloafing on a cellphone – but not on a desktop – appears to be related to job dissatisfaction.” He also cited studies that show that lack of sleep reduces self-control.

Salary.com’s survey asked people why they engaged in play at work. Four of the answer choices each resonated with about a third of employees: insufficient challenge, long hours, lack of employer-provided incentive and general dissatisfaction. These factors caused almost half of those surveyed to admit to job-hunting from the workplace.

Addiction is also a factor in cyberloafing. Specific websites, games and favorite devices all have a compelling pull. I know a woman who half-seriously refers to her Android tablet as her husband. I observed her receiving and answering a question from her boss late on a Saturday evening.

Employer policies and strategies

1. Janice Lawrence, Director of the Business Ethics Program at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, suggests that the appropriate time for conducting personal business on employer time is during breaks. State laws that mandate paid break time vary in duration and timing. Lawrence advises, “The company needs to make these policies clear so that employees know the limits to such ‘free time’ or personal tasks and any limits to use of personal devices.” She also notes that materials the employer “finds repugnant or against its ethical codes,” such as child pornography, should never be visible in the workplace.

Comprehensive employer policies on Internet usage in the workplace are essential, according to ContentWatch CEO Russ Warner, business efficiency and performance consultant Andrew Jensen and the law firm, DLA Piper Jensen explains, “Coaching your employees on the appropriate use of technology at work tends to be very effective, and it eliminates the extreme resentment that often arises as the result of an employer enforcing a group discipline policy.”

ISACA found that almost half of employees were unaware of their employers’ policies. A conclusion in one the association’s reports is, “This environment points to a strong need for clear communication of organization policies as well as education around possible security precautions employees who BYOD can take.”

Organizations with mostly hourly paid employees generally have very different policies than those with mostly salaried employees. Vail Resorts and Masterson's Food & Drink, Inc., both in the hospitality industry; specifically ban using cell phones and entertainment devices while on the clock. Outside Unlimited, a landscaping company, explicitly limits cell phone and Internet use to company business. The company informs its workers that it has the right to monitor their usage. Its handbook states, “Personal cell phones are prohibited from use except during your lunch break.”

Shannon Reising, a human resources supervisor at Ann’s House of Nuts manufacturing facility in North Carolina, takes a cut-and-dried approach, which seems appropriate for a company that makes trail mix. A few managers and executives at Ann’s House carry cellular phones, but those are partly subsidized by the company and are subject to company policy. Reising says, “Employees are allowed to use their personal tech devices during company-sponsored breaks and meal periods. Employees who use devices that connect to the Internet, whether by a hard line or wirelessly cannot use our Internet access. Period.” She asserts, “Anyone caught on my floor with a personal technological device (except for as discussed above) will be terminated immediately.”

Reising stresses the importance of having and communicating policy. Ann’s House has clear and specific policies. Reising demands 40 hours of work for 40 hours of pay, a practice that would be hard to dispute as ethical and fair. Even though Reising considers her comments to be work-related, she practiced the highest ethical standards by making them after business hours.

Companies with mostly salaried employees are much more liberal in allowing personal use of technology. Kenexa, a human resources consulting firm owned by IBM, embraces it. Kenexa CEO Rudy Karsan is at the opposite extreme of Shannon Reising. He encourages cyberloafing. He was quoted in an article, “We're really blending our lives together with work. I applaud it and hope we never lose that.”

I think the reason many employers allow cyberloafing is self-interest. Employers have much to gain by blurring the distinction between work and play.

A call for culture change

The cited studies and surveys show that cyberloafing is either allowed by employers or it is an offsetting behavior against perceived employer abuses. As the number of hours worked by employees is the core issue, the relevant form of abuse is pressuring employees into routinely working excessive hours. The work environment, dedication, ambition, unemployment rate and fear conspire to compel workers to comply. Increased productivity is the euphemism for this abuse, and it is a big contributor to the high unemployment rate in the U.S. Profitable businesses that maintain a corporate culture in which the average workweek is much more than 40 hours are behaving unethically.

Cyberloafing is a form of theft, which is also wrong, unless employees actually work 40 hours per week (or more) and the employer sanctions the activity. Employers that allow or encourage cyberloafing are trying to turn two wrongs into a right by creating a happier work place that masks their abuse.

 

John Henshell John Henshell is a freelance writer/editor/communications consultant who adds value to his clients’ words through adept use of diction, syntax, context, and images. He can be contacted at johnnhenshell@comcast.net.

Petraeus and E-Government Ethics

 

“In the past, a spymaster might have placed a flowerpot with a red flag on his balcony or drawn a mark on page 20 of his mistress’s newspaper” wrote Nicole Perlroth in a recent New York Times article. “Instead, Mr. Petraeus used Gmail. And he got caught.”

On November 9, 2012, David H. Petraeus resigned as the Director of the CIA upon the discovery of his extramarital affair with his biographer Paula Broadwell. The specifics of the Gmail account Petraeus used to communicate with Broadwell have been thoroughly investigated. But the Petraeus scandal raises much larger questions pertaining to digital government. Perlroth’s article, for example, asks: “If David H. Petraeus couldn’t keep his affair from prying eyes as director of the Central Intelligence Agency, then how is the average American to keep a secret?” What kinds of privacy laws exist in relation to digital government? Is such digital surveillance ethical? What kinds of ethical responsibilities do political or military leaders have to conserve the safety of their country’s citizens?

Before delving into these questions, it is worth defining the term “e-government.” “There is some debate of what exactly e-government is,” says Frank Bannister, an associate professor researching electronic government at Trinity College Dublin. “One definition is the use of the Internet and more specifically the World-wide Web to deliver government information and public services. A wider definition is that it is encompasses all use of ICT [information and communication technology] by governments and public administration in the business of government and public service delivery,” Bannister explains.

In his book Fundamental of Development Administration, political theorist Jeong Chun Hai says that e-government (also known as “e-gov,” “digital government,” “online government” or “connected government”) can take the form of digital interactions between the government and its citizens (G2C), the government and businesses (G2B), the government and employees (G2E), the government and government agencies (G2G), as well as citizens to government (C2G).

Given Petraeus’ former position at the C.I.A., one could say that his case is ethically particularly complex, as it affects all of the above digital interactions. But even for the ordinary citizen, there are intricate ethical issues at stake. “Among the most important [ethical issues associated with digital government] are transparency, access, equity and reliability,” said Dr. Stuart W. Shulman, a political science professor and Editor Emeritus of the Journal of Information Technology & Politics at the University of Massachusetts.

One of the first memorandums that Obama signed after being elected president was the Memorandum for the Heads of Executive Departments and Agencies on Transparency and Open Government. This document affirmed that government services, including public websites such as recovery.gov and data.gov, would help increase transparency and aid citizen participation. Given his commitment to improving the government’s technology, Obama even came to be called the nation’s first “tech president.”

But it is cases like Petraeus’ that backfire and actually help make digital surveillance more transparent to the general public. After his scandal, news sources started revealing the details on how ordinary internet users can keep their information private (or at least try to do so). For example, did you know that saving clandestine messages in a drafts folder of a joint email account is not “secret”? In fact, chances are, once you have submitted any kind of information via a web browser, the government can find it.

But not only that – Wired reports that under the Electronic Communications Privacy Act of 1986, the government can access e-mail that’s more than 6 months old without a warrant from a judge. Apple, Amazon, the ACLU, Facebook, Google and Twitter have all joined the protest against such ageing privacy laws, but so far, to no avail. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) , the United Nations, and country-specific organizations like the American Society for Public Administration (ASPA) all have put forth guidelines on digital government. But in the end, they are only guidelines and have little to say.

Instead of granting its citizens access to equitable e-government services, the U.S. government appears more committed to accessing citizens’ online information. Instead of providing services such as online systems for voting on imminent issues affecting citizens’ daily lives, dollars are spent so that the Department of Homeland Security can monitor social networks for the word “social media.”

In the United States, the National Broadband Plan is seeking to make technology accessible to everyone. Yet both between and within countries worldwide, a massive digital divide continues to exist, according to Shulman. Bannister argues that “there is a school of thought that says that the digital divide is a new ‘ethical’ issue.” Countries such as the U.K. and Denmark, for example, have announced and implemented “digital by default” policies for e-government. Rachel Neaman of The Guardianoutlines numerous benefits: “For example, monitoring social media channels generates valuable insight into what citizens really think. Holding webchats and inviting online comment actively engages people in debate. Crowdsourcing ideas and polling views contributes to policy making. And consulting and asking for input can influence legislation – all the stuff of a modern democratic government.”

However, such “digital by default” policies can “[raise] questions about equality of treatment for marginal groups,” Bannister explains. “This is both a hardware/networks issue and an information literacy issue,” Shulman says. Those who don’t have, or don’t know how to use technology, are clearly at a disadvantage. Digital literacy and other technical skills would need to be promoted, so that equal conditions to vote, stay informed, and perform other government-related actions are equal to all.

As a consequence, organizations like the United Nations are helping to research and implement e-government initiatives in Africa, for example. “E-government is a quick way for governments with limited infrastructure to catch up with the rest of the world in deployment of services, “ said Douglas Woolley, group executive at the Technology Group at Business Connexion, a South African information technology company. “We need this [e-government] because it alleviates an administrative burden and helps deal with fraud and corruption,” he added. If e-government does in fact reduce corruption, one might even say that governments have an ethical responsibility to implement it.

John-Mary Kauzya, chief of the Governance and Public Administration Branch of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, argues that: “It is quite another thing to successfully implement e-government,” he says. Infrastructure and lack of technology are undoubtedly issues, both in Africa and beyond. But they are “the easy part,” the United Nations Public Administration Network (UNPAN) reports. “If a government has not reached the [requisite] level of commitment to effectiveness, equity, efficiency, transparency and accountability, it would not have any incentive to invest in the development of e-government,” said Kauzya.

“Solutions to ethical problems have to be in appropriate and properly policed legislation, international standards, effective regulatory and citizen appeal mechanisms and constant vigilance,” says Bannister. “These questions are deeply political and can only be resolved by action in the political sphere.” He further explains that while some governments have established oversight bodies, others have parliamentary committees (or the equivalent). Quite a number of governments make use of legislation, such as data protection acts. “My own view is that you need a body that is independent and has the authority to take effective action when it detects unethical behaviour,” Bannister says.

Post-Petraeus, we can question whether basic requisites like effectiveness, equity, efficiency, transparency and accountability are guaranteed in America’s democracy. If, or when they are, e-government will come in more than handy. “If the price of liberty is eternal vigilance, the same price must be paid for ethical behavior by the state," Bannister says.

In the meantime, Obama has just tapped counter-terrorism adviser John Brennan to succeed Petraeus. TIME magazine’s Robert B. Baer writes that under Brennan, the CIA won’t use traditional espionage anymore. “In Brennan’s world, there’s no profit or sense going back to the old ways." In coming months we will see how the era of digital government effects the CIA and other agencies.

 

Isabel Eva Bohrer  Learn more about Isabel Eva Bohrer at www.isabelevabohrer.com.

Mug Shots

 

I have never been arrested. Because of that, there are no police mug shots of me in existence. That is a very good thing, because if I ever had been arrested, it's a safe bet the photo taken at the time of my incarceration would be featured on at least one of the many mug shot galleries that litter the internet, and my—most likely— disheveled and disoriented portrait would be a permanent fixture in this ever-growing online photo album of shame.

There are many different ethical implications and complications surrounding posting pictures of people who have been arrested. The Chicago Tribune, one of the most respected American papers to feature such a gallery, hits on the primary issue in the introduction to its frequently updated “Mugs in the news: A collection of Chicago-area arrest photos.”

About the gallery, the Tribune explains, “Arrest and booking photos are provided by law enforcement officials. Arrest does not imply guilt, and criminal charges are merely accusations. A defendant is presumed innocent unless proven guilty and convicted.”

So if the Chicago Tribune is a serious newspaper with a reputation for journalistic integrity and a history of winning more than two dozen Pulitzer Prizes, why would it post pictures of people who have been arrested but not yet convicted? Isn't it the job of such a paper to protect the innocent and the less powerful? Shouldn't a publication like this, one that is working in the best interests of the citizens, be extra vigilant in these kinds of situations, especially in light of the fact that the city of Chicago 's police department has a long history of corruption?

These mug shots are posted on a regular basis by the Trib, and often featured prominently on the front page of the paper's popular and influential web site, because the gallery is a cash cow. They cost absolutely nothing for the newspaper to produce; they are "provided by law enforcement officials" and they are an advertising inventory producing machine.

The last time I checked the Tribune's mug shot gallery, there were 149 pictures posted. Not only are there ads surrounding each of the mug shots, but also after only seven clicks into the gallery, the space containing the arrest photo itself featured an advertisement that I had to go through before I could get to the next picture.

If easy money is the primary motivating factor for sites like the Tribune to use these kinds of photo galleries, shock value is close on its heels. Features like this are meant to act like online train wrecks—they exploit vulnerable people and they appeal to our basest desires to mock and ridicule individuals when they are at their lowest point.

Mug shots and arrest records are easy pickings for lazy journalists with cruel streaks. They take very little research to produce, they don't require any fact-checking and they appeal to equally cruel editors who have a bent for sensational slants.

One recent example was published online by the New York Daily News. Titled "World's most hilarious mug shots," the story explained: "You don't need to be a celebrity for your mug shot to be newsworthy. We've rounded up the most ridiculous jailhouse pics from normal everyday folks ... well, sort of normal ..."

The story featured nearly 100 mug shots, many of people who could have been homeless, mentally ill or battered. The pictures were accompanied by wry captions like this: "What would the Addams Family think? Mercella Hernandez bears a striking resemblance to Cousin Itt as she poses for her mug shot on May 31, 2012. Herdandez was arrested on (sic) Arizona for parole violation and refused to show anything but her wild hair for her booking photo."

When asked by “Entertainment Weekly” about his thoughts on the “American Idol” TV show, Bruce Springsteen called the practice of ridiculing those put on the program with no real talent or chance of winning "theater of cruelty." And it's basically that same dynamic with these online mug shot galleries. They serve no productive purpose and they are not meant to protect the public in any way – they are sheer shock value.

And the cruelty that comes with these kinds of features can last forever online. The Internet never forgets a face, and Google searches can ruin a life or a career if someone finds a record of an arrest of a person who later turned out to be completely innocent. And the Chicago Tribune doesn't have a corresponding photo gallery of "Exonerated Mugs."

One reason this topic really resonates for me is that I actually wrote an online feature based on arrest mug shots, and it's something I regret. I guess you could argue that mine was not as mean-spirited as some of the other features of its ilk—it was titled "Nine Surprisingly Sexy Mugshots"—but it was exploitation nonetheless.

Why did I do it? I was paid $75, and it took me almost no time at all to compile it. Simple as that.

In the end, what the experience eventually taught me is that it's quite easy to destroy someone's reputation by posting this kind of possibly specious information online. However, once it's out there, it's almost impossible to repair and restore it.

 

John D. Thomas John Thomas, the former editor of Playboy.com, has been a frequent contributor at the New York Times, Chicago Tribune and Playboy magazine.

When CEOs Tweet

 

When the CEO of a publicly traded company posts a message on Facebook, Twitter or any social media network, it could be an illegal act, or also incur a civil lawsuit.

Take, for example, the case of Reed Hastings, CEO of Netflix Inc.

In December of 2012, a Security and Exchange Commission (SEC) filing cited Hastings and his company for allegedly violating fair disclosure rules in a July posting on Facebook. The SEC threatened to file a civil lawsuit against Netflix.

The posting in question hyped Netflix's streaming-subscriber growth, claiming that its viewing service for the month of June surpassed one billion hours for the first time ever.

As a result of Hasting's Facebook message, Netflix stock, which is traded on the NASDAQ, surged upward. Hasting's stock options also increased in value, topping out at $1.5 million in 2012.

Reacting to the SEC action, Hastings said, "...[It's] a fascinating social media story....Posting to over 200,000 people is very public, especially because many of my subscribers are reporters and bloggers."

Until this incident, Netflix typically dispatches material information to investors via SEC filings, press releases and letters to investors, according to Hastings.

"We think the fact of one billion hours of viewing in June was not 'material' to investors, and we had blogged a few weeks before that we were serving nearly one billion hours per month," Hastings said in a written statement.

"We remain optimistic this can be cleared up quickly through the SEC's review process," he said.

As more CEOs and senior management use social media for various business purposes – a growing trend – more problems like Hastings' are likely to occur, the majority of which will probably be inadvertent.

Why the increasing business use of social media by business? Social media offers immense potentialfor marketing, image-making, advertising, public relations efforts, customer relations, investor relations and a variety of other positive, beneficial activities. But it also carries potential risks, a caveat perfectly illustrated by the Hastings case.

The risks of social media are in some, but not all respects, similar to those of print media. But not all libel laws apply—issues of malice and negligence have not been definitively decided in the courts.

Insider trading issues, however, are clear. The transmission via social media of insider information about a publicly traded company is illegal. Using Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest or private blogs to transmit insider information to large numbers of people is a violation of law.

In one example of unethical use of social media, investors concealing their identities, entered chat rooms and touted a specific stock in an effort to convince people to buy it.

The hoped-for buying occurred, the stock went up in price, and the investors who hyped it sold their holdings at a nice profit.

As the use of social media becomes more widespread and more unethical or illegal activity occurs, increasing government oversight and restrictions are likely.

Government agencies have the power to subpoena social media accounts for investigative purposes and to determine who sent a certain message or messages. Anonymous postings are not protected by law, although the American Civil Liberties Union has objected to government access to social media, citing privacy issues.

As routine procedure now, the FBI monitors Facebook, Twitter and other social media for potential securities fraud, including insider trading.

But government may not be able to keep up with the latest advances in technology and social media to prevent their illegal misuse, according to April Brooks and David Chaves, agents working in the FBI's New York field office.

"I will tell you," said Brooks, "technology will play a huge part, social media, Twitter, any kind of technology that is new and doesn't exist today. If there is any way to exploit it, these individuals will exploit it," said Brooks in a Reuters TV interview.

Although social media may present opportunities for criminal acts, legitimate use of it by companies is expanding as the number of users increases. Smart CEOs, aware of the broad reach and power of social media, have authorized their firms to use it as a sales and public relations tool.

Many corporate executives have also posted messages under their own names to the vast unseen audience that regularly visits social media sites. CEOs also monitor sites like Facebook and Twitter anonymously, in search of customer feedback on products and services.

For example, John Krafcik, president of Hyundai USA, reportedly spends 90 minutes daily browsing through Facebook and Twitter looking for comments on his company's brands and products.

"Right now, social media is a wonderful opportunity for me to listen and really feel the pulse of what's going on," said Krafcik, who has not yet posted a social media message.

"But if I get out there in it myself, I want to make sure I can be committed to stay and deliver," he said. "And the time constraints are considerable."

Among the growing number of CEOs posting signed messages on social media is Brian Dunn, CEO of Best Buy. Dunn's Twitter account has about 5,000 followers.

"Best Buy's message has to be where people are, and today that means being on social networks," Dunn said. Without a presence in social media, according to Dunn, [Best Buy] "...risks not being in the conversation at all. Over time, I believe that can be fatal to a business."

Other notable CEOs and corporate executives who have embraced social media include:

Taje Jeff Joerres, head of Manpower. The Glendale, Wisconsin company is the world's biggest private employer. Joerres tweets, has a personal Facebook page and posts messages on domestic and international labor news.

David Sable is the top executive at Young & Rubicon, which is among the world's largest marketing-advertising firms. "Social media is an extension of social behavior, and social discourse is hugely important in business," he said. "That means the ROI [return on investment] is the highest in the world."

Even the CEO of the U.S.A., President Barack Obama, has used Facebook. A photo posted on Obama's official Facebook fan page after his re-election shows him hugging the first lady. The caption says, "Four more years." The photograph became the most "Liked" photo in Facebook's history.

As the trend to social networking continues, CEOs, corporate executives and company personnel would protect themselves and their employers by learning what is and is not acceptable as a tweet or Facebook posting, or a message on any of the other sites.

Social media experts and lawyers advise companies to draft clear, specific rules governing the use of social media. The National Federal of Independent Business has a model employee handbook with a section on social media.

There are legal and ethical dangers, but there are also immense potential payoffs.

 

Marc Davis Marc Davis is a veteran journalist and published novelist. His reporting and writing has been published in numerous print and online publications including AOL, The Chicago Tribune, Forbes Online Media, The Journal of the American Bar Association, and many others. His latest novel, Bottom Line, was published in 2013.

The Ethics of Scanlation

 

Digital piracy affects almost all forms of media, from books to film to music. Digital piracy has a particularly long and complicated relationship, though, with an art form that is less familiar to mainstream audiences — manga.

Manga is the Japanese term for comics. In America, comics are mostly a special interest. But in Japan, manga has long been a widely popular format. While manga sales are off from their peak, the top-selling manga in 2012 still sold more than 23 million copies in Japan. In contrast, the top comics in America sell in the neighborhood of 200,000 units a month, which would mean only about 1.2 million copies sold for the year.

Manga's influence is felt far beyond Japan--Japanese comics are a major regional export throughout Asia and Southeast Asia. They've also become quite popular in the U.S. market. Japanese titles like Naruto, for example, sell much better in the U.S. than any graphic novel.

While manga eventually conquered America, it took a while. In the early days (pre-1990s), there was growing interest in manga, but little translated product. And so there was the obvious result; fan circles sprang up, as individuals traded Xeroxed copies and translations of titles that had not yet been licensed. As the internet grew, scanlations — or scans of manga with the speech bubbles translated into English — became an important way for fans to access material that was unavailable in the U.S.

Erica Friedman, the president and founder of Yuricon & ALC Publishing, a small specialty manga publisher of yuri, or lesbian-themed manga, has pointed out that scanlations were originally not a problem to be solved, but a solution to an unmet demand. As Friedman says in an article on her website, "It was (and largely still is) a love for a title that leads a person to scan it — not a desire to harm, but a deep desire to share and expand the audience."

In part because of this history, and in part because translating a manga requires a good bit of work and value-added, the ethical status of scanlations is complicated. As Chris Meadows writes, scanlation "is technically piracy," and is therefore illegal. But, as manga critic and blogger Brigid Alverson said via email, even though scanlation "violates the law and the creator's wishes," it is still "hard to work up much moral outrage about a group of enthusiasts scanlating an obscure or niche manga with narrow appeal that will never be licensed outside Japan." Moreover, manga publishers have in the past used scanlations as a kind of marketing research — when a scanlation is popular, it's a good indication that there may be an audience for an official licensed translation.

The difficulty these days, according to Alverson, is that scanlation, or locating scanlations, has become too easy. Scanlation circles, she said, used to be based around IRC (Internet Relay Chat), and there was a fair amount of effort involved in finding and reading the material. Now, though, there are large scanlation aggregator sites, many of which provide scans directly from licensed manga. Thus, according to Alverson:

“Now you can Google the title of a manga and be reading it in your web browser within seconds, which I think has had a significant negative effect, because it has reduced the minimum price of manga to 'free,' at least for one segment of the market. Any time your product has been devalued to that extent, that's a bad thing, and I have had marketers tell me they have seen a drop in sales of a title when it becomes available on a scan site (in this case, scans of the translated manga--not scanlations).”

Friedman added that, in many cases, scanlation readers, "really have no idea they are doing anything wrong. They go online, find a manga for free, and read it. When you explain that those are bootleg sites, that the company and the artist makes no money off that, they have no idea what that means."

As she suggests, ethical standards for reading or using scanlations are both contested and fraught. As Friedman noted, "Almost every fan of manga has relied on a scanlation at some point." Friedman actually taught herself Japanese in part so that she would no longer have to rely on scans.

Alverson acknowledged that she had in the past looked at a scanlation if she could not get a volume. She no longer does so, however, in part for ethical reasons and in part she says, "because to be honest, the quality of the scanlations I read was so bad that I couldn't figure out what was going on, and I felt they weren't doing the books justice."

Other readers, however, may have different sets of concerns. “Subdee,” a manga reader and a columnist for the Hooded Utilitarian, a site I edit, explained by email that she doesn't "really ever think about the ethics of buying versus not buying something." She added that she will buy manga in bookstores when she sees it. However, she said she doesn’t, "believe in ‘consumer ethics’ as a general rule for all people.” She feels “it implies that people with less money to buy things are somehow less ethical, and I'm against that."

Friedman, in contrast, argued that no one has the right to read a book without the creator's permission. However, she also points out that Japanese companies and creators have failed to address the issue of scanlations adequately. This has in part helped illegal scanlation sites to proliferate. Friedman argues that companies and creators could partner with scanlators, licensing books and setting up direct micropayment systems so that creators would receive a small fee each time a scanlation is read. However, Friedman says publishers have been reluctant to do this, especially in a centralized way. As a result, each series has separate digital and print licensing, often requiring different software and hardware to access. In some cases, creators refuse altogether to license to digital — with the result that the only English translation available is scanlations. And if the only English translation is scanlations, that is what most people are going to read, no matter what ethical debates are happen.

Scanlations, then, present what is in some ways an extreme case, or a limit case, of piracy issues in media. Unlicensed and technically illegal scanlations are the only way to access a large amount — possibly a majority — of manga for English readers. As a result, a delivery system and a culture has been created which can be, and often is, used to pirate licensed as well as unlicensed works. There is some evidence that the illegal content has damaged the market for legal content, making it even more difficult to buy or read licensed manga, and so further encouraging the reading of scanlations.

How to address this is unclear…though clearly, shaming or scolding individuals isn't likely to work. Rather, as Friedman says, there needs to be a change in infrastructure so that there is a legal way for fans to easily read the manga they are interested in with the permission of (and hopefully with some payment to) the creators. Digital ethics, in this case, depends not just—and not even primarily—on individual good will, but on the creation of conditions online which will make ethical action possible.

 

Noah Berlatsky Noah Berlatsky edits the comics and culture website the Hooded Utilitarian and is a correspondent for the Atlantic. He is working on a book about the original Wonder Woman comics.

Who’s Behind That Tweet?

 

One of the most common complaints I hear about America — from print, radio and television pundits on both ends of the political spectrum — is that we now live in a society ruled by political correctness.That statement is really only half true, however, because most people, excluding those who make a living creating controversy, are only concerned with being politically correct, or even civil, when their reputations, careers or finances are at risk.

A quick look at almost any Twitter feed makes obvious that the cloak of anonymity produces large quantities of what is commonly referred to as “Internet Courage.” Put more simply, a lot of people seem to be brave enough to post just about anything online, as long as nobody knows who is posting it. There is even a scientific name for this phenomenon: “Online Disinhibition.”

All a person needs to create a Twitter account is an email address. A user is not required to provide any verifiable personal information and once an account is created, that user can post just about anything. That is not to say it is possible to act with complete impunity on Twitter: If you make bigoted or threatening remarks and are reported, your account will be suspended.

If you tweet a detailed assassination plan @BarackObama, chances are someone is going to show up at your door and ask you about it. In fact, last fall, a North Carolina man who tweeted that he was planning the president’s murder was visited by the Secret Service and subsequently arrested.

The United States government could probably track any anonymous Twitter user anywhere in the world. But the government doesn’t care if two people with differing political or social philosophies call each other names. In the vast majority of cases, people can say just about anything with absolutely no threat of repercussion other than the possibility of a temporary account suspension.

Last year, San Francisco 49ers’ kick returner Kyle Williams fumbled twice in the NFC Championship against the New York Giants, costing his team a chance to play in the Super Bowl. (As a Giants fan, this pleased me greatly). Shortly thereafter Williams, somewhat predictably, received some hateful messages on Twitter, including one from a nameless, faceless individual wishing death upon Williams and his family.

Death. Because of a football game.

In an ESPN radio interview the day after the game, Williams expressed shock at the comments.

"Some people cross that line and don't think twice about it ... don't think that there's somebody on the other side of that line that may feel that or that may have to respond to that or may have to deal with that," Williams said. “People just write blindly and I guess that's to be expected with how open Twitter is and how open Facebook is. Again, there's a line and some people cross it and some people have respect for it."

Any stable person, no matter how big a sports fan, realizes the outcome of a game simply isn’t important enough to wish for someone’s untimely demise. In all likelihood, whoever wrote the tweet understands that too and made the comment in a moment of irrational anger. But because he/she knew the tweet wouldn’t be traced, there was really no reason to pause before sending it.

No self-respecting journalist would ever advocate limiting free speech. I am not challenging anyone’s right to wish for Kyle Williams’ death — provided that he/she isn’t threatening to cause the death — idiotic though it might be. I am, however, questioning whether that person should be allowed to make the wish anonymously.

I believe a strong argument can be made for requiring users to provide some sort of identification and a real name to use Twitter and similar sites. If celebrities can have “verified” accounts, surely it would be pretty simple for Twitter to confirm the identities of all its users in a similar fashion.

The purpose of requiring identification would not be to punish people for posts they make — rather, the idea is to force people to stand up and take responsibility for them. While I understand that facilitating the exchange of ideas is not the sole purpose of social media, I believe it is one of its most important functions. Slinging mud from behind an empty Twitter handle makes productive dialogue nearly impossible and simply perpetuates further nastiness.

Requiring identification for Twitter would create some dilemmas. People suffering under oppressive governments need anonymity to avoid persecution. A rebel tweeter in Saudi Arabia, for example, has accumulated nearly a million followers by exposing corruption inside the country’s royal family.

Maybe an identification policy would only work in the United States. Maybe Twitter could allow users to make a case for an anonymous account and decide each case individually. Ultimately, these kinds of decisions would be left to the site’s gatekeepers, but the general idea is to create accountability.

I have to admit, I got the idea for this piece through personal experience. Last year, I set up a Twitter account for work, and after getting the hang of the site, I created a personal account from a different computer, using a different e-mail address. I did not post a photo or any personal information — I followed nobody, and nobody followed me.

I bounced around the site until I found some accounts — belonging to celebrities and regular folks alike – espousing beliefs I strongly oppose. I engaged in some petty name calling, my anger rising a bit with every tweet. I knew these people had no idea who or where I was, which made it easy to attack them.

It took a conversation with my younger brother to realize what should have been apparent right away; what I was doing made me feel good temporarily, but it was childish and a waste of my time. If I felt strongly enough about an issue to engage in a war of words online, he asked, wouldn’t my time be better spent trying to help in some tangible way?

 

Eric Lebowitz Eric Lebowitz is a professional journalist currently working for a community newspaper in Westchester County, New York. His work has been published on the Websites of The Chicago Tribune, Newsday, Golf Digest Magazine and amNewYork. You can contact him at ealebowitz@gmail.com.

Is fact checking dead?

 

It’s Jan. 8, 2011, and the fictional journalists in Aaron Sorkin’s HBO drama series “The Newsroom” are reporting a real-life event. U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and 18 others have just been shot in the parking lot of an Arizona grocery store.

One-by-one, other news outlets announce that Giffords died from her wounds, and the “News Night” television crew has a decision to make: Will they follow suit, without confirmation from a source at the hospital?

“Every second you're not current, a thousand people are changing the channel to the guy who is,” screams the network president from the sidelines.

But the hotshot anchor goes the moral route, and present-day viewers know that it’s the right call. Giffords survived. The make-believe journalists wait for verification and avoid an embarrassing public apology.

Critics may call the show naïve and preachy, but this particular scene illustrates an ethical quandary that real media groups encounter regularly: Is fact checking a priority in the 24-hour news cycle?

Consumers expect immediate access to information. The latest headlines are just a click or cable channel flip away. Text message alerts promulgate breaking news instantaneously.

In the meantime, traditional print journalism is in danger of extinction, and nobody’s quite sure how to make money on the web. The pressure is on, and being fast—ideally first—to publish the latest scoop is a majorgoal in the competitive news industry.

Does that pressure excuse NPR, Reuters, CNN and all the others that falsely announced Giffords demise?

Such missteps are not uncommon. Last December, Fox News, The Huffington Post and Slate were among the multiple news organizations that incorrectly identifiedthe gunman responsible for the Newtown, Conn. elementary school shooting.

Breaking news stories aren’t the only setting for factual error, and speed isn’t the only justification.

In January, an online piece in The Guardian derided Western consumption of imported quinoa for contributing to malnutrition and poverty in South America. It elicited more than a thousand reader comments and went viral in the blogosphere within days. Big-name news sites like Canadian newspaper The Globe and Mail and Yahoo! News picked up the story.

But readers and news organizations condemned the piece for being slanted. The author failed to mention the other side of the story, and didn’t explain how Bolivians and Peruvians benefit from the quinoa craze.

Measured in page views, the feature was a success for The Guardian. Even its controversial, one-sided angle generated buzz—as the saying goes, any press is good press. If the facts are wrong or imbalanced, they’ll still draw in an audience. Perhaps the 24-hour news cycle isn’t wholly to blame for errors, and sometimes good old-fashioned sensationalism is the perpetrator.

Failing to fact check both sides of the story means sacrificing accuracy and objectivity, two pillars of the journalistic code.

“Whatever the medium, we tell our audiences the complete, unvarnished truth as best we can learn it,” states The New York Times’ ethics policy.

Many media organizations rely on their reporters to confirm accuracy before submitting a story for publication or broadcast. Exact protocol varies, but generally informationis supposed to be verified by at least two independent and reliable sources.

Back in the day, many news companies had the luxury of fact checking departments, but most were cut in the late 1990s. Today, Time magazine, The New Yorker and a few others still bankroll employees who are devoted solely to fact checking. These staffers are responsible for notoriously rigorous, time-consuming verification processes, but even they make mistakes.

Let’s assume that the majority of media outlets have good intentions. They strive to ensure that their content is always accurate, but the pressure created by online media and the 24-hour news cycle gets in the way.

The key word is majority.

At the 2009 Magazine Publishers of America conference, Gawker Media founder Nick Denton didn’t hesitate to admit that his website does not bother to fact check.

“We aim to get the truth over time,” he said. “The verification model is post-publication rather than pre-publication. Our readers correct us and we apologize and we change it. We don’t have time to check it all before.”

Is Gawker paving the way for all news companies? Will its strategy be the norm in the future?

“That’s a terrible model, and I’m afraid it’s becoming more and more like that in the world of journalism,” said Fred Brown, a Denver-based media ethics professor with more than 40 years of reporting experience.

If indeed news providers shift to the Gawker model, readers—and viewers and listeners—will be in charge of discerning right information from wrong. It’s something they should be doing already.

“News consumers have a certain responsibility here too, to pay more attention to the sources that are consistently accurate,” says Brown, who serves on the Society for Professional Journalists’ Ethics Committee. “You have a certain obligation to look for truthful sources, not just sources that you agree with or that you think are entertaining.”

It’s easier said than done.

Consider again the Newtown shooter misidentification. The news organizations that reported the wrong name explained afterward that a law enforcement source gave them the incorrect information. In other words, it wasn’t their fault.

“You can excuse a certain amount of that as long as it’s corrected as quickly as possible,” said Brown of breaking news snafus like the one that occurred that morning in Connecticut. “But it would be better to look for at least one other source—not just one police official—to verify what information you’re getting.“

Another option for news reporters: Qualify the statement by acknowledging that the fact hasn’t been confirmed yet. Don’t send a breaking news alert to all of your subscribers broadcasting the shooter’s name, and don’t post the man’s photograph on your publication’s homepage—at least until that second source has come forward. “Show a little restraint,” says Brown.

But when something important happens—be it a national tragedy, highly anticipated election results, or even the moral condemnation of a food trend—it’s likely that consumers won’t hesitate to abandon their go-to news source if it fails to deliver the information promptly.

There’s a concept in business called the project management triangle. Each vertex of the triangle represents a limitation: “speed,” “quality” and “cost.” Associates can prioritize only two of the three opposing features when executing a task.

It’s easy to apply the theory to modern-day journalism: A paper or cable network with the resources to verify information will quickly produce high-caliber, trustworthy news, but it probably won’t be cheap. Or, they can cut costs and still be the first to report a story. But the result might not be factually true.

The fictional crew on “The Newsroom” forfeited speed in favor of the truth, and viewers of the HBO show witnessed little repercussion for that decision. But in the real world, the future of fact checking doesn’t follow that storyline.

 

We Are What We Click

 

In W. Somerset Maugham’s coming-of-age novel, Of Human Bondage, Philip, the young protagonist, is in conversation with Mildred, a young artist with whom he’s fallen in love. They speak briefly of a suicide that has affected the heartbroken Philip. Mildred, breezy as she is, says, “They’re a funny lot, suicides. […] Thing I’ve always noticed, people don’t commit suicide for love, as you’d expect, that’s just a fancy of novelists; they commit suicide because they haven’t got any money.”

Philip responds dryly, “I suppose money’s more important than love.”

Maugham is right in that life isn’t often the melodrama we’d like it to be, but often at the root of an existential dilemma is an ethical quandary. As the recent litigation and corresponding suicide of anti-SOPA activist, Harvard research fellow and Reddit co-founder Aaron Swartz suggests, the usually distinct line between the existential and the ethical takes on a tenebrous gray shade when ‘the digital’ gets thrown into the mix. And, as we’re in the midst of a complex ‘technological milieu’—a term coined by French philosopher Jacques Ellul. In his work, The Technological Society, this graying is far from idiosyncratic. Indeed, Ellul considers technology, and its correspondent artifacts (such as journal articles preserved in a digital library), in definitively martial terms: “Today’s war is a total war… It subjects everyone to the same way of life, puts everyone on a level with everyone else, and threatens everyone with the same death.” In other words, for questions of ethics in a digital age, there’s more at stake than money and love; freedom itself is on the line.

With this in mind, let’s examine the case of Aaron Swartz. He was found dead on Jan. 11, 2013 in his Brooklyn apartment. The New York City chief medical examiner ruled his death a suicide by hanging. Swartz was on the young end of 26, and he was found dead just a few days after the two-year anniversary of his federal arrest in January 2011 for his systematic (and perhaps, symbolic) downloading of articles from JSTOR, the navigable digital library that contains millions of academic articles from hundreds of disciplines. He was charged in 2011 under the Computer Fraud and Abuse act of 1986 with wire fraud, computer fraud, unlawfully obtaining information from a protected computer and recklessly damaging a protected computer, all in connection with the JSTOR activity, which was committed in an out-of-the-way room Swartz accessed at MIT.

The indictment against Swartz describes what sounds like a sub-plot stolen from a Hackers spin-off. According to the indictment, Swartz allegedly entered the basement of a building at MIT, where he had previously stored and hidden a laptop and external hard drive. He used the laptop to connect to MIT’s network and run a script (a not-so-subtly named ‘keepgrabbing.py’) to rapidly download articles from JSTOR that were previously kept behind a pay wall. According to the indictment, Swartz acquired around 4.8 million articles, which MIT valued at $50,000. Swartz was arrested two hours after he left MIT. After pleading not guilty, he was released on a $100,000 unsecured bail.

JSTOR chose not to pursue litigation against Swartz, but MIT was more persistent, and eighteen months of negotiation ensued between Swartz’s defense and the prosecution, with the latter being fueled by MIT to push for harder sentencing. According to prosecuting U.S. Attorney Carmen Ortiz, “If convicted on these charges, Swartz faces up to 35 years in prison, to be followed by three years of supervised release, restitution, forfeiture and a fine of up to $1 million.”

Negotiations came to a head at the beginning of January 2013. Swartz’s attorney, Marty Weinberg, drafted a plea bargain in which Swartz would not need to serve time. And though JSTOR agreed, MIT continued to pursue litigation. Elliot Peters, who took over Swartz’s case for Weinberg at the end of 2012, was ultimately unable to persuade the prosecution in their demand for a Swartz’s guilty plea, which would have branded Swartz as a felon and held him for at least six months in prison, and up to 35 years.

And then, on January 9, JSTOR announced a major expansion of their ‘Register & Read’ program which would provide free limited access to 4.5 million JSTOR articles from 1,200 different journals—a dash of salt in Swartz’s festered wound.

Those close to Swartz speculated that he struggled with depression, and as the pressures of litigation and sentencing continued to darken, undoubtedly his emotional burden intensified. It’s cheap to speculate about the ‘cause of suicide’ in general or Swartz’s reasons in particular, but within the greater digital (or technological) context, Swartz’s death is an unfortunate and unnecessary human attrition suffered in the increasingly volatile world of information. In turn, this suggests that the dimensions of the digital sphere—and its consonant ethical dynamic—are not as abstract as we would like them to be. That is, Mildred and Philip, when it comes to suicide, maybe money and love aren’t all there is.

Swartz’s attempt to free information from behind the pay walls at JSTOR and MIT was incendiary, insofar as he could have merely let things carry on ‘as usual,’ but in the spirit of open access—a digital virtue Swartz worked tirelessly to cultivate—his attempt to free information was an action with the clear intention to keep public what Swartz believed should be public. If the University, despite having specific culprits in mind, imbues its constituents (students, faculty, and staff) with the idea that its use of information be for the betterment of society, is it therefore right that the information compiled within the institutional walls be restricted (i.e.: by a pay wall)? Furthermore, if the pay wall is the restrictive agent, where is the money going? The writers aren’t getting it, and in most cases, neither are the journals. If keepgrabbing.py had an ethical motivation, that public information be kept public is the subject you’d find at its core.

But now we’ve entered some sticky territory. The prosecutors said Swartz was stealing from MIT, but Swartz and the myriad individuals and organizations supporting him were simply making free what he believed was—and is—meant to be free. And this word, free, is what’s at the core of our ethical conversation. Information, in our digital age, is the product of individuals, so if this information is restricted, it would seem that the individual is restricted, as well. But in some cases, the irony here, and what seemed to irk Swartz, is that the judgments handed down by the regulators, or restrictors, likewise affect the regulators themselves.

Here we return to Ellul’s martial language. He speaks of a war that subjects everyone. This means the subjected (Swartz) and the subjectors (MIT/prosecution). Weighed against isolated incidents like this, Ellul’s take on the situation, and choice of language, might seem overblown, or pretentious at best. But within the greater war—a cold one, of technological progress and information—our greatest enemy, both literally and metaphysically, is us. This, the convolution of ethical clarity, and in Swartz’s case, the myopic vision of the prosecution.

The key to understanding the ‘right’ path in a situation like this is less a question of applying retrospective ethical methodologies and, instead, understanding what exactly is our relationship with technology, and why this relationship with technology so lends itself to such aggressive infighting. According to Ellul, technique is the background geometry that determines all technological evolution. We are subject to this evolutionary process, adhering ourselves to the increasingly efficient mechanisms of technique. We’re now in an age where phrases like ‘digital copyright,’ ‘pay wall protection,’ and ‘computer fraud’ are sensible and viable concepts, likewise affecting our transmission and receipt of information; that is, the nature of how we communicate, and tangentially, how we related to one another. Our supposed concept of freedom has been incorporated by technique, such that our literal civic freedom can be threatened if we attempt to ‘right’ things, as Swartz did.

The subjectors, in this case, have come down with a classic case of Stockholm Syndrome. The technological milieu, as Ellul calls it, modifies the very essence of humankind, and to adjust for this change, “Man creates for himself a new religion of a rational and technical order to justify his work and be justified in it.” People like Swartz, in other words, are fighting to adjust the direction of technique, whereas the prosecution (in Swartz’s case, anyway) is simply going with the flow. But ultimately what connects all of us is the fact that we’re caught in the current of technological ‘progress.’ It is not simply that we are what we click, but that we are ever more becoming what we click.

Swartz’s weblog now stands as a testament to a mind in turmoil. In the seventh entry of his ‘Raw Nerve’ series which he describes as a ‘series of pieces on getting better at life,’ Swartz writes:

“And when the system isn’t working, it doesn’t make sense to just yell at the people in it — any more than you’d try to fix a machine by yelling at the gears. True, sometimes you have the wrong gears and need to replace them, but more often you’re just using them in the wrong way. When there’s a problem, you shouldn’t get angry with the gears — you should fix the machine.”

Swartz is speaking of the dehumanizing aspects of technique here, and what might be done to salvage freedom in the face of increased ‘mechanization.’ In this case, some argue that the ‘machine’—the machine of history, and the machine made by history—is the problem. Indeed, in The Technological Society, it’s easy to pick up shades of that, but Ellul’s solution in face of this, is that, “We must look at it dialectically, and say that man is indeed determined, but that it is open to him to overcome necessity, and that this act is freedom. Freedom is not static, but dynamic; not a vested interest, but a prize continually to be won.” Freedom, much like technique, is an evolving effort, and a cogent ethical conversation cannot be had without this dynamism in mind.

To Somerset Maugham’s precocious Philip and Mildred, I say that freedom is more important than both money and love. For Swartz, the ethical question therefore was—and is—one of freedom, but at what cost?

 

Benjamin van Loon Benjamin van Loon is a writer, researcher, and communications professional living in Chicago, IL. He holds a master’s degree in communications and media from Northeastern Illinois University and bachelors degrees in English and philosophy from North Park University. Follow him on Twitter @benvanloon and view more of his work at www.benvanloon.com.

Do Cloud Ethics Exist?

 

Cloud computing has been widely beneficial for sharing information and creating globally interconnected networks. It allows companies and consumers to access software and information that is stored remotely on a server, saving businesses the expense of having to install the software on every computer for every employee. While cloud computing has revolutionized the way in which global corporations operate, it has also jeopardized consumers’ digital privacy.

Let’s put it this way: if you have ever used a Google application like Google Docs or Google Sites, you’ve stored information via the cloud. That information is being housed in an off-site location on a remote server where users are able to access it from any internet-enabled device. Since that information is no longer solely accessible from your computer, it is likely able to be accessed by others. The problem lies in who could be accessing this information and what they are doing with it.

On Jan. 28, the Microsoft Innovation and Policy Center in Washington D.C. held a conference regarding the challenges of cloud computing in the digital age. Douglas Gansler, Maryland’s Attorney General, spoke at the event, and addressed the issue by announcing his new national digital privacy initiative, “Privacy in the Digital Age.” The initiative will create a specific unit within his office that will work to protect the privacy of online users.

“This is the biggest consumer protection issue of the 21^st century,” Gansler said. “To us, [the cloud] is very new as a problem … the technology is just so far ahead of the laws.”

Gansler, who is the current president of the National Association of Attorneys General, discussed the ways in which cloud computing gives companies access to consumers’ private information. For example, when consumers purchase items online and subsequently see advertisements for products similar to the one they purchased, that is a result of cloud companies selling consumer’s purchasing information.

Gansler questioned the ethics of cloud computing: “If these companies can look at my Gmail, how is that different than listening to my phone calls? It’s really not,” he said.

Gansler’s initiative will place digital privacy security groups in Attorneys General offices to ensure that cloud computing companies are following state and federal consumer protection laws. The initiative will also focus on geo-location tracking and cyberbullying. According to Gansler, the interdivisional privacy protection unit has reached out to Facebook in attempt to form a coalition that would enable the site to remove negative content— specifically cyber bullying—directed toward minors. Though Gansler understands that Internet companies will try to “hide behind the First Amendment,” and acknowledges that while certain “threats” are protected, he hopes that the proposed union with Facebook is successful.

Brendon Lynch, Microsoft’s Chief Privacy Officer, moderated a panel of experts who also spoke and answered questions regarding cloud computing at the conference as well.

Deborah Peel, M.D., the founder and chair of the Patient Privacy Rights Foundation, was the first on the panel to speak. She said, “We define privacy as the right to control your information as an individual. And with the cloud, that’s being taken away from us.”

Peel founded PPR in 2004 and it has been the leading advocate for consumer healthcare privacy ever since. She explained that while cloud computing has the potential to benefit the healthcare field, it has to be approached through an individual perspective rather than a corporate outlook.

“We think that decisions about privacy should be made by individuals, not by policy. We need to figure out how to do privacy in a meaningful way, with technology,” she said. “We have ethics in medicine, why can’t we have corporations and people be guided by ethics when the laws haven’t caught up?”

Urs Gasser, the executive director of the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University, views transparency as the most prominent challenge for cloud computing. He raised questions regarding the consumers’ expectations of privacy, where data is being stored, what the technology is really doing with the data.

“How do we draft the appropriate laws and implements to safeguard cloud computing? In short, we don’t know enough about the cloud and privacy,” Gasser added.

Gasser used the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA) as an example. FERPA is a federal law that grants students access to their education records and gives them some control over what is disclosed. However, since FERPA was written in 1974, without knowledge of the cloud, Gasser questions whether there should be new regulations as to how to follow the act.

Though Paul Ohm, a senior policy advisor for the Federal Trade Commission, is a proponent of the cloud, he still has concerns as to how companies are using consumer information. Specifically, he mentioned business models that collect consumer information now to sell for a profit in the future. “I would let your customers know at the outset if you’re going to monetize their data,” he warned.

Ohm also explained that since cloud computing has become so ubiquitous, all Internet users need to be aware of where they’re entering and storing their information.

“The efficiencies of the move to the cloud are hard to quarrel with,” Ohm said. “The inability to embrace the cloud or big data is a brand of dishonor, it means you’re not advancing.”

Ohm said that in order to embrace privacy, companies using cloud computing need to be held accountable to common rules and regulations that have repercussions. He explained that traditionally the people who were analyzing consumer data were universities and large companies who adhered to certain standards. Now, however, anyone with a computer can be a human researcher.

For Ohm, company cost reduction and advanced productivity are two reasons why he argues for the cloud, despite its apparent flaws. “If I had a magic wand and I could rework the Internet, I’d keep the cloud,” he said.

However, as for Gansler, he has a different outlook: “I wish we lived in a world that didn’t have all these computers,” he said, “it’d just be more simple.”

Though consumer privacy and protection laws haven’t yet caught up with the technology of the cloud, they are in the works. With initiatives like Gansler’s and with ongoing expert discussion, it is only a matter of time before privacy regulations are federally protected.

 

Emma Kantrowitz Emma Kantrowitz is a senior journalism major at the University of Maryland. She is currently an editorial assistant at the American Journalism Review and a reporting intern at the McClatchy Washington Bureau. She can be reached at kantroem@terpmail.umd.edu.

Pro-Ana and Social Media

 

British actress Kate Beckinsale once said, “I believe anorexia is the form of breakdown most readily accessible to young girls.” Indeed, it is during the teenage years that females are most emotionally vulnerable, and at risk for developing an eating disorder. In the Western world, we are continuously bombarded with not-so-subtle ideas that one of the staple requirements for being seen as sexy and desirable is being thin. In modern America, slimness connotes ethereal qualities like delicacy and grace. But when the media showcases supermodels with gaunt, undernourished bodies, the aesthetic takes a dark turn.

The accessibility of images and ideas afforded by the internet has not ameliorated the situation. Instead, it has enabled a disturbing movement- pro-anorexia. Pro-anorexics, or pro-anas, see anorexia as a valid lifestyle choice. While some pro-ana sites may include brief disclaimers about the risks of the illness, the majority of information circulated involves “thinspiration.” This includes (but is not limited to) photos of dangerously thin women, motivational quotes (“Skip dinner, end up thinner”), and personal weight loss progress reports. Throughout all of this, there is a perverse element of competition. Who will be hospitalized first? Who has the lowest BMI?

There is a question of ethics in the proliferation of pro-ana and pro-mia (pro-bulimia) sites. Should the dissemination of such information be illegal? What legal responsibility should such site owners have, if any, in their encouragement of life-threatening illnesses? There is a fervent religiosity in this community-there exist “Ana Psalms,” and the “Ana Creed,” which states mantras like:

“I believe in a wholly black and white world, the losing of weight, recrimination for sins, the abnegation of the body and a life ever fasting.”

Indeed, many pro-ana web sites seem to be penned with intelligence, and dark humor. Who owns these sites? Many have been cleverly set up through free web spaces like Weebly. Perhaps in the future, we will have stricter regulations in terms of requiring identification before web sites get set up - even free ones. This, of course, would open up another can of worms regarding the freedom of speech, and potential issues of censorship. Sometimes, such freedoms seem to come at a cost.

Free agent sites are not the only way in which the pro-ana subculture is being promoted. Social networking sites like Twitter, Tumblr, and Facebook are filled with “thinspiration.” Young girls connect to one another, share their experiences, and exacerbate their illness. Sometimes, they fast together. Other times they ridicule “wannarexics” for permeating their exclusive community. The term “wannarexic” (wannabe anorexic) is troublesome in itself. It refers to casual dieters or individuals seen as not sick enough.

Language shapes the way in which we perceive the world around us. Years ago, we didn't have terms like this; this extreme lens through which to see the world was simply nonexistent. The idea that someone can actually be a “failed anorexic” is very new and very troubling, because once someone has been marginalized in that way, their already sick mind is liable to create more self-damaging thoughts. Someone called a wannarexic one day could end up hospitalized a year from now - anorexia works fast.

There needs to be a change. Something needs to happen. Perhaps social networking sites can screen content with more discretion. Tumblr, for instance, already censors certain terms. If Tumblr were more vigilant in censoring terms like “proana,” would it help the situation? Unfortunately, new terms can be invented, or new social networking sites, that have less stringent rules. In February 2012, Tumblr claimed that they would be banning pro-ana sites. But a simple search proves that there are many sites still up and running. And while you cannot track the term “sex,” you can track “proana.”

Tumblr certainly isn't to blame for the existence of this subculture. Any web site that facilitates the dissemination of information unintentionally creates a channel through which radical ideas may be circulated. Researcher Anthony Casilli has been studying pro-ana and pro-mia communities for several years. According to Casilli, “They have a history of migrating frequently to avoid censorship. Moreover, censorship obtains the paradoxical outcome of multiplying them, mainly because bloggers and forum administrators feel the urge to duplicate and triplicate their contents for backup purposes: they don’t want to lose months of hard work because some web host’s pulled the plug on the their page or forum.” In other words, once an idea is born, it is hard for it to die. Fringe groups, while small, will always have an appeal to some. The troubling thing about pro-anorexia is that its appeal has claimed lives, and will continue to do so.

Because anorexia has a high co-morbidity for issues like depression, young sufferers of depression could potentially find out about the pro-ana community through the #depression hash tag on Twitter (or through searching for a similar mental health hash tag, like #anxiety or #BPD). Impressionable minds may be exposed to this movement, and enchanted by it. The community glamorizes anorexia as if starving were the next best thing to digital scales. When someone has depression, they are already pre-disposed to other mental ailments. At what point does simply talking about something become dangerous? At what point does recommending risky behavior become a crime? What if the person making the pro-ana web site isn't a sufferer of an eating disorder, but a sadist? These are tough questions, with no immediate answers.

Perhaps a small educational reform would be appropriate. Cyberbullying has been laughed off by some, who recommend just shutting off the computer. But online experience has the ability to cross into the “real world.” Digital experience bleeds into offline life when a young girl is taunted about a rumor that was generated online. Similarly, posting tips on how to unhealthily lose weight can affect another person in a profound and insidious way, such that pressing the Delete key doesn't undo the damage. An educational program that examines online actions and their offline effects could prove to be very advantageous.

Pro-ana and pro-mia are not the only disturbing communities out there. The self-injury community is also very active. In recent news, controversial image board 4-chan (birthplace of “Anonymous”) launched a hoax on Twitter, making the hash tag #cuttingforbieber. The group released photos, pretending to have cut themselves in response to allegations of Justin Bieber smoking marijuana. Even if the initial photos were fake, they could have triggered real responses from people who suffer from self-injury. Pro-anorexia photos are similarly damaging, and sometimes they are also fake or digitally altered.

The internet is an exciting place, but whenever people have the opportunity to create, there's a chance they will create destructive things. It's a troubling paradox, and one that will hopefully be addressed and discussed more in the future.

 

Laura Cerrato Laura Cerrato is a mental health advocate with a history of anorexia nervosa. She has not struggled with an eating disorder for 8 years now. Currently, she works as a writer, and operates www.anxietyland.com in her spare time.

Was Aaron Swartz’s Data Activism Ethical?

 

 

“If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of every one, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me.” – Thomas Jefferson, 1813.

 

Aaron Swartz was indicted on 13 felony charges for downloading approximately 4.3 million academic articles from the online database JSTOR in July 2011.

 

Swartz committed suicide on Jan. 11, 2013, while he was in the midst of a tense federal court battle over the files. The 26-year-old coding sage and activist struggled with depression, and his friends and family believe the harsh prosecution tipped him into suicidal ideation. In his 26 years, Swartz co-founded Reddit, organized Demand Progress, helped create RSS and Creative Commons and led the charge to stop SOPA and PIPA, two controversial piracy bills. His intense devotion to activism stirred young people to protest SOPA/PIPA in an unprecedented flexing of Internet hivemind muscle. Swartz possessed dizzying potential as a force for good.

 

His death inevitably colors every conversation about his actions, and commentators and reporters tend to focus on the overzealous prosecution, rather than the ethical foundation of his behavior.

 

It’s not clear exactly what Swartz intended to do with the JSTOR articles. But based on his politics, it is extremely unlikely that Swartz intended to sell them, and it’s likely that he planned to distribute the documents in some capacity. It’s not clear whether he wanted to focus on disseminating the articles in the third world, or to make them available to everyone with Internet access.

 

In Eremo, Italy, back in 2008, Swartz drafted what he called the “Guerilla Open Access Manifesto.” He laid out a persuasive case against the current information distribution system, highlighting how certain people have more privilege than others, depending on their socioeconomic status.

 

As Swartz wrote, “Information is power. But like all power, there are those who want to keep it for themselves. The world’s entire scientific and cultural heritage, published over centuries in books and journals, is increasingly being digitized and locked up by a handful of private corporations.”

 

The manifesto is a potent call to action, and one that prophesies the JSTOR download. Swartz’s declaration unambiguously called for the exact type of actions he took in the MIT closet where he downloaded the articles: “There is no justice in following unjust laws. It’s time to come into the light and, in the grand tradition of civil disobedience, declare our opposition to this private theft of public culture.”

 

The manifesto continues: “We need to take information, wherever it is stored, make our copies and share them with the world. We need to take stuff that's out of copyright and add it to the archive. We need to buy secret databases and put them on the Web. We need to download scientific journals and upload them to file sharing networks. We need to fight for Guerilla Open Access.”

 

Federal prosecutors used the manifesto as evidence of Swartz’s guilt. Though JSTOR did not press charges, the prosecutors pushed hard to punish Swartz, perhaps attempting to make an example of him to illustrate that the court would not go easy on hackers. Swartz was not initially indicted for breaking copyright; instead, he was charged with breaking the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act of 1986.

 

Lawrence Lessig, one of Swartz’s closest confidants, and a professor and cyberlaw expert at Harvard, gave a talk about Swartz at the university last week. Lessig could not disclose Swartz’s intentions for downloading the catalog because he acted as Swartz’s lawyer for a short time. But his words shed light on what Swartz may have done with the articles he downloaded.

 

Lessig mentored Swartz, and he delivered a passionate speech about his close friend, laying out a clear case against the prosecution and for Swartz’s personal integrity. However, Lessig did not mount a case defending Swartz’s actions.

 

But perhaps he should have.

 

JSTOR isn’t exactly a mustache-twirling villain, and it does not control the exorbitant fees per article – the journals they host do.

 

So it’s not as if Swartz attempted to free these articles from an institution that hoarded them to selfishly amass a fortune.

 

Swartz’s decision to download JSTOR’s catalog may not have been the most impactful way to call attention to and rectify the injustice of walled-off information. But it clearly falls into two of philosopher and constitutional law scholar Ronald Dworkin’s categories for civil disobedience. The first is “integrity based,” where someone opposes a law they feel is immoral. The second is “policy based,” where someone violates a law to illustrate that it must be amended.

 

Years after Dworkin defined the categories of civil disobedience, he outlined how important it is to avoid prosecuting them. In his essay “On Not Prosecuting Civil Disobedience,” Dworkin’s words presaged the tragic conclusion to Swartz’s saga: “our society suffers a loss if it punishes a group that includes—as the group of draft dissenters does—some of its most thoughtful and loyal citizens. Jailing such men solidifies their alienation from society, and alienates many like them who are deterred by the threat.”

 

Based on his Swartz’s prior statements on information access, it’s fair to guess Swartz saw distributing JSTOR’s information to people who did not have access to it as an act of liberation. Though his strategy landed him in big trouble, Swartz’s actions were clearly an act of civil disobedience. Instead of getting excused as a lapse in judgment from an otherwise brilliant mind, they should be viewed as an extension of his larger commitment to justice.

 

Acts of civil disobedience tend to get cast in warmer light as time passes. Hagiographers and historians praise leaders like Martin Luther King, Jr. and Gandhi, both who broke laws they felt unjust. Leaders like these did not win their victories without bruising bystanders, but such inevitable harms were dwarfed by the massive societal gains that followed.

 

When civil disobedience addresses causes that are less accessible and immediately rousing than equal rights and anti-colonialism, it’s not as easy to justify the decision to break the law. But that doesn’t make the desire to fight for open access less ethically valid. Information access isn’t quite as sexy as more flagrant human rights violations, but the exclusionary nature of the current information distribution system certainly contributes to larger systemic inequality, since the people who have access to important information are better equipped for life than those who do not.

 

Placing Swartz in the same category as famous civil dissidents like MLK and Gandhi is an incendiary gesture. And there is an explicit division between the goals of King and Gandhi and those of Swartz. The former two violated laws to secure basic rights for a specific oppressed constituency. Swartz’s fight for open information access appears, at first glance, to be much more “special interest” and narrow– but that does not mean Swartz’s cause is unworthy.

 

In the outpouring of grief and examinations of the events leading up to Swartz’s death, many luminaries, Lessig included, emphasized that they wholeheartedly endorsed the sentiments and ideals behind Swartz’s actions. However, they did not necessarily condone the actions themselves – as Lessig noted, though he believed the same thing as Swartz, “his means were not mine.”

 

Could Swartz have picked a better target? Certainly. JSTOR contributes to the roping off academic articles, but it also does not have the power to set those article prices, and it does the academic community a service by making these materials accessible. It’s hard to rally against an organization dedicated to intellectual progress.

 

So why did Swartz target JSTOR? While his exact motivations behind this particular project remain unknown, based on his previous rallying cries against information exclusivity, it is clear he wanted to grant everyone access to academic texts, not just people in positions of privilege.

 

JSTOR helps people who can access its articles, but it is ineffectual at delivering materials needed for intellectual progress to large swathes of people. And sure, most people don’t want to look at JSTOR, since it contains academic documents that generally only appeal to scholars, which makes it all the more poignant when someone who could really benefit from access is blocked by exorbitant pricing.

 

Many acts of civil disobedience have collateral damage.

 

But would releasing JSTOR’s catalog have hurt the authors and institutions supporting academic progress? As discussed above, authors do not get paid for their contributions to JSTOR. And while journals set the prices for their JSTOR articles, they do not make money off of being on JSTOR. The only thing that might become obsolete if each article available on JSTOR became accessible for free is JSTOR itself.

 

As mentioned above, JSTOR isn’t evil, and it provides a service. But the people who can take advantage of its services represent a small percentage of the global population. If activists like Swartz disseminated the information for free online and provided a more affordable or free alternative, it would give more people the chance to benefit from what is supposed to be a shared intellectual heritage. The current model obstructs discovery by keeping documents out of reach of people over lower socio-economic means and less privilege.

 

But JSTOR does provide a service beyond putting these papers online. JSTOR scans and digitizes the documents, which costs money. If JSTOR gets eliminated because all of its information is available for free and institutes no longer want to pay a subscription fee, all of the articles it would put up in the future aren’t going to magically scan themselves or find themselves a server. Chances are, even if JSTOR articles appear online for people who cannot otherwise access them, institutions and academics will still want to use the service because it puts everything in one convenient place.

 

Positive ripple effects from Swartz’s actions are already happening. After an online petition drew over 65,000 signatures, the White House moved to make federally funded research publicly available.

 

JSTOR issued a statement about Swartz up on its website. One line stands out: “We will continue to work to distribute the content under our care as widely as possible while balancing the interests of researchers, students, libraries, and publishers.”

 

This line illustrates how JSTOR serves many masters, including publishers. Nowhere in the statement does JSTOR mention how the current pricing system makes it financially unrealistic for people without privilege and money to access these materials.

 

If Swartz did intend to make the information he downloaded available to all people with Internet access, it would have been a bold act of civil disobedience. That act should have shone light on how wrong it is for institutions devoted to intellectual progress to embrace socioeconomically exclusory practices. And Swartz’s decision to expose how deeply artificial the division between the information “haves” and information “have-nots” is by bridging the gap with technology certainly falls into the categories of “integrity based” and “policy based” civil disobedience.

 

I write this as a writer on a strict budget. Researching this article proved difficult for me because of the high price of admission to many of the sources I wanted to use. Luckily for me, I have a husband who is currently attending an elite academic institution, so I accessed information using his JSTOR privileges. Otherwise, I would have spent hundreds of dollars looking at the information that informed this article.

 

If it came down to brass tacks, I could have feasibly scrounged up the money to see some of the sources. But other minds aren’t in the same position. Aaron Swartz identified a legitimate societal ill in the barrier to information access. He broke laws in a stunt that drew attention to this problem. The United States government recognized that information meant for the public was unfairly withheld. Swartz’s ambitions in his act of defiance were narrower in scope than the iconic civil dissidents that went before him. And Swartz could have chosen a better target. But as he sought to use hacking to illuminate a social justice problem, his decision to download the JSTOR articles was consistent with the ethically valid tradition of civil disobedience.

 

Kate Knibbs Kate Knibbs is a writer and web culture journalist from the southwest side of Chicago. She probably spends too much time on the Internet.

 

The Digital Competence of Leaders

 

Their status updates can spark investigations, as Netflix CEO Reed Hastings is learning the hard way. Their tweets can destroy reputations; ask former OMGPOP CEO Dan Porter. But their blogs can also be thought provoking, and their Facebook posts inspiring.

CEOs are under ever-increasing pressure to be accessible, which can translate into offering a 24/7 view into the company’s business practices, corporate culture, operations and even the CEO themselves. With such mixed results, however, how social media savvy should they personally be?

“The role of the CEO has evolved to become more visible, social, connected and accessible than ever before,” says Ann Charles, founder and CEO of BRANDFog, a New York City-based organization specializing in social media branding for leadership. “While social media is new, the nexus between communication and leadership is not. Social media, in all its forms, empowers CEOs to improve their communications skills, deepen their connections with people inside and outside the company, and emerge as more effective leaders.”

As Charles notes, there are benefits to social media engagement: social media offers real-time talk and authentic conversation, can enhance transparency and a perception of accessibility, and encourages feedback both up and down the chain of command, or between the consumer and supplier. Social media can encourage the development of the company as an industry leader; with increased communication, it is easier for an organization to rise above competitors and be seen as an authority. Social media also offers a chance to tap into a silent audience, those whose opinions are shaped by watching the online dialogue without actively participating.

Social media offers valuable insight into not only what an organization does, but also how they do it. In the modern market, business ethics are of greater interest than ever before. Some consumers watch for signs of Wall Street shenanigans, while others only patronize businesses with values similar to their own, such as green initiatives or prolific charitable endeavors.

Despite a never-ending push by digital gurus, however, a Domo survey conducted last year found that 7 in 10 Fortune 500 CEOs have no presence on major social media networks such as Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest or Google+.

Though not a part of the Domo survey, Admiral James Stavridis can be considered the military equivalent of the CEO of a Fortune 500 company, and is among the small percentage of senior leaders in any sector that actively engage in social media under his own name. Stavridis, currently commanding United States and NATO troops in Europe, is one of the military’s most prolific users of social media, openly engaging both the public and an internal audience of service members and their families through a variety of platforms.

“We are in the business of ideas, not missiles,” Stavridis says. “Our main battery, so to speak, is communication.”

Organizations funded by the taxpayer, such as the military, assume the unique responsibility of communicating with the public that funds them. Digital engagement is part of that effort. Stavridis, for instance, is “easy to keep up with by checking Facebook or Twitter,” according to the Washington Post.

"The bottom line is that a leader must ‘own the message’ and be able to articulate it,” Stavridis told American Armed Forces Press Service reporter Donna Miles. In addition to a Facebook page with more than 10,000 fans and frequent tweets, he also blogs for European Command, is a regular speaker at events like the TED Talks and often writes for military journals and trade publications.

For many CEOs in the private sector, however, the argument for becoming personally involved in social media endeavors remains unconvincing.

“Some simply don’t see the cost-benefit of the personal commitment,” elaborated Chris Perry in a recent Forbes article. “Others turn away due to the risk of well-documented personal attacks, disclosure issues or media scrutiny from off-the-cuff commentary.”

Social media engagement requires frequent, candid updates, ranging from at least once a week for an effective blog to several times each day for an engaging Twitter. CEOs, typically in their mid-50s, came of professional age in a time when privacy was more heavily valued, communication often delayed, and social media nonexistent. “Public accountability” was a much less real-time concept, and leaders may chaff at the technical burden.

“As with anything, I believe that to be a valuable participant in social media, you must really dedicate the time,” says OtterBox founder and CEO Curt Richardson. “I can admit that this stance could have something to do with my age. Ten years ago, someone told me that your view on life really changes after 50. I dismissed it then, but now know this is true. The things that are truly important come into focus--my family, my community, my employees. I want to do right by these things by making sure I can dedicate time and attention to them. As such, I'm unable to dedicate time and attention to being an upstanding member of the social-sphere.”

Regardless of the rationale for staying away from social media themselves, a lack of personal CEO accounts has no documented effect on sales; nor does the creation of “brand enthusiasm” that digital gurus tout as a major benefit do anything to convert into cash revenue. Though “transparency” is often stated as a goal of social media engagement, even if a CEO does put their own fingers to the keyboard, the reader may assume that someone other than the CEO drafted, or at the very least reviewed, content before it was posted, thereby diluting any perceived enhancement of transparency. There is also the immeasurable effect created when an audience begins following an individual, not the brand – will that audience migrate with the CEO if they retire or are fired, or will they transfer their loyalty to the brand? The former is more likely, which further chips away at any benefit gained by a CEOs personal involvement in social media

While in theory digital outreach has the potential to replace conventional mechanisms for conveying information, such as press releases, with a more user-focused experience easily adapted to include images, video and infographics, corporations remain limited by trade regulations that require the employment of press releases and dictate other required forms of communication. Social media announcements then become highly redundant for time-crunched companies. To some organizations, this represents a potential benefit, lost.

Josh James, the CEO of Domo, speaks of delegation when he encourages CEOs to get social.

“Social media isn’t a passing fad,” extolls James in a Forbes article he penned last summer. “You have to spend enough time online to at least understand the shift in the world. What gets in the way of executives getting on board? Social takes significant time and commitment, plus it’s an entirely new way of engaging with the world. But this argument strikes me as particularly odd because CEOs have people who can help filter the tweets and Facebook messages just like they filter their email and voicemail messages. “

One CEO that has mastered the art of social media engagement by delegation is retired Army General Joe Robles, head of United States Automobile Association, a financial services institution. USAA has been called the “King of Social Media Among Big Banks”. The company currently counts more than half a million followers on their Facebook page, and more than 40,000 on their Twitter account. Robles does not engage in social media endeavors himself.

Most CEOs, already laden with the operational and strategic demands of running a company, are best served by adhering to the Robles model; that is, empowering their communication experts to translate their vision through cutting-edge digital avenues, but staying out of it themselves. Doing all that they can to enhance brand awareness and esteem, including acceptance of the importance of communication and the possible place of social media tools in their arsenal, is certainly part of a savvy CEO’s job. So too is hiring well-trained and knowledgeable people to spearhead such communication efforts.

“Social media is serious business,” echoes Richardson, CEO of OtterBox,”and as with many other aspects of the company, I've decided to leave it to the experts.”

While ultimately each organization must find the right balance for their team and brand, in the social media cacophony, the voice of the expert rarely belongs to the CEO.

 

Jan Shultis Jan Shultis is a writer, painter, and photographer, and has served around the country and in Afghanistan as a veteran of the U.S. Navy.  When not exploring digital media, she can be found on the beaches of southern California or catering to her horse; she can always be reached at jan.shultis@gmail.com and through the website www.foryouraction.com.

Where Have All the Essays Gone? Check the Standard Paper Repository

 

The television commercial begins with a man in a dusty office. He’s packing the contents of his bookshelf into a box.

“Professor Fuller?” asks the woman who enters with an envelope. She is Beth Hooper, a student from many years ago who stopped by because she heard that he is retiring. After an awkward second or two, the professor brings up bonsai trees, his new hobby. Beth Hooper smiles with sympathy before offering the card she brought. Since Professor Fuller does not have his glasses nearby, she opens the envelope and reads, her shaky voice more steady with each word:

Who in their life hasn’t planted a seed just hoping that somehow something would grow? You may not remember all the things that you’ve done, but everywhere around you seeds are growing and people are blooming. I know, I’m one of them.

The professor and his former student are quiet. Then the professor speaks, his gaze on the wall behind her, remembering: “Birth order and early childhood development,” he says.

“That’s right,” Beth Hooper responds, chin trembling. “That was me. That was my paper.”

“Good work, Hooper.” Professor Fuller says. “Thank you.”

This advertisement for Hallmark greeting cards might be sentimental, but it reflects a culturally ingrained fantasy about education. We like to think that going to school—especially college—is a rewarding and personally fulfilling experience. The people responsible for that fulfillment, we also think, are the educators who stand at the front of the room and deliver lectures loaded with fascinating food for thought. We are made to think that these faces of wisdom and knowledge are fence posts along the path to success, which is where education promises to take us. We will enjoy remembering them someday, their jokes and quirks and the demands they made. We hope they will recall our merits as Professor Fuller did with Beth Hooper. (With such outstanding tutelage in her past, it’s no surprise when she announces at the commercial’s close that she is a teacher now, too.)

Hallmark’s business is to sell cards, so they can’t be blamed for reinforcing what feels good about student-teacher relationships. But can we blame ourselves for believing—or even hoping—that Professor Fuller remembered what Beth Hooper wrote about?

While it’s a heartwarming thought, it usually isn’t true that teachers remember research papers and their authors. Do the math: A college class like the one Fuller taught might have had anywhere from 15 to 100 students enrolled in each section. As full-time faculty, Fuller might have two to five sections every semester. Most classes require about three papers, so Fuller would have some number between 90 and 1,500 papers to grade during a semester. In a career that might include 40 semesters (if not more), Fuller would be looking at up to 60,000 papers. That’s a lot of reading, commenting and grading. No wonder he went Bonsai.

Professor Fuller retired before Turnitin.com came along. A product of iParadigms, based in Oakland, Calif., this web software provides educators with a set of assessment tools that automate grading. With an essay open in a window, the teacher can check for plagiarism (an “originality score” of more than 10 percent should be investigated), apply a rubric, drag and drop pre-written comments onto any page and take a look at what e-Rater, a natural language processor (NLP), notices about the writer’s punctuation, grammar and style. Before returning the paper, the instructor can record a text and voice comment.

The student opens his or her essay inside Turnitin.com to see a report with a grade on the very top. The assigned rubric percentage points are explained in neat boxes. Each comment the instructor dropped into the paper is supplemented with a summary of what the comment means. If the student received a personal text or audio comment, the report will include it (text) or, for audio, link to it. The paper is stored in the student’s account and—if the teacher allows—in Turnitin.com’s standard paper repository, a mammoth database of student writing that has been the subject of a copyright infringement lawsuit.

A judge decided against the accusation, but iParadigms is as guilty as charged to those who view Turnitin.com as yet another example of privatization of public education. In a journal article on the “Scriptural Enterprise of Plagiarism Detection,” Bill Marsh of University of California San Diego argues that Turnitin.com’s plagiarism-detection feature is a vehicle of detection and surveillance that upholds cultural norms: “the originality report – as both figure and signifying form – functions as a kind of remedial or therapeutic device designed to index and recode in relation to standards of health and normalcy.” Marsh goes on to discuss the ways in which Turnitin.com assumes ownership of the “resulting text product” and “then sells it back (as an exact duplicate) to the client.”

Turnitin.com’s grading tools might save a teacher some time, but what should we make of Marsh’s claim that it’s just a new way to employ an archaic system of assessment?

A Case Study

I’ve been teaching freshman composition at the University of Michigan’s Dearborn campus for about five years, and I’ve used Turnitin.com’s grading tools for about three semesters. Sometimes I have 75 students at a time, yet I don’t teach as many classes as some of my colleagues. Why not? I find that reading and grading sets of 75 essays four or five times in a term, along with the work of preparing and teaching class, is more than I can handle for the pay I receive. The challenge of giving my students what they expect and what they need in order to improve their writing is what led me to the Turnitin.com grading system and the time it promised to save.

Although universities have come to value the profit-pulling model of large classes taught by adjuncts and lecturers instead of tenured faculty like Professor Fuller from the Hallmark commercial, most students have not come to value scant feedback in a composition class. An essay returned unread with a few hasty marks and a grade that’s probably too high will hardly inspire a nostalgic visit and a retirement card in the future. And it certainly won’t inspire positive course evaluations. Turnitin.com is a solution: Now that I know exactly how to use it, I can grade more quickly and more effectively. My students receive the feedback they deserve through the rubric, both pre-written and original comments and my audio remark. And although they may not always like what I have to say, or may find it difficult to face an originality report that reveals patch writing and plagiarism, they are at least receiving enough feedback to address specific problems if they choose to do so.

Still, I haven’t put away the purple pen just yet. For all its merits, Turnitin.com has revealed an effect that I never anticipated: The student-teacher relationship so romantically presented in the Hallmark commercial, which is also deeply rooted in our society, changes significantly when a digital entity is invited to the party. With Turnitin.com, a third person sits between every student and me. That third person involved is not only a computer, but also a corporation.

In The Skillful Teacher, a well-respected book about teaching, Stephen Brookfield labels the psychological, cultural and contextual experiences of college students as “the emotional side of learning.” Certainly, learning affects us on every level of being, but I think that emotions and learning are more intertwined in a language course than in, say, a geology class. As a composition instructor, I’ve read private and highly personal confessions about eating disorders, suicide attempts, drunk driving tickets, hate crimes and many, many dysfunctional families. As the somewhat reluctant recipient of the trust embedded in these personal narratives, I’ve learned that students see me as more than a grammar guardian. As an English teacher, I am, in essence, a filter for life experience: Pass through my gates and – voila – you are transformed. Pass through Turnitin.com’s gates and you are…well, we don’t know for sure. Not yet.

Lynn Z. Bloom, chair of the University of Connecticut’s Writing Program, more exactly defines the unspoken psychology behind composition instruction in the October 1996 issue of College English: “When students learn to write, or are reminded once again of how to write (which of course they should have learned in high school), they also absorb a vast subtext of related folkways, the whys and hows of good citizenship in their college world, and by extrapolation, in the workaday world for which their educations are designed to prepare them” (656). I agree with Bloom that college is initiation to life, especially the middle-class life she goes on to discuss in her article. Although I want to teach students that they don’t have to write the way their parents or peers do, this is nearly impossible because I am the moderator of cultural and linguistic standards.

Turn it In, Tune In, Drop Out

Turnitin.com affirms the teacher as one who polices and mediates language and that situates the student as a consumer of his or her own writing. But iParadigms is guilty only of recognizing an opportunity for profit and giving administrators what they wanted: an easy and secure way to sustain status quo. The real problem lies with educational institutions that fail to consider what really happens when classes are overfilled, instructors are underpaid and education is increasingly digitized. Giving instructors the license to use Turnitin.com or a similar software product for grading and grade management not only affects emotional learning, it also sends a subtle message to students that their writing – so easily numbered, queued, processed and regenerated – is just another entry into the “student paper repository” and is therefore without value. The economic value is instead with iParadigms, who might be commended for creating and sustaining useful technology, and with educational institutions credited for creatively and efficiently solving pedagogical and organizational problems with software.

In 2009, the New Teacher Project (NTP), an organization that works with schools to identify good teachers and train new ones, put out a second edition of “The Widget Effect.” The catchy title refers to the core idea driving the NTP, which is that most educational institutions today view teachers as interchangeable parts, or widgets that are small but fundamental components in a machine. Schools today “conflate educational access with educational quality,” NTP claims in the executive summary.

The group signifies that change and progress is on the horizon. In the meantime, Turnitin.com will certainly grow and thrive. We can only hope that this widget for widgets will not evaporate what is real and human about teaching and learning. I plan to turn off the originality report and eRater and focus more on developing my database of personal comments. And, of course, I won’t forget the words on that Hallmark card:

Who in their life hasn’t planted a seed just hoping that somehow something would grow? You may not remember all the things that you’ve done, but everywhere around you seeds are growing and people are blooming. I know, I’m one of them.

 

Anne-Marie Yerks Anne-Marie Yerks teaches composition and creative writing at University of Michigan-Dearborn. She holds an MFA in creative writing from George Mason University.

Can There Be An Ethical Mashup?

 

What would it sound like if Beyoncé sang doom metal? You've probably never asked yourself that question. As it happens though, I'm a big fan of both Beyoncé and doom metal, and a few years back, I became unaccountably obsessed with finding out what would happen if you put them together. So I took the Garage Band software that came with my computer, plugged in an mp3 of Beyoncé’s song "Single Ladies," added an mp3 of Australian female doom metal duo Murkrat's "Plague Gestation" and…voila! I had created a work of genius (or something) for the world to admire.

My Beyoncé/Murkrat hybrid monstrosity is a (very clumsy) example of a mashup — a song created by combining two or more different recordings. Depending on how you look at it, mashups have been around for a long time: the New York Times ran a piece dating them back to Charles Ives' 1906 sound collage "Central Park in the Dark." Most mashups today though are less highbrow. One example is this crazed mashup put together by Wax Audio of Iron Maiden and the Bollywood soundtrack for Dhoom2. One more example is this mashup, also created by Wax Audio, of the Bee Gees and Pink Floyd. The video is so arch that it's hard not to see it as a deliberate parody — both of the vapidity of the Bee Gees and of the pretensions of Pink Floyd.

Parodies, of course, have considerable legal protection under the First Amendment. Thus, in the case of Campbell v. Acuff-Rose Music, the Supreme Court ruled that a song by 2 Live Crew that used samples of Roy Orbison's "Pretty Woman" qualified for Constitutional protection because it was "clearly intended to ridicule the white-bread original and remind us that sexual congress with nameless streetwalkers is not necessarily the stuff of romance and is not necessarily without its consequences.”

As an essay at the law firm McBride Law, PC notes, though, most mashups aren't parodies. Instead they "involve straight-forward, albeit very creative, borrowing of another’s work." In other words, a mashup doesn't comment on works of art; it simply combines them. Copyright law as currently constituted is generally intended to protect original artists from just such borrowing. As a result, the essay at McBride Law concludes mashups are—in most cases—probably illegal.

Because of their quasi-legal — or flat-out illegal — status, mashups are almost never sold. Instead, they are usually made available for no charge, often essentially as free samples advertising a DJ’s set or performances. Or, in some cases, a person like me who doesn't DJ may simply make a mashup available because he or she likes to share music.

I may like sharing music, but the fact remains that I don't own the rights to Beyoncés' "Single Ladies," nor to Murkrat's "Plague Gestation," nor to the Carter Family snippet at the end of my mashup. The record companies that do hold the rights could, therefore, take legal action against me.

This does, in fact, occasionally happen to mashup artists. For example, the rights holders for deceased Nirvana singer and guitarist Kurt Cobain have been quite aggressive in demanding that his vocals not be used in mashups. Similarly, when DJ Danger Mouse put together The Grey Album — a full album length combination of The Beatles White Album and Jay-Z's Black Album — he received a cease and desist letter from the Beatles' label EMI took no further legal action though, perhaps in part because Paul McCartney publicly said he was a fan of Danger Mouse's work (as, for that matter, did Jay-Z). The Grey Album is still readily available online.

The fact that artists often seem happy to ignore or even support mashups of their work suggests that the ethics of mashups can be even more complicated than the legal issues surrounding them. There's no doubt that a mashup can promote the music it borrows — I bought the Dhoom 2 soundtrack after seeing the video of that Wax Audio mashup, and listening to The Grey Album now for the first time is making me realize that I really need to purchase more of Jay-Z’s music. Artists will sometimes even deliberately use mashups as promotional tools. In 2004, David Bowie offered a sports car to the mashup artist who best combined two of his songs.

While mashups may benefit the original artists, though, they don't necessarily do so — or, at least, they don't do so in a predictable and legally sanctioned way. There is no set means for mashed-up artists to receive a fee for their contribution to the mashups.

What would a legal, ethical mashup system look like? I'm not a lawyer, but it seems like the best approach would be to use a formula that has already been in use for decades — that established to deal with cover songs. Songwriters have a straightforward way to be recompensed for use of their work. As Jeff Price of the online music distribution site TuneCore explains:

First, if the songwriter (Dolly) has commercially released her song, anyone who wants may cover her song on their release as long as the songwriter is paid the "mechanical royalty" for each reproduction. In other words, once you release a song, you cannot stop anyone from covering it. However, anyone that covers your song MUST pay you the mechanical royalty rate. If they don’t, they have violated the law and you can sue them.

This system has advantages for both the songwriters and the cover artists who use their work. Songwriters, obviously, get paid. Cover artists, for their part, know exactly what rate they will pay for using a song, and do not have to worry about songwriters denying them rights. This can be a serious problem. 2 Live Crew, for example, initially tried to get the rights to "Pretty Woman" from Acuff-Rose, but — because they were sampling the track rather than covering it — they were refused. The current system, then, allows songwriters to be fairly recompensed for their work. But it also recognizes the interest of other artists, and of society, in making that old work available for new artistic purposes.

The Constitution actually says that copyright is meant "to promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries." In other words, legally—and I would argue, ethically—copyright is intended not to protect property rights, but rather to promote art and creativity. Making sure that artists don't get ripped off is an important part of providing them with the incentive to create. But so is creating a legal climate in which artists are able to innovate without fear of being sued.

Creating mashups without compensating the remixed artists may be unethical — but strangling a new, exciting, creative art form isn't ethical either. I don't think I've done anything immoral by making Beyoncé perform with Murkrat. But I do think that everyone involved in mashups — record companies, pop stars, doom goddesses and laptop tinkerers alike — would be in a better position ethically if we could figure out a way to make mashups legal.

 

Noah Berlatsky Noah Berlatsky edits the comics and culture website the Hooded Utilitarian and is a correspondent for the Atlantic. He is working on a book about the original Wonder Woman comics.

Bradley Manning and the Ethics of Secrecy

 

February 23, 2013 marked the 1000th day of Pfc. Bradley Manning’s incarceration. In May 2010, Manning was arrested for passing classified information to Wikileaks, a nonprofit organization that has gained notoriety for exposing a multitude of secrets from various governments and regimes. The materials Manning sent to Wikileaks included videos of the 2007 Baghdad airstrike and the 2009 airstrike in Granai, Afghanistan,  250,000 U.S. diplomatic cables, and 500,000 army reports, often referred to as the Iraq War Logs and the Afghan War Logs, respectively. The video of the Baghdad airstrike later was later condensed, edited and released by Wikileaks, in an effort to expose what both Manning and Wikileaks operatives saw as crimes against humanity. On February 28, Manning pleaded guilty to 10 of the 22 charges against him, including “misuse of classified material.” Among the charges, one of the most inauspicious is “aiding the enemy,” which could mean life in prison for Manning. Notably, he did not plead guilty to that charge. Manning also read from a 35-page statement, which claimed that he intended to spark domestic debate regarding military action in Iraq and Afghanistan. It was the first time Manning openly admitted to releasing the documents.

With Manning’s trial expected to commence in June, it seems poignant to explore the ethics of secrecy in an increasingly open world. With information becoming more readily available at the click of a mouse, can anything be kept secret? At best, Manning’s actions could be construed as a patriotic stand against an oppressive, war-mongering U.S. military-industrial complex. With little regard for his own future, Manning aired out some of the U.S. military’s dirty laundry for the world to see. But at worst, Manning’s idealistic crusade is a naïve grab for attention that has caused considerable harm to U.S. military operations overseas. How can we reconcile these two views? The path to what is right is paved with murky hypocrisies on both sides.

Whatever one’s views are on secrecy, it’s clear that Manning has proven that he is brave when faced with near-certain punitive action. In his statement, Manning described how he felt watching the video of the airstrike in Iraq, particularly with respect to the apparent disregard by American troops for the lives of innocent people. "I wanted the public to know that not everyone living in Iraq were targets to be neutralized," Manning said. Indeed, the details of the Baghdad airstrike video are deeply troubling. The video depicts an American helicopter assaulting a small group gathered in Baghdad. Among the men who were attacked on the ground, one was later revealed to be a journalist and two were Reuters employees. The men were carrying cameras that were mistaken for grenade launchers. A military review concluded that the Reuters employees were in the company of armed insurgents. Crew members can be heard referring to the innocents as “dead bastards,” and congratulating one anotheron their large kills. Later, a bus comes to retrieve the bodies of the dead. One U.S. gunner can be heard requesting to engage the bus, later revealed to be carrying two children. “Come on, let me shoot!” the soldier says gleefully, almost as if playing a video game. Permission is granted, and the bus takes on massive gunfire from the helicopter. Later, ground troops carry the injured children to be evacuated. Most officials, when questioned, dismiss the video as out of context. Though the 2009 Granai airstrike video has not been released, up to 147 Afghan civilians were estimated to have been killed in the assault, with the majority of the casualties being women and children.

The Obama administration contends that by releasing classified material, Manning put the lives of American soldiers in danger and strained diplomatic relations, a charge that should not be taken lightly. But not once has the president addressed the willful killing of civilians depicted in these videos. It would appear that American troops are straining quite a few relations between themselves and civilians. This “shoot first, ask questions later” mindset is directly harmful not only to our military overseas, but also to the American people. Every innocent civilian harmed overseas becomes a martyr, and a justifiable reason for tension and hostility among foreigners. There must be an ethical distinction between Manning’s release of the videos—which he argues ought to be public domain—and the irresponsible actions of soldiers who actively target unarmed people. It seems pertinent to ask, what is more harmful?

Obama has expressed concern that Afghan informants were named in the documents, which would put them in immediate danger. Former Defense Secretary Robert Gates expressed similar concerns in 2010, stating, “the battlefield consequences of the release of these documents are potentially severe and dangerous for our troops, our allies and Afghan partners, and may well damage our relationships and reputation in that key part of the world." The immense volume of Manning’s leak of classified material does suggest some irresponsibility on his part. If Manning did indeed intend for his leaks to stir a debate, wouldn’t the videos depicting the brutality of the Iraq and Afghanistan invasions alone suffice? What accounts for the astounding half million army reports allegedly leaked by Manning? And what of the quarter million diplomatic cables? By any account, this gratuitous amount of information has done far more than spur a debate. It’s set a precedent in the zeitgeist of American history. What exactly is the extent of the damage done to U.S. military operations in the long term? Has Manning truly aided the enemy, as prosecutors argue? This factor is the most damnable in Manning’s case, and it’s also one that is the most questionable.

Manning didn’t exercise much discretion when it came to protecting the names of informants. He merely deferred the responsibility onto Wikileaks’ founder, Julian Assange, and his cohorts. Because Wikileaks is outside of the bounds of U.S. jurisdiction, one could argue that this whistleblowing organization serves as a kind of independent watchdog. That’s a rosy thought. But an organization outside the realm of prosecution is a dangerous thing. What gives someone like Assange the kind of moral authority to decide which classified documents get published?  Assange claims that the release of classified information exposes war crimes. And there is certainly a case to be made for that. But where is this principled rigor when it comes to exercising discretion with the amount of classified documents published? There is a clear line between than exposing war crimes and simply wanting to shed an unfavorable light on the United States government.

Wikileaks operatives were careful to never confirm any dealings with Manning in an effort to prevent further incriminating the young soldier. However, Assange has called Manning “America’s foremost political prisoner.”  Is this the case? Manning has framed his crime in a political context—this much is true—but were there political motivations behind his incarceration? Nelson Mandela was imprisoned for 27 years because of his tireless work to end apartheid in Africa. One of the world’s most prominent political prisoners, Aung San Suu Kyi, was detained numerous times for enduringly long periods because of her attempts to seek democratic reforms in Myanmar. Could the same kind of reverence be given to Manning? Many have already ascribed him with this stature. Manning was among the many nominated this year for the Nobel Peace Prize. Activists have waged numerous campaigns demanding his release. If the zeal of political martyrdom has already been ascribed to Manning within the three years since his arrest, it wouldn’t be controversial to posit that a favorable light will be cast upon the Manning in the broad scope of history.

This series of leaks and the controversy that followed is ultimately a catastrophe of U.S. government’s own making. During the time of both the War on Terror and the Iraq War, the United States military gave the same kind of classified access that Manning had to thousands of other soldiers, putting many soldiers in a compromised place. At the very least, the U.S. government is culpable for putting Manning in the unfortunate position of having to choose between his principles and his country. A savvy legal team might argue that Manning’s actions were intended to expose atrocities, many of which blatantly violate the Geneva Convention. It certainly is pertinent to ask what the moral responsibility of military personnel who witness such atrocities might be. After all, the United States government has agreed to a specific set of combat terms. The Geneva Convention explicitly forbids the willful harming of civilians. And in the videos released by Manning, there is clear evidence of U.S. soldiers not only targeting civilians, but of the soldiers reveling in the deaths of civilians. After witnessing something like that, what was Manning’s ethical obligation?

Manning has set a precedent by which others can follow. Among the entire U.S. military, how many soldiers have been influenced by Manning’s actions? While Manning’s leak of classified information has certainly tarnished the reputation of the United States military, Manning himself may very well be the prime extrapolation of the idea that the U.S. possesses a superior moral fortitude, precisely because it is a nation that produces ethically bound, principled minds like that of Bradley Manning’s. The free and near limitless exchange of information that has been brought forth by the digital age is something of a liberating factor for oppressive constructs of the war machine. Whatever harm has come from the release of these documents, here is the silver lining: this series of leaks by Manning is evidence enough that secrecy is becoming a thing of the past, and that secrecy in the future may be completely implausible. Though government officials can double their efforts, they’ll have to contend with an expanding, morally conscious, techno-savvy generation that could soon possess the key to a dark infinity: access to the atrocious secrets of a once proud empire—redemption through transparency.

 

David Stockdale David Stockdale is a freelance writer from the Chicagoland area. His political columns and book reviews have been featured in AND Magazine. His fictional work has appeared in Electric Rather, The Commonline Journal, Midwest Literary Magazine and Go Read Your Lunch.  Two of his essays are featured in A Practical Guide to Digital Journalism Ethics. David can be reached at dstock3@gmail.com, and his URL is http://davidstockdale.tumblr.com/.

Is Mommy Ethical?

 

I click “post” on my latest blog entry and a pang of regret hits instantly. I wonder if perhaps I shared too much about my daughter in that post. I click “edit” and begin to pare down the details. After all, some aspects of our lives together are too private, too precious for public consumption. Moments later, as I am scanning Facebook, I click on a link that leads me to a blog post containing a photo of a red-faced, screaming child, accompanied by a mother’s rant about her “toddler from hell.” I flash forward to what this child might think if he or she were to come across this blog post in ten or twenty years. My focus immediately turns inward. What will my daughter think of what I’ve shared about her life on the Internet? Even though the things I’ve written about her are flattering, is it my right to share anything about her online? Or am I participating in an ethical breach that will impact both of us in the future? I close my browser, filled with more questions than answers.

The Genre of Mommy Blogging

Unlike generations before them, the lives of many members of Generation Z (children born after 1990) are “on view” on a daily basis, perhaps none more than the children of “mommy bloggers.” According to eMarketer, a digital media analytics firm, there are nearly four million American moms who blog, and this number is growing steadily. In her article on the “radical act of mommy blogging,” Lori Kido Lopez describes the genre as such: “women categorized as ‘mommy bloggers’ are simply women who are mothers and occasionally write about their own children. The language used in such blogs is extremely informal and usually narrative, and the most popular writers employ a great deal of humor and levity to entertain their audience… Nothing is off limits to these writers, and yet the recurrent theme of writing about children positions these women in the category of ‘mommy blogger.’”

This continually emerging genre blurs the lines between parenthood, hobby, social outlet and, for some, career. At best, mommy blogging is a way for mothers to connect with others by sharing articulately rendered experiences during what can be a particularly isolating and challenging and/or joyful and inspiring time (and a range of experiences in-between) in one’s life. At worst, mommy blogs provide a forum for child exploitation: using shocking or vulgar written imagery (often accompanied by photos and videos) of one’s children intended to provoke a strong reaction, thereby gaining a larger readership and more notoriety for the blogger herself. The reality is that most mommy blogs fall somewhere within this range, between “appropriate” sharing and exploitative practices.

Both journalists and academics have weighed in on why the genre of mommy blogging is significant from a feminist perspective, positing mommy blogging as a “radical act” that subverts the themes, style and expectations associated with the traditionally masculine blogosphere. These articles address how mommy bloggers shape public discourse and perceptions of motherhood through revealing private details of their own lives, and, of course, their children’s lives. The ethical issues pertaining to mommy bloggers have been discussed frequently online over the past few years, but usually the focus is on product endorsement (whether or not it is ethical for mommy bloggers to accept free products and money for posts, their disclosure practices, etc.). Far fewer articles, however, mention the impact of mommy blogging on its unwitting subjects: mommy’s children.

What are the ethical implications of the child-based connecting and airing of grievances, and the catharsis that is mommy blogging? Moreover, how much information about one’s child is, indeed, “appropriate” to share in a public forum? The truth is there is no way to fully grasp the ramifications of the widespread trend of mommy blogging (or social media in general) on Generation Z, given the fact that the reactions and outcomes of mommy blogging on these millions of children will be different depending on the particularities of each situation. We can, however, identify some broad, concerning trends.

Parental Overshare

Of course, mommy bloggers are not the only writers who engage in sharing information about kids online; plenty of father/grandparent/aunt/uncle writers/social media users do as well. Most parents or family members who use social media, whether the medium is a blog or a social networking site, have engaged in some sort of sharing about their children (i.e. a photo, an anecdote, a video). The “appropriateness” of what is shared is a subjective (and slippery) concept that differs from social media user to social media user, blogger to blogger, reader to reader. Most often, this type of everyday online sharing is done within one’s social media community, and is not intended to be read by a wider audience.

For mommy bloggers who are motivated to reach large numbers of readers, this sharing can quickly turn into what Atlantic contributor Phoebe Maltz calls “parental overshare.” She describes the concept as such: “First, the children need to be identifiable. That does not necessarily mean full names. The author's full name is plenty, even if the children have a different (i.e. their father's) last name. Next, there needs to be ambition to reach a mass audience.”

Child Shaming

At times, parental overshare is centered on the negative, resulting in public “child shaming.” Closely related to the “bad mommy” genre (in which women blog about what horrible mothers they are in an attempt to find solidarity, redefine traditional maternal roles or attract readers), child shaming involves posting photos or anecdotes of children engaging in “bad behavior” in order to “shame them.” At times, the blogger even goes so far as to call her child a derogatory term. It’s typically intended as comedy (sometimes not), but one can’t help but wonder what types of serious psychological consequences this practice could produce in the child being “shamed.”

Potential Consequences

The future consequences of parental overshare and child shaming are numerous; these of-the-moment anecdotes will continue to exist in cyberspace as their subjects mature, potentially impacting their view of themself, the way the world views them, and their future personal and professional relationships. However, the ethical implications of parental overshare and child shaming don’t simply pertain to the future; there are immediate ethical questions to consider, the first of which is safety. When a blogger publishes details about a child’s preferences, weaknesses, appearance, whereabouts, etc., the public nature of this information only exacerbates the already vulnerable position of the child in today’s society.

Second, whether the information published on a blog is of a positive or negative nature, the very act of making it accessible to a wide audience calls into question in the notion of consent. It’s safe to assume that many mommy bloggers do not ask their child’s consent before publishing information about the child online. Even if they do, he or she may not even understand what the concepts of consent or privacy truly entail, depending on the age of the child.

When it comes to parental overshare and child shaming, it’s easy for critics to focus (or place blame) on the mommy bloggers themselves. There is another element to this equation, however. As I read through mommy blogs at all points along the sharing/over-sharing/child shaming continuum, it becomes evident that the barometer for what is socially acceptable to share about children online has been recalibrated by the mommy blogging phenomenon. If this is indeed the case, what has the role of the reader been in this process?

Mommy bloggers write to be read; without readers, the cycle is incomplete. If a blog post featuring a particularly personal and embarrassing anecdote or photo of a child gets a lot of views, then a mommy blogger who is looking to gain readership or notoriety is likely to post similar content in the future. Thus, readers who continue to visit these blogs are complicit in the disrespect and potential endangerment of children. As we move further into the cyber future, there needs to be more awareness of how children are (and will be) impacted by the actions of mommy bloggers who engage in parental overshare and child shaming, and how those who read these blogs participate in this ethical breach.

Jen Westmoreland Bouchard Jen Westmoreland Bouchard is the owner of a boutique writing, editing and translation agency, Lucidité Writing, LLC.

The Ethics of Digital Dating

 

The Internet makes it easy to find love but hard to leave it behind. In less than a minute, I can search thousands of OkCupid members’ profiles for the word “feminist,” click on a cute one (let’s call him Progressive84), stumble on his Twitter account with the same username, and read his 140-character thoughts all the way back to 2010. And if dating Progressive84 doesn’t work out, I can torture myself -- with a glass of wine in me on a lonely Sunday night -- with his cute new LinkedIn picture (hmm, he looks good without facial hair) and the inside jokes on his Facebook wall with some girl I’ve never met (but already resent). It’s enough to make a seemingly sane person shake her fist at the sky and thunder theatrically, “DAMN YOU, INTERNET!”

Is it worth Googling for a peek at a potential partner when he could virtually smear your relationship-entrails all over AskMen.com six months later? And perhaps more importantly, is it ethical?

There are three main tricky areas when trying to date ethically in the digital age:

- Searching for info about someone online before you meet – or early in the throes of dating

- Scouring the web for info after you’ve broken up

- Dissecting your failed relationship on blogs and social media sites

The “before” part of this equation seems harmless enough. You’re hardly alone: 43 percent of singles polled by the dating service It’s Just Lunch said they’d Googled someone before meeting. And Match.com’s estimates are even higher: "48 percent of single women research a date on Facebook before the first date (vs. 38 percent of men), although nearly half of single men (49 percent) think researching someone prior to a first date is unacceptable." Should you hit pay dirt and find something like a criminal record, an Internet search can save you time or even your life, considering predators have murdered people they’ve met through Match.com; one 2005 estimate said 1 in 4 rapists found a victim by using an online dating site. (If safety and not curiosity is your main motivator, consider sticking to a dating site like True.com, which claims to screen members against a U.S. criminal database in order to keep out felons, sex offenders and married people.) So where’s the line between keeping yourself safe and simply digging up dirt?

The situation becomes ethically murkier when you simply have a hankering for juicy deets about someone’s personality or past partners. If there’s nothing wrong with piecing together details from someone’s online dating profile and a cursory web search, then why do we feel guilty about it? “Googling a prospective date is shallow, intrusive upon your date's dignity, and betrays a fundamental lack of faith about life, love, and the divine sweetness of the universe,” waxes one Match.com blogger. “It's a search engine, not a crystal ball.”

Although that may be true, I think the guilt comes from knowing things about your potential date that you’re not supposed to know yet. It can be eyebrow-raising at best, and upsetting at worst, when someone mentions something you haven’t explicitly shared with them yet. Some may flat-out refuse to date you if you Google them, feeling legitimately violated. After all, you’d never actually visit a stranger’s workplace or show up at their band’s show before you met them. But doing the equivalent online is so easy and seemingly anonymous that it blurs our normal ethical boundaries, lulling us into a false sense that it’s okay. “Seemingly” is the key word – be aware that if you stumble on someone’s personal site, she may have tracking analytics in place that tell her someone in your area spent so much time on her site after Googling her. Rule of thumb: When in doubt, don’t. (Suggested guidelines for ethical dating are at the end of this piece.)

Similarly, why do we Facebook-stalk people after they’ve dumped us, becoming the digital version of a peeping Tom? “Breaking up in the age of social media addiction makes things much more complicated and it seems like the wounds take longer to heal,” mused NPR’s Shereen Meraji in a post about Facebook-stalking your ex. One commenter noted that staying away from your ex on social media was like trying to stick to a diet, easily avoiding temptation on some days and relapsing on others.

This virtual bingeing even made its way into The New York Times’ “Modern Love” column, in which one woman divulges spending hours reading an ex’s blog: “When I finally realized I had spent my workday this way, I felt kind of sick to my stomach, as if I had climbed through his bedroom window and stolen his journal from his dresser drawer.” Yet she found herself compulsively checking her ex’s blog daily and keeping it a secret from her husband – an ethical red flag for some. Only when the blog is deleted does she stop reading, concluding that, after all, it was “an intimacy that was unearned.”

To resist this “tenderness that lacked back and forth,” conventional wisdom advises liberally blocking, unfriending and deleting exes (after all, you can always reconnect after the wounds aren’t as oozy). Oddly enough, a 2012 study in the journal Cyberpsychology, Behavior, and Social Networking cautions against either Facebook-stalking your ex or completely cutting him off. The latter can cause your imagination to run wild, envisioning your ex with a great new partner. Psychology Today suggests, “The goal, then, should be to maintain a weak connection with your ex. Seeing their boring statuses…may be just enough to allow us to move on.” Easy for you to say, Psychology Today.

While Googling someone before a date can be awkward, and lurking online can be depressing, neither is as devastating as realizing your ex has blabbed about you online for anyone with an Internet connection to read. It’s the emotional equivalent of PETA dumping red paint all over your coat (which happens to be faux, thankyouverymuch). And it happens more often than people think: 95 percent of people surveyed think their partner won’t share their pictures or data, but 12 percent of people have had a partner or ex leak their personal info, Buzzfeed reports. Lying, cheating and dumping someone are the top three actions that prompt someone to leak private info about an ex  – obviously all highly emotionally charged actions, but hardly excuses for violating someone’s privacy.

Like Googling someone before you meet, spilling info about someone after you part ways is murky ethically as well. Blogs like Hollaback call out those who sexually harass others in public as a way of empowering the victim. If your partner verbally, physically or emotionally abused you and you want to warn others, that’s different than maliciously dishing dirt on someone who dumped you. Blogs like My Ex Was a Cheapskate, My Ex-Wife Is Crazy, and My Husband’s Crap clearly function differently than Hollaback, serving instead as a therapeutic exercise, passive-aggressive tactic or both. Blogging about your dating life might net those coveted pageviews (and in turn ad dollars), but the tradeoff may be resentment from friends and potential partners, as one Memphis blogger told Match.com.

Bottom line? The Internet has definitely complicated relationships, making morality a big gray area. Consider the following guidelines for ethical dating in a world that’s always online:

1. Think before you Google. What exactly are you trying to find out? Do you have any mutual friends who can vouch for this person so you don’t go down an Internet k-hole? Set some mental boundaries before you start Googling, like “I’ll check out links that suggest this guy could be bad news, but I’m NOT going to read his profiles on Last.fm, Goodreads or Twitter.” Consider asking a close friend to Google this person instead of doing it yourself, and tell them only to report back to you if there are any red flags.
2. …And think after you Google. If you slip up and go on an Internet stalking binge, ask yourself why afterward. Did you have a bad feeling in your gut? If so, listen to it – you don’t have to meet this person or go on another date, even if you agreed to in the past. Your safety is more important. When Googling, are you grasping for a reason to not go out with this person? If so, why? Are you worried they won’t like you? Are you afraid to tell them you actually aren’t interested? Or are you trying to decipher ambiguous behavior? Let me tell you from experience: Googling someone will not help you answer the question “Why hasn’t he texted?”
3. Listen to your conscience. One Match.com writer confessed to his partner that he’d been reading her deeply personal blog: “I didn't think it'd be fair to continue checking in on her online diary without her knowing I'd be doing so.” Again, pay attention to your gut – if you’re discovering information they haven’t chosen to disclose, weigh the invasiveness of the info and how long you think the relationship will last. Honesty becomes even more important if you want something lasting with this person.
4. If caught, fess up (duh). That is, if you slip up and mention something they haven’t told you yet (and that you’d only know by searching online), and they call you on it, be honest. Say something simple like “Sorry. I get a little paranoid about meeting Internet strangers for the first time” with an embarrassed smile. Internet stalking plus lying gets you a guaranteed F- in ethics.
5. Review your online presence and purge religiously for both your personal safety as much as your peace of mind and privacy. As the Brand Yourself blog suggests, “At the end of the day you won’t want your Googler to know more about you than you’re comfortable sharing.” Ultimately, we have a responsibility to erase traces of ourselves online that we aren’t okay with everyone seeing. Until you personally get burned, there’s often a delusion that only your friends read your blog, that nobody cares about that YouTube video of you from five years ago or saw your slightly offensive drunk tweet. Don’t get seduced by that thinking. Even hiding behind a username only works if you use a different one for every site.
6. Tread extremely cautiously when dishing about your ex. Thanks to Facebook’s granular (if convoluted) privacy controls, you can post a vague, angsty song lyric in your status update, but hide it from your ex. If you have mutual Facebook friends, though, it gets tricky fast. The more public the forum you use, the more careful you should be. Even your tweets and personal Tumblr or Wordpress blog should be vague because they’re just as Google-able as anything else, even if you thinkonly a handful of people read them.And if you write for a site like xoJane, The Hairpin or Jezebel, no matter HOW tempting it is to submit that “It Happened to Me: My Boyfriend Had a Poop Fetish” post, avoid defamation and major emotional fallout by resisting the urge to post names, photos (which can be reverse-image searched) and identifying details. You can mourn your relationship online, but first ask yourself, “If someone read this and had it out for my ex, could they threaten his/her safety?” Ideally, obtain permission from your partner or ex beforehand and maintain his or her anonymity.
7. Be kind. “Show compassion” and “minimize harm” are two snippets from CyberJournalism.net’s Bloggers’ Code of Ethics. Everybody says stupid stuff from time to time when tipsy, hurt or angry. Does your ex’s glib statement really need to live online in perpetuity? “I felt awful – not only because I'd said something so hurtful, but that her hurt was being broadcast to anyone and everyone who regularly read about her goings-on,” one writer divulged on Match.com’s blog. “There was no way I could undo it; my stupid comment would live on forever on her blog.” Consider extending a modicum of grace as a wise investment in your future karma.

 

Holly Richmond Holly Richmond is a Portland writer. Learn more at hollyrichmond.com.

Is Free Speech Free Everywhere?

 

The Internet has opened wide the doors of communication. It has revolutionized the way people access information, interact with others and disseminate knowledge. However, some governments go to great lengths to censor the type of information that its citizens can access. And some attempt to silence those who choose to openly criticize the government and its political leaders. In this light, freedom of expression and the right to access all parts of the Internet becomes an issue of digital ethics.

We post things to our blogs, comment in forums and register our details on websites, sometimes attracting the attention of individuals or collective entities. Conscious users may wonder how their data is being used or if others are interested in what they post online. Companies like LinkedIn, Microsoft and Twitter are starting to respond to users’ curiosity about how data is treated by publishing transparency reports. Google publishes a report twice a year, which includes stats on the accessibility of Google services as well as requests that copyright holders or governments have made for the removal of content. It also reports on other issues of importance related to Internet freedom on its blog. Google reported that, in the first half of 2012, 20,938 government inquiries were made regarding user data.

In terms of content removal, governments made 1,791 requests to remove 17,746 pieces of information. Overall, Google noted that in the last few years there has been an increase in requests from governments to take down political language. It’s this censorship trend that has raised alarm bells.

Keeping censorship activities transparent is important to more than a few Internet giants. There are several watchdog organizations that keep tabs on digital censorship. Freedom House is one organization that believes freedom is only guaranteed in democratic societies, where the government is held accountable to its citizens. For the past few years, Freedom House has put out a comprehensive report called Freedom on the Net, which highlights the censorship activities of other countries. Freedom House views digital media as an “increasingly important dimension of human rights.”

In its 2012 report, it profiled 47 countries, many of which could be divided into three categories: blockers, nonblockers, and nascent blockers. “Blockers” are defined as those governments that block a “large number of politically relevant websites, often imposing complete blocks on certain social-media platforms.” These countries—which include Bahrain, Iran and Ethiopia—mainly employ these blocking tactics to curtail freedom of expression. “Nonblockers” employ more subtle censorship tactics, i.e., not blocking sites outright, but controlling behind the scenes through enforcing strict laws on free speech or employing agents to delete website content. “Nascent blockers,” like Russia, have dabbled in censorship, but have no structured system for doing so.

Governments that have enforced tighter Internet controls recently may have been intimidated by the events of Arab Spring, which erupted at the end of 2010 in Tunisia. The tumultuous events that took place set off waves of protests throughout the Middle East. 26-year-old Mohamed Bouazizi set himself on fire in response to the abusive treatment he received from municipal officials. He represented just one of many dispirited by unemployment, unjust treatment and poor living standards. Almost immediately people began mobilizing themselves online through Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, despite media blackout attempts.

The government quickly pushed back by disabling profiles, hacking into accounts and engaging in online surveillance. More than 100 Facebook pages regarding the protests were blocked. Articles from foreign media, like the BBC, covering these events were also censored. We know that in the end President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali was eventually ousted from his post. From there the fervor for change spread to other parts of the Middle East. While social media didn’t single-handedly dismantle an already broken system, it helped to further shake things up by keeping the public abreast of the unfolding events.

China is probably the classic example of a place where its users are subject to Internet censorship on a regular basis. The government enforces a complex network known as the Great Firewall on the largest number of online users. Not surprisingly, Freedom House classifies China under the “blocker” category. In order to keep the web of censorship going, the government privately employs censors, Internet monitors, and Internet police. Social media platforms are restricted by controlling international networks and by directing local providers to censor and monitor usage.

Sometimes censorship manifests itself offline, too. In February 2011, Chinese bloggers, activists and lawyers were subject to detention, abduction and abuse after calling for a revolution in line with the events of Arab Spring. These protests were named the “Jasmine Revolution,” after the Tunisian uprisings. Telecommunication companies China Mobile and China Unicom also employed the usual censorship methods by blocking the word “jasmine” from being transmitted and from coming up in searches.

Savvy users work their way around the blocks by using code words to circumvent censorship or through alternative means. Websites like Sina Weibo, a popular microblogging platform, has been cited as one tool at users’ disposal. While the website is subject to censorship, there is still the potential to reach millions of readers. A recent study conducted in Hong Kong shows that the percentage of active users may not be as high as previously thought, but regardless of exact numbers, Sina Weibo provides another venue for people to practice freedom of expression.

Both individuals and organizations are invested in raising awareness of unlawful censorship and finding ways to counteract these activities. At the end of June 2012, the UN affirmed that the right to freedom of expression on the Internet is an issue of increasing importance as individuals continue to gain access to, and experiment with technology. It stated that the same rights people have offline should be protected online as well. From individuals who assert their own rights regardless of the consequences, to organizations like the UN and other independent entities who “out” those who try to censor behind closed doors, it’s becoming more difficult to keep excessive censorship practices hidden for very long.

It’s not just authoritarian governments that have considered online censorship either. Watchful eyes turn toward countries like the United States as well, where freedom of expression in its various forms is protected under the Constitution’s First Amendment. While constitutional freedoms are more desirable than the controlling situations elsewhere, the laws in place pose its own set of challenges. Over the years, there have been many conversations as to how much, if any, content should be censored by the government.

Obscenity, particularly when it comes to child pornography, is a big moral issue. Minors should be protected online, and in order to do so laws would need to be enacted to cover their rights. In 1998, the US government passed the Child Online Protection Act (COPA), which would criminalize websites that allow children access to objectionable material or solicit information beyond what’s needed to participate in an activity without parental consent. The law was reviewed for merit shortly after, and put to rest 10 years later. Perhaps due to its overbroad nature, COPA was ruled unconstitutional and said to infringe on adults’ right to free speech. Skeptics of the effectiveness of such censorship point to the need for parents to educate their children about using the Internet responsibly. Other bills related to online security continue to be proposed, but its success always comes down to whether or not the law treads too much on First Amendment rights.

That raises the question: Is there such a thing as ethical censorship? Under law, particularly in democratic nations, there are assurances that citizens can freely express themselves without fear of persecution or censorship. For some, even if that censorship is aimed at so-called objectionable content, “ethical” and “censorship” do not go hand and hand. Most of us can probably agree that the heavy hand that certain governments have on its people is uncalled for and unjust. But it seems that in democratic nations where freedom of expression is inherent in its laws, there won’t be 100 percent agreement on where the boundaries lie. On the one hand, there is freedom of expression. On the other, there is a desire to protect the population from potentially unsavory and otherwise harmful content. Fine line aside, it’s apparent that free speech is definitely not free everywhere. However, it’s becoming harder and harder for those who desire to quench the liberties of its citizens to do so without meeting resistance.

 

Erin Mauger Erin Mauger is a freelance writer from Milwaukee currently based in Australia. You may contact her at erin.mauger@gmail.com.

Neuromarketing - Is Big Brother in Your Head?

 

In the 1950s, marketing consultant and huckster James Vicary introduced the world to the idea that words, sounds and images hidden in advertising could compel people to buy. Two decades later he’d admitted that his research was a hoax, but the idea of subliminal messages still struck fear into the hearts of consumers. More than 200 scientific studies have been conducted that show there’s no evidence that subliminal ads motivate consumers, but now there’s a new monster in the closet: neuromarketing.

Coined in 1990 by two Harvard psychiatrists, the term “neuromarketing” refers to a science that has its roots in Plato’s theory that human behavior is driven by both emotion and reasoning. Over the years, neuromarketing has gained momentum and research has backed up its efficacy, so much so that a specific technique was patented in the late ‘90s by Harvard professor Jerry Zaltman. The resultant, Zaltman Metaphor Elicitation Technique (ZMET) is a prominent marketing tool for companies like Coca-Cola, Nestle and General Motors, and its use continues to gain popularity. Online knowledge site Tech.FAQ notes that, “While neuromarketing is a relatively new technique, it has been widely implemented in recent years and nearly every marketing agency and medium-large company in the world now uses it.”

Did you catch that?

“...nearly every marketing agency and medium-large company in the world now uses it.”

More alarming than the widespread usage of neuromarketing is the fact that this technique’s influence extends beyond simple sales of products and services. Even political parties are tapping into neuromarketing to design campaigns that tip the scales in favor of the “right” candidate by appealing specifically to swing voters.

That companies and other entities are resorting to this kind of manipulation should come as no surprise to most. Advertising has always ranked poorly when it comes to perceived ethical standards. In a 2011 survey on honesty and ethics in professions, Gallup pollsters found that advertisers ranked third from the bottom in a list of 22 professions, just above members of Congress and car salesmen. Although the Federal Trade Commission states that advertising must be non-deceptive, fair and supported by evidence to back up expressed or implied claims, it has done little to prevent companies from gaining an unfair advantage over consumers by using technologies that literally “hack your brain.”

This is Your Brain

Part of what makes neuromarketing so frightening is its ability to get inside your head—literally. Typical neuromarketing studies delve inside the brain using high-tech resources like functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), steady state topography (SST), electroencephalography (EEG) and facial coding and biometrics to look at how the physical brain reacts to, and is changed by, advertising images, sounds and other stimuli.

The brain is segmented into three parts: the new brain (logic, research); the middle or limbic brain (gut feeling, intuition, emotion); and the old, or reptilian, brain (instinct). Science shows that 95% of our decisions are made subconsciously by the reptilian and limbic brain areas. These are the areas targeted by neuromarketing; the subconscious centers that can only be accessed or understood through brain imaging and biometrics, since even we are unaware of the processes firing through our synapses at the subconscious level. Case in point: one block of research showed that more than half the people involved in a Coke vs. Pepsi taste test said they preferred Pepsi, (it produced a stronger response in the brain’s ventromedial prefrontal cortex, an area that produces feelings of reward), yet many exhibited a strong bias towards Coke in the marketplace, which had to do with feelings toward the brand.

A study commissioned by PepsiCo for its Frito-Lay division which used neuromarketing determined that although women were snacking more frequently than men, they weren’t choosing Frito-Lay snacks. Research showed that the female brain’s larger anterior cingulate cortex caused women to be more prone to feelings of guilt (presumably brought on by snacking on some Fritos). To mitigate this and encourage women to snack, Frito-Lay is changing packaging from shiny to matte bags and showing pictures of “healthy” ingredients such as spices on the packages; both of which were proven through brain imaging to prevent triggering of emotional guilt responses.

While many companies like Frito-Lay have the budget ($30 to $100 million dollars) to deeply explore neuromarketing, even smaller companies are jumping on the bandwagon using relatively inexpensive techniques such as biometrics to reduce testing costs.

This is Your Brain Online

Online marketing is on the upswing, with online retail sales predicted to reach $327 billion by 2016. With more consumers using computer technology to search, research and purchase products, more companies are turning to online advertising and using neuromarketing to stack the odds in their favor.

Recently, the Center for Digital Democracy reported that Facebook is using a neuromarketing company, NeuroFocus, to get inside consumer’s minds and fine-tune their advertising. NeuroFocus’ study centered on measuring brain response and the “degree to which messages and conceptual associations are strengthened by an experience.” They targeted the conscious and subconscious reactions of consumers who watched an ad on television versus viewing it on a webpage. Researchers were able to show higher levels of brain engagement for ads presented in a social media environment versus other venues.

Yahoo’s $100 million dollar branding campaign featured a neuromarketer-tested and approved online spot to drive more users to its search engine. Several ads were shown to consumers who were wearing EEG devices to determine which version best stimulated the limbic and front cortices of their brains—the areas associated with emotional thought and memory functions.

As if that isn’t enough, even PayPal gets into the game by using brainwave research to determine that customers prefer speed and convenience to safety and security when checking out online. Their resultant campaign pitches PayPal as “fast, easy, secure” rather than the other way around.

One of my favorite examples of online neuromarketing involves Microsoft’s neuromarketing-enhanced Xbox LIVE ads. Test subjects had their brain activity, heart rate, blink rate, skin temperature and breath rate measured while being shown several campaigns over a variety of media. Brain scans showed that consumers who played an Xbox LIVE game with interactive billboards were able to recall brands 90% more often, making advertising of video games a lucrative choice for online advertisers.

Thanks to multiple online venues, advertisers have more access to their intended prey, especially when it comes to reaching kids and teens. A 2012 report by the Federal Trade Commission finds that food and beverage marketers are taking a “Four Screens” approach to advertising; that is, tracking consumers across computer, smartphone, tablet and television, ensuring that potential customers can be reached, no matter what device they are working on. This across-the-board saturation leaves online consumers little respite from bombardment by neurally-tweaked advertising.

Brainy or Bogus?

Yet, some people disagree that neuromarketing tips the scales in favor of the seller. In fact, some neuroscientists dismiss current studies as seriously flawed. One leading authority in neuroscience, Martha Farah, Ph.D., noted that images of increased brain activity present after viewing a stimulus could be easily be interpreted as a positive rather than a negative reaction. If this were the case, an MRI or EEG result would be as ambiguous as any focus group finding. This disconnect between results and interpretation is borne out by a study that ranked Super Bowl ads by the amount of “neurological engagement” observed in test subjects that viewed them. For the 2008 Super Bowl, GoDaddy’s ad was low on the brain activity score, but it was a touchdown for their marketing campaign—the ad produced a staggering 1.5 million hits on their site.

Others outright support the use of neuromarketing and some go so far as to consider it a boon to consumers. Roger Dooley, author of the blog Neuromarketing, says in his new book, Brainfluence, “If neuromarketing techniques are used properly, we’ll have better ads, better products and happier customers...Would consumers really be better off if companies annoyed them with ineffective yet costly ad campaigns?" I, for one, would prefer a straight-up, non-manipulative advertisement that allows me to exercise my own powers of choice based on logical review of the product’s benefits. If the ad is annoying to me, perhaps I don’t really need the product or service on offer.

There is still much we don’t understand about the way the human brain functions. Neuroscience has a long way to go before significant progress is made in mapping the processes of the brain. And the jury is still out on the effectiveness of current neuromarketing efforts. However, the potential exists for access to, and control of, subconscious decision-making that casts a decidedly sinister pall on this new addition to the marketing arsenal and takes the term “Buyer Beware” to a whole new level.

 

Nikki Williams Bestselling author based in Houston, Texas. She writes about fact and fiction and the realms between, and her nonfiction work appears in both online and print publications around the world. Follow her on Twitter @williamsbnikki or at gottabeewriting.com

Eating, Ethics and Food Reviews

 

“This place is so disgusting. The waitress hated me. I forgot the name of the sandwich I had, but it was really good.”

This might not be what comes to mind when you think of a restaurant review, but with 36 million reviews and growing on Yelp, you’d better think again.

Food journalism has gotten quite a shake up the last decade with the instant and astounding popularity of sites like Yelp, Zagat and Urban Spoon, to name a few. While these sites give us a glimpse into the dining experience of our peers and can introduce us to new, unknown restaurants, it also raises the question of whether or not it is ethical food journalism, and if it really is journalism at all.

Everyone’s a critic

In a world where there’s a gray area of what constitutes food journalism and what doesn’t, it’s more than safe to say Elizabeth Schiele is a food journalist. Schiele spent 10 years in the back of the house and front of the house in fine dining restaurants in Chicago while pursuing a masters degree in Journalism. The accomplished writer, who has decades of experience covering the industry for Chefs.com, Chicago Sun-Times and the Chicago Tribune, feels there’s much more than eating and writing that goes into it.

“Food writers should have a solid understanding of how to follow a recipe and how to prepare food in a variety of ways,” Schiele said. She recommends food writers spend time in both the back and front of the house at restaurants so they can understand cooking techniques, line organization and food presentation.

Despite the level of professionalism she expects from food writers, Schiele believes Yelp to be quite useful for finding the best restaurants, and got a spot-on recommendation from the site while on a recent trip to Newport Beach, Calif.

Seattle Weekly food critic Hanna Raskin couldn’t agree more. While she feels there is a dramatic difference between a restaurant review associated with a notable publication and a review from Yelp, she does think Yelp has a positive influence in the food community.

“With the budget cuts in the print industry, there is no way we’d be able to get out there to try all of the new restaurants that are opening,” Raskin explained. “They (Yelp reviewers) are the ones out there finding these places and bringing them to our attention.”

With a passion for food and the written word, Raskin feels anything that is promoting a dialogue about food is positive.

Not all five-star reviews

According to a Local Consumer Review Survey published on the Yelp official blog, 85 percent of all consumers use Yelp. So what about the restaurant that gets a negative review? Unlike a “professional” food writer, a Yelp reviewer can hide behind a fake name and a fake photo and really, say whatever they’d like.

Andrew Zimmern, host of Bizarre Foods, has been quoted bashing Yelp saying it “essentially gives a tremendous forum for a bunch of uninformed morons to take down restaurants.”

The less than favorable feelings towards Yelp are shared with David Schoon, the founder of BeerChow.com, a website which offers suggestions on food and beer pairings, recipes and recaps from breweries.

“They write things like 'way over-priced' on something that has a 2 – 3 percent profit for the owner or 'didn’t taste good' because they don’t understand what they’re eating and how it should taste,” Schoon said.

“Granted some restaurants do deserve some of the reviews they get, but for the most part these restaurants, chefs, owners and servers work their hearts out to bring incredible food experiences to uneducated critics who are unfairly subjected to their ignorant criticism,” he added.

The Chicago Tribune’s food features writer, Kevin Pang, believes Yelp reviews have their place but thinks that a lot of the feedback on Yelp, especially negative, is based on knee jerk reactions.

“Maybe the diner had a bad day and the server wasn’t so sharp, and that’s why they get one star,” Pang said.

He says there’s more credibility to a review by a professional. “I have the luxury [of] going to many places, multiple times if need be, paid for by my company. I feel that I can give a restaurant a fair shake. Servers and chefs have bad days too – I wouldn’t want one isolated incident to be representative of the restaurant as a whole.”

The James Beard Award-nominated journalist said he follows a code of ethics established by the Chicago Tribune. In addition to each publication having their own ethical code and guidelines for food writers, the Association of Food Journalists (AFJ) has specific ethics, too.

The AFJ feel critics should visit a restaurant as many times as needed to properly assess it, and states that two or more times is ideal. Just like Pang mentioned, service, food quality and atmosphere can vary (sometimes quite dramatically) from day to day, so it’s fair to go multiple times.

The AFJ also say that while reviewing a restaurant, there should be an attempt to have the most typical dining experience, such as eating breakfast at a place that is generally known for breakfast. They also recommend sampling a full range of the menu, including items that require different cooking techniques and different ingredients. The AFJ says visiting places multiple times is especially vital with negative reviews, since you are dealing with “people’s livelihood.”

The code of ethics asks writers to remain fair, honest and to “look beyond specific dishes and experiences to capture the whole of a restaurant.” Writers should practice under their real names and make contact information general to the public and fact-check all information. The code specifically states that this also pertains to social media.

The International Food, Wine and Travel Writers Association (IFWTWA) has a similar code of ethics, and believes critics should have an accurate representation of the food and drink from a restaurant and even says writers should ask their server to assist with ordering.

Yelpers have rules too

A study by Harvard Business School concluded that restaurants see business increase between 5-9 percent with an addition of one star from a Yelp review. While this is great news for businesses grabbing rave reviews, business owners can have a love-hate relationship with Yelp. Restaurant owners may feel it is shaky territory for their business when facing writers with no filter, no one to answer to and no consequences.

But there are indeed guidelines that Yelp asks writers to adhere to. The website asks that all writers write their own reviews and use their own photos. They ask that reviewers make content relevant and appropriate, not to focus on employment practices, political ideologies, extraordinary circumstances and to only include first hand experiences. They encourage reviews that are factually correct and ask writers to update a review if an opinion has changed.

And even if Yelp users choose not to follow these guidelines, they aren’t off the hook. There have been lawsuits filed by business owners over negative reviews that were accused of being false.

Despite the idea that Yelp is a forum for complaining about a meal, Yelp can actually be a place to say how great a meal was. Results show that 39 percent of Yelp reviews are 5 stars, followed by 28 percent 4 stars, 13 percent are 3 stars and the remaining portions are between 2 and 1 star reviews. And even if there is a bad review, 65 percent of consumers read between two and 10 reviews before making a decision. So, chances are one bad review won’t break a business.

Either way, it doesn’t look like Yelp and other review sites are going anywhere, so food journalists will have to make room for Yelpers and what they have to say.

 

Kristen Kuchar Kristen Kuchar is author of Mac n’ Cheese to the Rescue and writes about food, beer and culinary travel for a variety of publications.

The Ethics of Fashion Photo Manipulation

 

When my wife worked at a women's magazine, there was an issue where the publisher wanted a Gillian Anderson cover. So the staff went looking for pictures of Gillian Anderson. Unfortunately, they couldn't find any pictures that were exactly what the publisher wanted. So they improvised. The staff took a photo of Anderson's body and added to it someone else’s more substantial cleavage.

This was done in the days before Photoshop. Back then, making a cover model more bosomy required calling up a lab with specialized equipment and paying upwards of $100 an hour. Now, of course, you can slim your model down or smooth out her wrinkles or even give her someone else's chest with a simple drag of the mouse. Or you can lighten the model’s skin, as Elle did when they put Gabby Sidibe on their cover as reported by Jezebel.

Replacing breasts or lightening skin can seem, at best, tasteless, and at worst, deceitful. And yet, artists have manipulated the human form for many, many years. For instance, consider this Rubens painting, which he called “The Little Fur,” from 1638. It's an image of Rubens' second wife, Helen Fourment.

As John Berger pointed out in his book, “Ways of Seeing,” a real woman's body couldn't possibly twist like that. In the painting, Fourment's legs are twisted and displaced in relation to her torso. If she were really standing in that position, she'd have to be made out of rubber, or else her top and her bottom would have to be disconnected. The effect is that her body appears to be impossibly dynamic, torqueing around its hidden genitalia, the "little fur" around her explicitly concealing, referencing and drawing attention to what it conceals. The painting is, then, not so much a document of Fourment's body, as it is an idealized, sexualized dream of her body — a dream in which her sexuality virtually explodes the body itself.

As Amanda Fortini points to in the New Yorker, there is a long history of such dream bodies in art and concludes that there is no real reason to get upset about Photoshop retouching. As she says, "How many adult women actually take the images in fashion magazines — artificial as they are, feats of makeup and lighting and camera angles, even without retouching — at face value?" She argues that women know that the images in fashion magazines are not real, so there isn't any real deceit, nor any real harm in the alterations. On the contrary, Fortini says, what is needed is a more open acknowledgement of the fakeness of photos. Fashion images should be seen as art or illustration — "an open fiction, a candid fantasy. If we could ditch the idea that these images bear any resemblance to reality, viewers might not feel conned or played for fools." The altered Gabby Sidibe image is no different than the Rubens image: both are artistic representations, not reality, and should be acknowledged, viewed and appreciated as such.

There are a few problems with Fortini's argument, I think. First, it's not at all clear that women, or especially girls (who Fortini rather callously dismisses in the article), know the full extent of image modification. People probably know there is some retouching done, but when they look at a picture of a celebrity, are they actually thinking that she is sporting someone else's cleavage? Or that her head may have been moved to someone else's body, as seems to have been the case with one America Ferrera cover shoot. Do they know that even supposedly "candid" images of celebrities shot on the street are retouched? A general sense that the images are not entirely accurate (which many people probably have) is somewhat different from really viscerally knowing that the images in the magazines have nothing remotely to do with any physical human body.

Even if people do know that the images in magazines aren't real, that doesn't necessarily mean that knowledge will lead to power. Just because you know something is fake doesn't mean that it doesn't affect you. After all, if fiction weren't affecting, no one would bother to read it or watch it. People knew Uncle Tom's Cabin was a story, but it nonetheless convinced many people of the wrongness of slavery. People knew 24 was just a TV drama, but nonetheless it became a centerpiece of many pro-torture arguments. People cry when something sad happens in a book, and they laugh when something funny happens in a movie. Is it really impossible to imagine that a person might compare themself to an image — even a fictional image — in a magazine?

Fontini argues that before-and-after Photoshopped images are only popular on sites like Jezebelbecause of prurience. People like to see stars looking like normal folks. But that simply confirms the fact that even women who know that perfected images are fake can also find them unsettling or oppressive.

One commenter at Jezebel responded to this before/after photo above, declaring "Oh my gosh! The first thing that I thought when I saw the Megan Fox picture was....."HELL YES! I am SOOOOO normal it's ridiculous!" Surely this woman had never thought that Fox's skin was actually flawless. But even with that knowledge, there's still a relief in seeing the evidence that you are, as the commenter said, "normal."

Endless images of impossibly thin or flawless bodies or the constant insistence that only light-skinned women can be pretty can affect how you see yourself, regardless of whether you think those images are real. This is why the American Medical Association's plea for more realistic images in magazines makes sense. As the AMA says, "A large body of literature links exposure to media-propagated images of unrealistic body image to eating disorders and other child and adolescent health problems."

So, then, should adolescent girls be kept away from that Reubens image, lest they try to stand like that and dislocate their hips? Why, if we have had images of fantasy bodies for hundreds of years, would we suddenly start to worry about them now?

First, the fact that there have been sexualized, idealized images of women for hundreds of years is not a sign that the problem doesn't exist. On the contrary, one could argue that that legacy is the problem itself. The fact that the new technology of photoshopping has history and tradition behind it means that we should think harder about the ethical implications, rather than ignore them.

And while the Rubens painting is similar to fashion photoshopping in some ways, it is also very different. Rubens’ image is meant to capture, emphasize and celebrate the subject. The painting is exaggerated, but that exaggeration is in the interest of capturing something that Rubens sees in his sitter — her energy, her dynamism. It's about her sexuality too, definitely, but it's her sexuality. Indeed, the sexuality animates her. It's in her whole body, and in the way the body turns around herself. It can't be chopped off and put on Gillian Anderson.

Most Photoshopped fashion images, on the other hand, don't have much (if any) interest in the women they are (however tenuously) representing. The goal is not to capture individuality, but to erase it, and to turn every woman into one woman with the same skin tone, the same body shape, the same legs, the same cleavage. Even when body parts aren't actually digitally swapped, the effect is to make all women infinitely, interchangeably fungible.

The fact that Photoshop creates fantasies of women's bodies isn't in itself unethical. What's unethical is the fantasy that is created— a dream of women's bodies as vivisectable, exchangeable things, best appreciated when severed from themselves.

 

Noah Berlatsky Noah Berlatsky edits the comics and culture website the Hooded Utilitarian and is a correspondent for the Atlantic. He is working on a book about the original Wonder Woman comics.

How Do We Work Towards the Ethical Evolution of Technology?

 

In wondering what we've achieved over the past century of technological progress, Philip K. Dick puts it best: Do androids dream of electric sheep? That phrase was the title of his 1968 book that later inspired Ridley Scott's iconic future-noir, Blade Runner. But Dick was asking it of the age where modern computing was just then breaching the horizon of popular consciousness. And the question itself, which packed all of contemporaneity's irony, gloom and anxiety into a six-word phrase, is perhaps now more pertinent than Dick ever imagined.

The book details a dystopian future where bounty hunter Rick Deckard is contracted to "retire" six androids. The hitch is that the androids are hardly distinguishable from their human counterparts. With our ongoing advancements in artificial intelligence, so-called 'cyborg rights' questions of technologized, ersatz emotion, it's clear that we've evolved into the age of the androids: we communicate with mobile devices, we use programmed apps to order our lives and our priorities, we use the Internet to help us recall information otherwise inaccessible to us, we use technological appendages to aid in our own sense function. So, how do we work towards the ethical evolution of technology?

A recent article by technology writer Konstantin Kakaes on Slate.com asks if we can teach computers what “truth” means. He suggests two ideas of truth: one mathematical (1+1=2), and one ‘moral,’ citing the use of the word ‘truth’ as it appears in the Declaration of Independence (“We hold these truths to be self-evident…”). On one hand, it can be said that mathematical truths are self-evident: one and one can’t possibly make anything else but two, but according to scores of 20th-century philosophers—folks like Gottleb Frege, who had one foot in mathematics and the other in philosophy—mathematics correspond to a certain logic. Kakaes quotes Frege on this point, for whom logic means, “those laws of thought that transcend all particulars.” In this way, mathematics is secondary to the ‘laws’ of logic. Math works because it abides by a certain logic, thus suggesting that if this logic could be programmed, computers could learn, at least, a type of moral truth.

Here, Kakaes refers to computer scientists’ efforts to encode certain ethical scenarios into AI programs. The Yale Shooting Anomaly is one such instance of this (and also, given the high rate of violent shootings at large academic institutions, it’s perhaps not so far-fetched an anomaly). As Kakaes explains, the scenario “aims to formally codify the fact that an unloaded shotgun, if loaded and then shot at a person, would kill the person”; 1+1=2. On a simple level, this is how some computer games work: you have ammo, you load your gun, you aim at a bad guy, you shoot the gun, and the bad guy dies. But there’s also an infinite set of non-quantifiables—environmental quality, age of ammunition, firing range, dispersion of shot, point of entry—that don’t always allow the Yale Shooting Anomaly to be ‘true’; 1+1+X=Y. A computer doesn’t know X, so it will definitely not know Y.

There is not yet a way for computer programs to account for these non-quantifiables. Kakaes argues, “to encode common-sense knowledge, computer scientists need a way to allow for events to take place.” He outlines the ‘ramification problem’ here, which is a form of John McCarthy and Patrick J. Hayes’ “frame problem” as stated in their 1969 article, Some Philosophical Problems from the Standpoint of Artificial Intelligence: how can you determine which things remain the same in a changing world?

Here is where we face the difficult question of types of truth: mathematical truths are apparently always true, whereas ‘moral’ truths (“These truths which we hold to be self-evident”) are perhaps nominally ‘true,’ for lack of a better word. But then, to what extent is mathematics a reflection of the human struggle for making sense of the world? Is mathematics a type of moral truth? Consider the nameless protagonist in Dostoyevsky’s Notes From Underground, who, in defending the human impulse towards irrationality, argues that, “The formula ‘two and two make five’ is not without its attractions.” In his own cosmology, the person for whom two and two make five is operating by a perfectly sensible concept, and may in fact be ordering its life around this ‘logic.’ This logic is in defiance of the clear, apparent, dominant logic of things, but if this person who insists on the correctness of incorrect math equations were an android, wouldn’t its insistence on irrationality be what makes it human?

In order to support the ethical evolution of technology as it now tends towards artificial intelligence and bio-technical integration, we need to understand the operations of our own human intelligence, especially as these artificialities are being made (or programmed) in our own image. It’s a Utopian vision to believe that a computer can be taught truth because it supposes there is an absolute truth that can be condensed into a string of code. In Notes From Underground, the protagonist says the only thing that’s reliable about people is that they’re unreliable. That an unreliable narrator is saying this further complicates and supports the ‘certainty’ of human unreliability.

An ethical approach to technological evolution must also account for the existential intricacies of ‘logic.’ Technological evolution is informed by our self-conception and self-consciousness. And despite our best intentions, technology is flawed as such. There is no ‘perfect’ technology, and a reason why teaching a computer ‘truth’ doesn’t just have to do with proper coding. Ideally, technology complements our human function, even if we are, in many ways, subservient to the whims of technological evolution. To assume that a computer can be taught truth assumes that we understand truth. This assumption completely discredits the existential structure of logic.

Consider the case of artist/composer/cyborg activist Neil Harbisson. Born in 1982 and later diagnosed with achromatopsia (the ability to see only in black and white), Harbisson has had a colorful career as an artist and activist. While he was in his second year at the Darlington College of Arts in 2003, he began working with Plymouth University student Adam Montandon to create the ‘eyeborg’ device, which is a head-mounted device that allows Harbisson to ‘see’ color. He was later photographed for his passport wearing the device, and it has since been treated as a formal recognition of Harbisson’s status as a cyborg, later founding the Cyborg Foundation in 2010, which is, “a nonprofit organization that aims to help people become cyborgs (extend their senses by applying cybernetics to the organism); defend cyborg rights and promote the use of cybernetics in the arts.”

In a recent interview, Harbisson says, “I believe that being a cyborg is a feeling, it's when you feel that a cybernetic device is no longer an external element but a part of your organism.” He also speculates that in the space of the next century, cyborgs will be ‘normal.’ The key here, however, is that cyborg-ness is not a logical on-off state, but a feeling. That is, it’s a human state, not a machine state. Note the existential language: the cyborg exists in the same way other conscious creatures exist; that is, in the awareness of their own existence. Currently, the cyborg exists as a human with sense functionality enhanced by technological devices. In this way, there is no concern for proper coding, as the human herself contains the proper programmatic framework for enhanced technological function and corresponding technological development, or evolution.

Perhaps the ‘truth’ impasse Kakaes discusses is a type of techno-Copernican conception, and this idea of cyborg as feeling a techno-Ptolemaic correction. In the techno-Copernican universe, the evolution of technology looks outside, to technological and robot devices as the impetus for resolving the ethical equation. A techno-Ptolemaic correction locates that impetus inwards, on us. Of the two positions, the latter is at least more human (or cyborg), and if not more ethical in its own right, it is nonetheless situated in the dynamic existential framework that allows us to have an ethical conversation about how the mode of technological evolution can and should progress. Algorithms can’t tell us what X equals; only we can. We’re already dreaming of electric sheep.

 

Benjamin van Loon Benjamin van Loon is a writer, researcher, and communications professional living in Chicago, IL. He holds a master’s degree in communications and media from Northeastern Illinois University and bachelors degrees in English and philosophy from North Park University. Follow him on Twitter @benvanloon and view more of his work at www.benvanloon.com.

I Know Who You Are and I Saw What You Did by Lori Andrews

 

Lori Andrews' book "I Know Who You Are and I Saw What You Did: Social Networks and the Death of Privacy" (2012) fits nicely on the bookshelf between Daniel Solove’s "The Future of Reputation" and Viktor Mayer-Schonberger’s "Delete."

While the title and the proposed constitution focus on social networking sites, Andrews discusses the dangers that can arise from intentionally sharing information online as well as the minute data collection that occurs behind the scenes, which exist in most areas of the Internet.

She spends a chapter on threats to identity (no clear property or privacy protections for the data-based second self), access (no clear protection for connectivity and discourse), expression (no clear protection from ramifications, particularly from employers and schools, for speech online), dignity (no clear protection from hate speech and other threats online because of CDA Section 230), location and informational privacy (difficulties and complexities involved in users protecting their own data and use of data to find legal liability), child rearing (no clear protection from use of information in divorce and custody cases), fair trial (no clear protection from lawyers, judges, and jurors abusing online information both inside and outside the courtroom), and due process (no clear protection from government acquisition and use of data collected by private parties online).

Andrews argues that transferring values, legal interests, and rights into the Internet Age has not gone smoothly. She claims social networks are necessary places for individuals to express themselves and grow, but do not provide the protection necessary to maintain values of autonomy, freedom from discrimination and prejudice, freedom from government surveillance, and connectivity. Andrews argues that all social networking sites should have to respect 10 basic rights:

• The Right to Connect
• The Right to Free Speech and Freedom of Expression
• The Right to Privacy of Place and Information
• The Right to Privacy of Thoughts, Emotions, and Sentiments
• The Right to Control One’s Image
• The Right to Fair Trial - The Right to an Untainted Jury
• The Right to Due Process of Law and the Right to Notice
• Freedom from Discrimination
• Freedom of Association

In developing these 10 basic rights, the author relies on certain assumptions about social networks that seem questionable. Andrews contends, for example, that "[p]eople came to Facebook Nation for freedom of association, free expression, and the chance to present an evolving self.” (p.13) I do not know anyone that has joined Facebook for those particular reasons (people usually claim “keeping up with friends from high school”). There are sites where individuals go to say whatever they want (e.g., 4chan) and meet individuals with similar interests (e.g., interest specific forums), and even presenting an evolving self can be done, although very difficult (this may be because the evolving self is not agreed upon as a positive aspect of society, as the right to be forgotten debate illustrates).

Another dubious claim is that “Social networks have become ubiquitous, necessary, and addictive.” (p.3) However, many people do not have Facebook profiles and get along just fine (I can personally attest to this) and  according to a recent PEW study, a majority of Facebook users have taken extended breaks from the social network site or have left it altogether.

Whether or not social networking sites are necessary to modern life and whether they all must protect a standard set of social network-specific rights aside, what I enjoyed about this book is the intolerance Andrews has for these audacious and manipulative data collection and use practices. Social networking sites, third party partners, and governments take advantage of users, are deceptive about it, and are not accountable for the harms that result. Like a number of privacy books, the examples are quite frightening (Goodreads review: “OMG. If this book were transferred into fiction, it would be classified in the horror genre.”), but unlike the others, Andrews does not want to spend much time talking about and balancing the benefits of big data or information sharing, which is very refreshing.

The quibble I have with Andrews’ book relates to the neglect of the European Union Data Protection Directive. She mentions it briefly three times in the book, but it is unclear to me why she would not promote the Directive as the global Social Network Constitution with some minor changes (her SNS Constitution holds a very American prioritization of speech). Having been in place since 1995 (work to update the 1995 version was announced in 2010 and a draft regulation was released in 2012), the EU Directive seeks to establish foundational information rights, many of which are included in the 10 rights listed by Andrews. The problems that ensue from a horizontal approach to privacy that grants vague rights and is difficult to enforce across a number of countries are those I would like to have gotten Andrews’ take on, as well as why her proposal would not suffer from the same shortcomings.

Photo courtesy of Social Network Constitution

 

Meg Leta Ambrose Doctoral candidate, interdisciplinary Technology, Media, & Society program at the ATLAS Institute, the University of Colorado

We Are Anonymous by Parmy Olson

 

Parmy Olson’s fascinating book "We Are Anonymous" will prompt readers to concoct impossible-to-remember passwords and to disguise their online identities as it takes them on an excursion through the muddy cyber land of hackers.  In their attempts to take on governments and ridicule the gullible, they take few prisoners.  Members of the loosely organized collective Anonymous have been “credited” with a plethora of cyber attacks, including one on Paypal that cost the company millions of dollars.

The book starts out by recounting the early days of the mysterious hacker group.  Olson traces the origins of the group back to early discussion boards and chat rooms, where people talked about Japanese anime, posted photography, or ranted about other random topics.

She distinguishes two sides of Anonymous: a side motivated by a prankster mindset and a side driven by activism. An example of the former is when Anonymous members manipulated Facebook users into sharing their passwords or threatened them with hacks until they agreed to share pornographic images of themselves. The activist side of Anonymous is on display in the larger and more organized attacks against specific governments and countries.

The true heart of the book is the introduction of specific individuals who were deeply involved in Anonymous.  Olson gives a gripping account of conversations that occurred among Anonymous members as they were perpetrating their attacks.  She describes the tension that erupted between various groups of hackers, their methods for attacking fellow hackers, and their attempts to reveal each other’s identities.

The book shines a spotlight on a core group of Anonymous members who broke away from the organization and developed their own hacking group, LulzSec.  The author familiarizes readers with online personalities such as Kayla, Sabu, and Topiary as they launched attacks on PBS, Sony, or the CIA and developed ties with Wikileaks.

As the book progresses, the author reveals the real identities of the LulzSec members who were arrested as well as those of other Anonymous members. Olson pays particular attention to the actions of the lone Anonymous member who acted as an informer to the FBI for eight months.

While the author defines hacking or cyber terms as they are introduced, the use of the lingo can make the book confusing to read. (It is easy to forget some terms if you put the book down for a few days.) Thankfully, Olson has included a useful glossary that can jog the reader’s memory as needed.  Another welcome feature of the book is a timeline that provides the reader with a brief history of hacktivism between 1994 and 2012.

"We Are Anonymous" provides a compelling and often creepy look into the world of Anonymous.  It likely will leave readers paranoid about their own online identities.  The book is well-suited for academics who are interested in hacking as well as individuals who are looking for a captivating story.

 

Jenn Burleson Mackay Multimedia journalism professor at Virginia Tech

The Circle by Dave Eggers

 

The Circle by Dave Eggers Alfred A. Knopf, McSweeney’s Books | 2013

Dave Eggers’ new novel, “The Circle,” follows 20-something Mae Holland through her first days as a new hire to her increasingly public role at “the most influential company in the world.” By the time Mae steps foot on the company’s 400-acre campus—complete with pristine glass and steel offices, picnic areas, tennis and bocce courts, dorms, parties, a day center and health clinic—the Circle is already well known and admired for having transformed the web by combining social media profiles, payment systems, passwords, email accounts, user names and preferences into one unified system. As described in the novel, the Circle “put all of it, all of every user’s needs and tools, into one pot and invented TruYou—one account, one identity, one password, one payment system, per person…One button for the rest of your life online.”

The Circle’s tools are the best and most dominant, and the company’s reign over data tracking and digital innovation has just begun. They introduce tools like SeeChange, lollipop-sized, wireless, real-time video cameras that can be placed anywhere on the globe, and ChildTrack, microchips that can be embedded in the bones of children. The Circle advocates the wondrous prospects for gathering knowledge, eliminating anonymity, reducing crime and increasing transparency and accountability—all made possible by their advances. But Eggers hints at, and his readers likely will imagine, the darker, more twisted side of those digital innovations.

As she moves up the ranks, Mae overcomes any initial discomfort with the Circle’s Big Brother tendencies and with the accumulating screens on her desk demanding she fulfill her participation, engagement and social networking quotas. She quickly acclimates to the Circle’s culture of information sharing, and like her college friend Annie Allerton, the senior staff member who got her the job, Mae becomes one of the 10,000 “Circlers” who throw themselves into work at the company with disciple-like devotion.

Dismissing a nagging feeling about the scope and ramifications of the Circle’s tools and networks, Mae buys in to the company’s mottos that “all that happens must be known,” “sharing is caring,” “privacy is theft” and “secrets are lies.” As she grows increasingly detached from family and the outside world, she feels most at home on campus. After all, outside the gates of the Circle, “there were homeless people, and there were attendant and assaulting smells, and there were machines that didn’t work, and floors and seats that had not been cleaned, and there was, everywhere, the chaos of an orderless world.” But the Circle works to improve all that, whether it’s through the gamification of shelter allotment, dissembling tornadoes, turning nighttime dreaming into organized thinking or doing things, like counting the sands of the Sahara, on a lark, to see if they could be done. Mae understands the Circle’s projects “as most Circlers did: as a show of strength, and as a demonstration that with the will and ingenuity and economic wherewithal of the Circle, no earthly question would remain unanswered.”

Eventually, Mae becomes the very public face and voice of the Circle—an ambassador-like representative filming and recording every aspect of her day. But when events start to expose the darker side of creating a dome of surveillance and the company unveils its plans to “complete the circle” by making membership mandatory, a colleague questions whether a private company should have the power to control the flow of all information or the ability to track people from cradle to grave. When he implores Mae to consider the implications on democracy, privacy and free will, she’s confronted with a choice to make about the Circle’s true intentions and her power to support or undermine its vision.

Eggers sets the book in the near future, but the world he imagines doesn’t feel that removed from today’s already highly connected, need to be seen and heard culture. His writing makes readers think about technological advances that sound sensible, innovative, harmless on the surface but that might ultimately test the limits of how much can our minds handle, the boundaries between the known and unknown, and our ability to judge what’s balanced, ethical and humane in a digital world.

Digital Disconnect: How Capitalism is Turning the Internet Against Democracy by Robert McChesney

 

Digital Disconnect: How Capitalism is Turning the Internet Against Democracy by Robert McChesney

The book under review offers persuasive political economic analysis of the Internet, and its complex (and ongoing) inter-relationship with capitalism and democracy in the United States. Placing his work under the rubric of political economy, McChesney charts a detailed analysis of the alliances and interplay between private/public institutions, policy and legislative debates, government, and media conglomerates that have shaped the evolving Internet architecture. In fact, McChesney’s main task in the book is to show the workings of the complex relationship of the Internet to actually existing capitalism, and how this relationship has far-reaching consequences for democracy.

The seven chapters in the book are detailed and tightly argued, and draw upon a range of policy as well as internal memos and documents from governmental, journalistic, and corporate sources to illustrate the intricate web of relations between and across the Internet, capitalism, and democracy. The writing draws upon several theoretical and popular publications on the Internet, capitalism, and democracy, and presents the arguments in simple and lucid language. The first chapter provides an overview of a range of writings on the Internet that can be grouped under two camps: celebrants and skeptics. According to McChesney, while both camps offer interesting perspectives on the Internet—the celebrants point to the emergence of the wired society a revolutionary development, the skeptics offer a contra view that suggests that digital media and the Internet is leading to increase in loneliness and social anomie—they ignore how really existing capitalism has come to define the horizon of social life. In short, McChesney indicates that both camps lack a political economy context that would help illuminate how the structures of the Internet are shaped by capitalism. What is needed, McChesney notes, is a critical examination of the notions like “free” markets that have become a sort of quasi-mythical metaphors in journalistic writing as well as scholarly literature. To this end, McChesney provides compelling arguments that urge that we consider capitalism as the third rail of Internet scholarship. 

The second and third chapters provide a powerful account of workings of political economy. McChesney presents substantial data to debunk the dominant argument that “free” markets as a panacea for the socio-economic inequities. The political economic analysis reveals how capitalism in the name of economic growth perpetuates economic inequality and social instability among the poor and lower middle class Americans, and that the digital revolution being shaped by capitalist interests does not reinvigorate democracy, rather usurped by corporations who seek to privatize social life. The sections on labor and inequality, monopoly, advertising, technology and growth, government and markets make persuasive arguments about commonsense assumptions that equating capitalism with democracy.

In chapter three, McChesney employs the political economy of communication (PEC) framework to examine how corporations dominate media, Internet, journalism, and commercial entertainment industries. It is here that McChesney offers a basic exposition of the PEC that enables a reader not familiar with the theoretical background to understand several key conceptual ideas that underpin the analytic framework. There is an interesting discussion on the foundation of journalism and broadcasting (partisan press, a public good, commercial endeavor) in United States that traces significant developments later appropriated by “markets” and commercial interests. Both chapters present key analytic arguments backed up by substantial data and history to illustrate the overarching argument of the book.

Chapters four and five explicate the relationship between capitalism and the Internet, and how the noncommercial beginning of the Internet and web was turned into commercial and privatized enterprise. McChesney maintains that his argument is against the capitalist development of the Internet, and not capitalism per se. Chapter four is a historical discussion of the origins of the Internet, the subsequent policy changes, rise of the Internet Service Providers from monopoly to cartels, rise of digital piracy, threats to free speech and privacy, etc. In chapter five, McChesney examines the monopoly of several Internet and telecommunication firms, their relationships with the military, U.S. government, and national security agencies, and the threats posed to individual liberty and democracy vis-à-vis discussions of Homeland Security, the Patriot Act, and the 2010 WikiLeaks.

In chapter six, McChesney discusses how the Internet and digital media has impacted the field of journalism by placing his overall arguments beyond the positive and negative binaries that seem to inform assessments of journalism. The PEC perspective is employed to examine the role of traditional and digital journalism (as a public good) in United States. Through a persuasive discussion of the digital forms of journalism spawned by the Internet, the encroachment of market and private interests on traditional journalism, McChesney notes that much of journalism on the Internet lacks original reporting; rather previously published information is repackaged as news. A few old media firms (New York Times) utilize the practices of digital journalism to produce original news reporting and analysis. According to McChesney, the capitalism-Internet nexus is a key feature that is driving online journalism business model. The online digital journalism models (Huffington Post) focus on entertainment, celebrities, and sex, even though their main task is to generate news content. These sites rely on volunteer labor, and aggregate content from other media. The author indicates that nonprofit activist groups like NGOs have become involved in online reporting that raises troubling questions about the boundaries of journalism. McChesney notes that although the recent initiatives by foundations to reinvigorate online journalism are commendable, they run the risk of diluting the integrity of journalism. McChesney argues that journalism is a public good and needs to be shielded from private and government interests. The author discusses some nonprofit forms of journalism in the United States (MinnPost, Voices of San Diego, ProPublica) that are producing original reporting and analyses. In closing, McChesney argues for a heterogeneous system of democratic journalism—public, community, and student media—that are based on nonprofit competition, and driven by a government subsidy system. The author proposes the concept of citizen news voucher, where “every American adult gets a $200 voucher she can use to donate money to any nonprofit news medium of her choice. She will indicate her choice on her tax return. If she does not file a tax return, a simple form will be available to use. She can split her $200 among several different qualifying nonprofit media. This program would be purely voluntary, like the tax reform check-offs for funding elections or protecting wildlife” (p. 212). The concluding chapter draws upon McChesney’s involvement in media reform, and situates his overall arguments of the book in terms of some concrete proposals for the policymaker as well as the general audience. He discusses his proposals at length and offers some compelling arguments (need for large public investments, net neutrality, and online privacy) for reinvigorating journalism as a public good in the age of the Internet.

 

Sanjay Asthana Middle Tennessee State University

Who's a Journalist?

 

You can't practice medicine or the law without a license. If you set up shop as a phony doctor or lawyer and the authorities catch you, a prison term and a substantial monetary fine may be imposed upon you.

But anyone can call himself a journalist — no college or university degree, no special training and no state license are required.

Writers and editors who work for a major media firm in the print, broadcast or Internet sectors, should have no trouble establishing their credentials as journalists for legal purposes. 

But independent purveyors of news and/or opinion — bloggers, newsletter publishers and e-book authors, for example — may not be given legal standing as journalists. If they are not recognized by the state as journalists, they cannot be protected by the so-called journalist shield laws.

A significant such case decided in 2011 illustrates the point. A U.S. District Court judge in Portland, Ore., denied protection under the state's journalist shield law to a blogger sued for defamation. The blogger had posted accusations of fraud against a finance group and its co-founder. The judge ruled that the blogger did not qualify as a journalist and the blogger was hit with a $2.5 million judgement.

Forty-nine states and the District of Columbia, as of late August 2013, have journalist shield laws. Wyoming is the only hold out. Specifics of the law and its various protections for journalists vary from state to state, but they all have one aspect in common: Journalists are exempt from the legal requirement, if ordered by a court, to disclose the source of the news or information they've published. And each state has established criteria for determining who is a journalist and is therefore entitled to the legal protections granted to the profession.

Although the federal government does not yet have a journalist shield law as of this posting, as the U.S. Senate took its August recess, it was debating the proposed Free Flow of Information Act, which would provide federal protection for journalists.

Debate on the act will resume when the Senate reconvenes. A major point to be discussed and resolved is the definition of a journalist for purposes of applying the shield law. 

Two opposing views of who qualifies as a journalist are currently being argued. One view holds that only a salaried employee of a news organization can qualify as a journalist. The other view advocates a broader definition of a journalist to include bloggers, freelance or independent reporters and writers, and authors of books.

It seems likely that responsible bloggers will eventually be granted protection under a federal shield law. Many bloggers with large followings were once well-established professional journalists working for big media before they were downsized in one of the recent economic downturns. 

Although it's not a certainty, citizen journalism — the growing trend of amateurs reporting news of a more local nature on the Internet — may also be included for accreditation as journalists under the Free Flow of Information Act.

Once an individual meets the requirements for accreditation as a journalist, new questions arise: Will the journalist act in accordance with established journalistic ethics, what are those ethics and who will enforce them?

A fair assumption is that professional journalists who derive their principle incomes from their work for various media will abide by the ethics of their craft. To enforce compliance are a battery of editors, publishers and journalism ombudsmen. Ethical violations, depending on their severity, can get a journalist fired and some could eventuate in a civil suit — a libel or defamation action, for example — or even a criminal charge for impersonating a law enforcement officer, disclosing classified documents, or breaking and entering, all crimes which one journalist or another has perpetrated over the past decades.

Another major issue likely to be debated and resolved before the Free Flow of Information Act can be voted into law and signed by the president, is the question of oversight: 

What agency of the federal government will monitor bloggers and other writers or publishers to assure compliance with the ethical standards of professional journalists?

A third question now arises: What are the ethical principles that guide professional journalists? To answer this question, we looked to The New York Times, assuming its code of ethics for journalists would be representative of the profession.

The New York Times Company Policy on Ethics in Journalism lists 139 items, including a long list of principles. These policies are generally applicable to all journalists, regardless of the media for which they work -- print, broadcast and Internet.

Briefly, and in summary, The New York Times requires ethical conduct of their writers, reporters, columnists, editors, producers, editorial writers, photographers, picture editors, art directors, artists, designers, graphics editors and researchers. The ethical guidelines also apply to contributors and freelancers:

- They must avoid conflicts of interest, real or apparent, both in their professional work and in their private lives.
- They must report facts, and those facts must be placed in context.
- They must practice a strict neutrality, impartiality and detachment.
- They must "treat readers, news sources, advertisers and all parts of our society fairly and openly."
- They must limit their political activity. Staff may not wear political campaign buttons "or display any other form of political partisanship while on the job."
- They must not "exploit for personal gain any nonpublic information acquired at work, or use an association with our news organization to gain favor or advantage."
- Misrepresenting oneself as a law enforcement officer, government official or anyone other than a staff member of The New York Times is forbidden.

There are also ethical guidelines on how to gather the news and rules against:

- Harassment in person or by telephone or computer.
- Accepting gifts and free tickets to performances, shows or sports events.
- Entering competitions and contests.
- Editorial staff members must maintain their independence when dealing with New York Times advertisers.

There are also guidelines on public speaking and fees, giving advice and writing books.

The complete guidelines governing these and other ethical issues are spelled out on The New York Times Company’s website on ethics.

A separate, but in many ways similar, code of ethics applies to photojournalists.

The National Press Photographers Association has established a rigorous guide to ethical conduct and the integrity of photographic images to which professional photojournalists subscribe. Ethical violations, such as photo manipulation, selective cropping to distort truth, or certain enhancements of an image, can result in a photographer getting fired. 

 Many organizations for professional journalists have posted and endorsed comprehensive codes of ethics for reporters, editors, publishers and all editorial personnel. Among them are:

American Society of Business Publication Editors
http://www.asbpe.org./

American Society of Newspaper Editors Statement of Principles
American Society of Newspaper Editors

American Society of Magazine Editors Guidelines for Editors and Publishers
American Society of Magazine Editors

Associated Press Managing Editors Statement of Ethical Principles
Associated Press Managing Editors Association

BBC Editorial Guidelines
British Broadcasting System

Corporation for Public Broadcasting Ethics Guide for Public Radio Journalism
Corporation for Public Broadcasting

Detroit Free Press Ethics Policy
Detroit Free Press

Gannett Newspaper Division Ethics Policy
Gannett Company Newspapers

Los Angeles Times Ethics Guidelines for Reporters, Editors
Los Angeles Times

European Codes of Journalism Ethics
Ethicnet's Databank for European Codes of Journalism Ethics

Improving Public Dialogue: Media and Citizen Responsibilities
Santa Clara University

International Federation of Journalists' Declaration of Principles on the Conduct of Journalists
International Federation of Journalists

Journalism Ethics Cases Online
Indiana University School of Journalism

Media & Ethics
U.S. Department of State

National Press Photographers Association Code of Ethics
National Press Photographers Association

National Public Radio Ethics Code
National Public Radio

New York Times Ethical Journalism Guidebook
The New York Times Company

New York Times Policy on Confidential News Sources
The New York Times Company

Online News Association Mission Statement
OnlineNews Association

RTDNA Ethics Code
RadioTelevision Digital News Association

A Scorecard for Net News Ethics
USC Annenberg Online Journalism Review

Society of American Business Editors and Writers
Society of American Business Editors and Writers

Society of Professional Journalists Code of Ethics
Society of Professional Journalists

The First Amendment Handbook
The Reporters Committee for Freedom of the Press

What are the ethics of online journalism?
USC Annenberg Online Journalism Review

 

Marc Davis Marc Davis is a veteran journalist and published novelist. His reporting and writing has been published in numerous print and online publications including AOL, The Chicago Tribune, Forbes Online Media, The Journal of the American Bar Association, and many others. His latest novel, Bottom Line, was published in 2013.

PyCon and the ethics of harassment in the tech industry

 

The tech industry’s dark, misogynist underbelly has repeatedly made headlines lately, revealing just how scary a place it can be for women, and how social media can be a tool used to share experiences of injustice and abuse. From serious allegations of rape to critiques of seemingly harmless jokes said to a friend, women are using relatively new outlets to expose harassment. However, they're inevitably subjected to a wave of dismissal, criticism, victim-blaming and even death threats, being called whiners and much worse. Where do digital ethics come in? Is using social media this way unnecessarily and publicly shaming someone?

What happened

In what is now known as "Donglegate," Adria Richards used Twitter to call out two men at March's PyCon tech conference who were joking about "dongles" and "forking." A media storm followed ­– along with both men being fired from Playhaven and Richards being fired from SendGrid. The incident stirs up multiple ethical dilemmas: Is it okay to publicly post someone's photo online without his or her permission? Is it ethical to tweet something that gets someone else fired? Does the situation change if he or she is engaging in conduct that is offensive and explicitly forbidden? If you do something wrong, do you forfeit your right to privacy?

This is how we live now

Before the digital age, holding someone accountable for harassment was definitely more difficult. The Internet gives the powerless a direct line to power (or at least publicity), whether it's sending an email to a CEO, posting a bad Yelp review or broadcasting a situation publicly on YouTube, Facebook or Twitter. Blogging and tweeting have emerged as new ways to shed light on harassment and injustice. Just look at the plethora of sites documenting cat-calling and unwanted sexual advances, such as Hollaback or the woman who posted her rapist's name and photo to Tumblr, then stickered her campus with the URL.

The invasion of privacy is an immediate concern. As fashion journalist Tim Blanks said in the documentary 'Take My Picture’, "It's a world where everything is just on display the whole time." One tweet, photo or video posted online even for a few seconds can be preserved indefinitely via a download, copy or screengrab. Relatively harmless results might be whispers, teasing or being turned down for a potential new job. More troubling consequences include the spate of suicides by those who've been the subject of slut shaming due to sex-related texts, photos and videos spread by classmates (one 17-year-old, for instance, hanged herself after a photo of herthrowing up while being gang-raped spread through her school). The idea that something you post online could kill someone should make anyone think twice.

So was Donglegate a case of public shaming and cyberbullying? Or was it holding someone accountable? Based on the answer to that, what ethical standards or guidelines apply to these kinds of situations?

Nothing happens in a vacuum

As Lindy West wrote on Jezebel, context matters. Sexual harassment training or diversity training are seen as laughably, unnecessarily politically correct formalities pursued to look good on paper or avoid lawsuits. But they’re obviously still needed to help create environments that are welcoming to people other than straight, white, affluent, able-bodied men. It's the responsibility of everyone with power and privilege to be aware of the source of these things – which, uncomfortably, may not be how hard you’ve worked. The tech industry and other male-dominated spheres need to proactively address their inherent sexism and actively work to create an atmosphere that is welcoming of people who are different.

"Dongle" and "forking" jokes seem innocuous enough, but in the PyCon context, they were yet another contribution to an undercurrent of hostility. “[S]eemingly tiny, individual acts of sexism – like innocent dongle jokes – matter,” wrote Wired’s Alice Marwick of Donglegate. “Such ‘microaggressions’ combine to reinforce structural sexism.” After being told she’d only gotten a tech job because she was a “young hot chick,” one woman in the tech industry wrote on Huffington Post. “This 'beneath the surface, only having a laugh' sexism may seem harmless at first – indeed, any woman who calls someone out about it is liable to be labeled as an overreacting feminazi – but I'll be honest with you: it's exhausting.” As female Google engineer Julie Pagano put it, it feels like “death by 1000 paper cuts.”

For Richards and other women within earshot, the jokes likely aren't simply offhand remarks, but the umpteenth reminder that they weren't welcome at PyCon. Cyberbullying and public shaming are usually the strong picking on the weak. Considering Richards’ status as a woman of color in a mostly male, mostly white environment, and that her tweet was not a malicious personal attack, her actions fall into the "holding someone accountable" camp. Could she have achieved the same result with a direct message to conference organizers instead of a public tweet? Maybe. We'll never really know.

Whose responsibility is it?

The depressing yet not unpredictable result of Donglegate was a massive uproar not against the jokers in question, but against Richards. The backlash against her is largely of the "she overreacted; she should've just talked to them" variety. But as Lindy West put it, "[A]ttempting to speak quietly with each individual man and instruct them in the particulars of rape culture and the subtle hostilities of gendered interaction might eventually begin to seem like a lost cause (and also, potentially, frightening)." A request to pipe down could’ve prompted derision from the men rather than an apology. Considering the tech industry's hostility to women, Richards' decision to tweet rather than risk further, direct and personal harassment is understandable.

The fact that she took a photo of the two men (rather than, say, asking them both their full names) is ethically ambiguous. If confronted, the men could've become defensive and refused to tell her their names. Tweeting a photo of two people who violated PyCon's guidelines is a far cry from emailing a naked picture of your ex to everyone at your high school.

Those who say Richards responded to the men’s jokes in the wrong way mistakenly place the responsibility on individual women to single-handedly "fix" male-dominated industries. Such a response misses the point. "Women shouldn't have to grow 'thick skin' to go into a technical field," PyCon attendee Eric Matthes wrote. As long as the “it’s her problem” mindset is pervasive, we can expect the victimized to continue using whatever methods at their disposal – smartphone pictures, tweets and the like – to try to get the powers that be to pay attention and pursue much-needed, high-level reform. So yes, if you harass someone, you should know that doing so is at the risk of your face getting plastered across the Internet. No one should have to endure death threats, stalking, attacks or the like. But as is abundantly clear, such treatment ironically seems solely reserved for the whistle-blowers.

Postscript

Tech blogger Loren Feldman recently made some powerful statements in a video addressing the allegations that TechCrunch founder Mike Arrington raped and beat his girlfriend. But Feldman’s remarks could've just as easily been addressing the PyCon scandal. I'll let Feldman have the last word:

"This is important. And it's not just important because of the shock value. It's important because of how we treat women in this country, and more specifically women in tech. Women in tech have it horrible…I'm already starting to see shades of blaming and vilifying the victim, and that's certainly not the way to go."

 

Holly Richmond Holly Richmond is a Portland writer. Learn more at hollyrichmond.com.

Filtering free speech in public libraries

 

My son just celebrated his first birthday. I guarantee that before he is 10, he will see some very disturbing things online, no matter how closely his mother and I watch him, and no matter how many filters and blocks we apply to his Internet access. He's already a very inquisitive child with a willful mind of his own, and I can only imagine some of the dark roads of the information superhighway he is going to roar down. It's a scary thought, and as parents, I only hope that my wife and I can be smart about protecting him as much as possible, while also preparing him for some of the truly twisted things he is bound to see.

In pondering the idea of setting up barriers between my son and the web content that, as a parent, I think he should not view, I began to think about what responsibility (if any) a public library has in helping me protect him, or other children, from digital danger. When I researched the topic, I found a recent news article about an event that occurred at a library not far from my home.

An April 14 headline in the Chicago Sun-Times trumpeted, "Man Watching Porn at Library Prompts Mom's Petition." According to the story, "After one River North mom saw a library patron using one of the free computers to watch porn, it took but a day before a fellow mom drafted a petition to block porn at public libraries."

Excuse me? Porn isn't already blocked at public libraries?

According to Bob Doyle, executive director of the Illinois Library Association, “Even if you do have filters on computers, they provide that false sense of security. There is some material that some people would consider to be inappropriate that still can be accessed, and at the same time, they can block access to constitutionally protected speech.”

The Chicago Public Library's website contains this official statement on the matter: "All Chicago Public Library locations offer free wireless access. All you need is a wireless-enabled device. The Library’s network is open to all visitors and offered without filters. No special encryption settings, usernames or passwords are required."

But what about public libraries in other cities? Do they have the same progressive approach when it comes to internet access? What about New York City, a place known for its open mindedness? Not so much.

In a long and quite convoluted section about filtering, the New York Public Library's website explains the following:

 "As required by the Children's Internet Protection Act ('CIPA'), in order to remain eligible for certain federal funding, the Library has implemented software filtering on all of its Internet-accessible computer terminals. The software installed on Internet-accessible computers at the Library protects against access to visual depictions of obscenity, child pornography, and, in the case of persons under the age of 17 years, materials that are 'harmful to minors.' Users should be aware, however, that all currently available filtering software results in a degree of both 'underblocking' (i.e., permitting access to certain material that falls within the foregoing categories) and 'overblocking' (i.e., denying access to certain constitutionally protected material that does not fall within the foregoing categories). The Library has attempted to select filtering software that best complies with CIPA while providing Library users with the broadest possible access to constitutionally protected speech and information. The Library cannot and does not guarantee that the filtering software will block all obscenity, child pornography, or materials that are harmful to minors. Nor can the Library guarantee that the filtering software will not restrict access to sites that may have legitimate research or other value. In order to help address the overblocking problem and to enhance users' access to constitutionally protected speech and information, the Library requests that all users, both adults and minors, contact the Library at filtering@nypl.org (or at such other contact point as the Library shall designate from time to time) to request unblocking of an incorrectly blocked site. In addition, any user who is 17 years of age or older may disable the filtering software in order to obtain unfiltered Internet access for bona fide research or other lawful purpose by following the instructions provided on the computer screen or such instructions as the Library shall otherwise provide from time to time."

Wow. That is some serious bureaucratese.

After reading the Big Apple's public library filtering policy, a great debate began to rage in my head. Should people be free to search and surf the Web as they please in a public library—as they can in Chicago—or should a library not only block adults from accessing "adult" material, but also restrict minors from material that might be "harmful," as is done in New York.

My conclusion? Score one for Chicago. That doesn't mean that I am in favor of people using libraries to watch adult movies, which my son might not only search for himself once he hears about them, but also might inadvertently see if he passed by a terminal on which someone was watching something explicit.

That risk, in my opinion, far outweighs the serious free speech issues associated with making often arbitrary decisions about what content a person can and can't see. If you write a policy about access to digital information that includes the phrase, "Nor can the Library guarantee that the filtering software will not restrict access to sites that may have legitimate research or other value," then you have entered a twisted Orwellian netherworld ruled by non-human software information filters. And that's much more terrifying than anything my son might see on a computer screen in a public library.

 

John D. Thomas John Thomas, the former editor of Playboy.com, has been a frequent contributor at the New York Times, Chicago Tribune and Playboy magazine.

America Wages A New Kind of War

 

America is waging a new kind of war on battlefields at home and abroad: Cyber war.

Cyber war, once the futuristic fantasy of science fiction, is today a dark and dangerous reality. And there is no Geneva Convention to guide or constrain the combatants, either ethically or morally.

There are a variety of vulnerable targets at risk domestically in an escalating global combat that pits nation against nation, starting with computer against computer.

These include power grids, transportation hubs, financial operations and networks, computer-driven critical industries such as utilities, corporate intellectual property such as patents and proprietary software, military computer networks and anything else controlled, archived, monitored or powered by computers.

Though no blood is shed in cyber warfare, the damage can be catastrophic, and the threat to the U.S. grows daily. But the U.S. has been fighting back, defensively and aggressively.

As an aggressor, the U.S. reportedly teamed up with Israel to launch an attack in 2007 on Iran's nuclear program with a computer virus called Stuxnet. The cyber attack targeted a uranium enrichment facility causing a disruptive slowdown in operations.

Conversely, Iran is suspected of launching cyber attacks on U.S. banks and Saudi Arabian oil companies.

So far, cyber enemies of the U.S. have successfully penetrated or outflanked our defenses, despite counter measures.

In recent testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee, James Clapper, Director of National Intelligence, said, "It's hard to overemphasize the significance [of these threats.]"

The list of America's cyber enemies, according to Mr. Clapper, includes state-sponsored spies and hackers, criminal hackers and cyber terrorists.

Perhaps the most formidable combatant is a secret Chinese military unit based in Shanghai that was recently identified by Mandiant, an American computer security firm, as the source of espionage operations against 141 U.S. companies.

According to a Mandiant report, the Chinese government allegedly stole technology blueprints, proprietary manufacturing processes, test results, business plans, pricing documents, partnership agreements, emails and contact information.

In 2009, the U.S. created a new military command whose mission is to provide cyber security, principally for military networks. The commanding officer is a four-star general, reflecting the serious nature of the threat. But United States Cyber Command (USCYBERCOM) cannot protect attacks against all U.S. businesses, targets frequently attacked by Russian and Chinese cyber warriors.

"War is hell," said U.S. Civil War General William T. Sherman, who was a contributor to that idea. In Sherman's famous march to the sea through Georgia in 1864, his troops burned military and civilian targets, destroying infrastructure, industry, agriculture and most anything else that could be torched.

With the signing of the first Geneva Convention in 1864 by most European nations, war had the potential to be a little less hellish if the signatories lived up to their commitments.

The Conventions were expanded several times over the next 100 years or more, through 1949 and in 1977. The U.S. has signed on to all of them with the exception of two protocols added in 1977.

Designed for the “old-fashioned” wars that were fought on land, on sea and in the air, the Geneva Conventions did not envision cyber wars, which are fought computer against computer in cyberspace. Consequently, there are currently no agreements in place governing the conduct of cyber combat.

Included among the Geneva Conventions are rules governing:

• - The protection and rights of civilians.
• - The humane treatment of the wounded and sick.
• - The protection of medical personnel.
• - A ban on targeting hospitals and medical facilities and transport vehicles or ships.
• - A ban on torture
• - The humane treatment of prisoners of war.
• - Rules governing military forces occupying foreign countries.
• - A ban on targeting critical infrastructure elements such as nuclear plants and dams.

Rules were enforced through domestic legislation and courts, by an international tribunal established by the United Nations Security Council and by the International Criminal Court, provided the country accused of a violation was a participant in it.

The International Red Cross and Red Crescent monitored humanitarian aspects of the Conventions.

Cyber wars, by contrast, have no rules or conventions, written or unwritten, and consequently can be exceedingly disastrous for its casualties.

A Geneva Convention for cyber wars, signed by the principal combatants – China, the U.S., Russia, Iran and others – might agree to the following provisions:

• - The protection and rights of civilians -- meaning non-combatant individuals will not be targeted or attacked; not their computers or any mobile devices.
• - The protection of intellectual property – patents, proprietary software, blueprints, product formulas, etc.
• - A ban on targeting hospitals and medical facilities and transport vehicles or ships, and their digitized communication devices.
• - A ban on targeting critical infrastructure elements run by computers and vulnerable to attack, such as power grids, nuclear plants and dams.
• - A ban on targeting mass communication operations, such as print, broadcast and Internet sources.
• - A ban against targeting civilian aviation, including air traffic control centers and personnel.

Assuming all the above points would be agreed to, what would be left for the cyber warriors to fight? The answer is mostly military targets, which under the Geneva Conventions were the only legitimate targets of yesteryears’ wars.

Stateless terrorists waging an ongoing cyber war would, of course, not be inclined to sign the agreement. Nor would criminal hackers who steal data, identity, intellectual property and even cash, and individual hackers driven by malice or destructive impulses.

But for nation states who signed the cyber war conventions, enforcement protocols could be based on those used for signatories of the Geneva Convention.

Rather than rely, however, on the goodwill of nations that signed a treaty, experts say the U.S. needs better defenses and deterrents against this new kind of war.

A major deterrent to attack by nations is the threat of military retaliation against the attacking state, assuming the U.S. knows the source of the attack. Terrorist attacks most likely cannot be deterred by the threat of a direct retaliatory attack on the aggressor.

Without an international treaty spelling out the rules, requirements and restrictions of cyber warfare, much like the Geneva Conventions, all-out cyber war is possible and the attacks could be increasingly more destructive.

Meanwhile, newly appointed Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel recently called cyber warfare, "the greatest threat to our security – economic security, political security, diplomatic security, military security – that confronts us."

 

Marc Davis Marc Davis is a veteran journalist and published novelist. His reporting and writing has been published in numerous print and online publications including AOL, The Chicago Tribune, Forbes Online Media, The Journal of the American Bar Association, and many others. His latest novel, Bottom Line, was published in 2013.

The Black Market of E-Waste

 

My mom’s old Compaq has been sitting on a desk alongside her new Mac for several months now. I promised to clear her files and get rid of it as soon as I found a local recycler. It was the same process I went through last year when I replaced my five-year-old Sony VAIO, a computer that seemed archaic at the time. We’re just two of the many people who accumulate electronics and purchase new ones every time something goes wrong or it’s “about time” to upgrade.

A production structure that revolves around creating one-and-done parts that are too expensive to fix and too passé to try is a fairly common concept for manufacturers. Planned obsolescence has resulted in cluttered landfills, and recyclers are not guaranteed to profit from them if processing costs outweigh material sales. It’s a problem that has given rise to a surprisingly unconventional black market – the sale and transport of electronic waste to undeveloped countries.

Electronic waste, or “e-waste” for short, is an informal term that applies to electronic products that have been discarded by their owners. Among other things, it refers to computers, TVs, music players, phones, and kitchen appliances. E-waste typically contains hazardous materials that are linked to various environmental and health problems, but some discarded electronics can be refurbished or dismantled to retrieve precious metals.

Regulated U.S. recycling isn’t what you’d call a booming business, and the process of product disassembly isn’t safe, easy or cheap. It costs less to pay middlemen to handle business deals overseas than it does to invest in processing equipment that would make recycling safer for employees and the environment. Rather than processing everything themselves, recyclers often send their e-waste to China, India, Pakistan, Ghana, and other countries where labor costs are low and environmental laws aren’t well enforced. With little oversight or federal laws preventing recyclers from moving e-waste abroad, shipping used electronics is fairly easy to get away with.

The U.S. is the largest producer of e-waste in the world. According to a 2010 press release by the United Nations Environment Programme, we throw away approximately 3 million tons of it each year. The U.S. is also the only developed country that has not ratified the Basel Convention, an international treaty created to stop the transfer of hazardous waste from developed nations to impoverished ones. On the list of 179 states that ratified the agreement (180 after Afghanistan’s ratification enters into force this June), the U.S. stands out like a sore thumb as a missing party. Recyclers who dump their e-waste overseas often do it under false pretenses, claiming that electronics and electronic scraps will still be recycled.

But the U.S. recycling businesses that pay fair wages and abide by safety regulations bear little resemblance to the low paying, unsafe recycling processes used by developing nations. China has outlawed the import of e-waste, but the lax regulations keep the underground business thriving. The Chinese government turns a blind eye to the trade, in part because so many of its citizens are dependent on it. According to the Basel Action Network (BAN), an organization dedicated to stopping toxic trade, approximately 80 percent of e-waste collected for recycling in the U.S. is shipped to China, frequently to worksites in Guiyu.

The region of Guiyu is one of the largest e-waste hubs of the world, employing over 150,000 men, women, and children to manually process electronics. Hundreds of small shelters in the area specialize in dismantling different device components. Some people work with circuit boards, some with wires, and others process plastics. Their livelihoods depend on getting it down to a science.

E-waste workers in Guiyu spend their time breaking apart used goods and picking out the most important materials. Making sure that noxious fumes are trapped and toxic fragments are handled safely is not the priority, and the workers do not always know the risks involved. Residents log 16-hour days disassembling products with little to no protective equipment and can make as little as $1.50 per day taking products apart.

Workers extract precious metals from various electronic parts, but circuit boards are particularly valuable. They begin taking the boards apart by de-soldering them, a process that involves heating them over grills to take out attached pieces. They place reusable electronic chips in one bucket, and further separate the rest to retrieve silver, gold and other materials of worth. Used metals can later be melted, sold, and made into jewelry, flatware and car parts. Once there’s little left, the nearly cleared circuit boards are burned again or soaked in acid baths to retrieve remains.

Residents who burn equipment and use acid baths are exposed to dioxin, lead, cadmium, brominated flame retardants and mercury, toxins that have been linked to various health and environmental problems. Reportsreleased by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) have shown that lead found in solder, CRT monitor glass and batteries can impair the nervous and reproductive systems, and the cadmium from semiconductor chips can damage the kidneys. Workers who are exposed to mercury after handling circuit board switches, cell phones and flat screen monitors also put themselves at risk for tremors and memory loss. Not all hazardous e-waste can be recycled, and what remains is often melted or dumped along the roads and river ditches. You won’t find the photos on a postcard.

One dumping incident made headlines in 2012 when executives of a Colorado-based recycling firm were found guilty of mail and wire fraud, environmental crimes, and smuggling and obstruction after selling their e-waste overseas. Brandon Richter and Tor Olson of Executive Recycling Inc. lied to residents by claiming that electronics they collected would be safely recycled inside the U.S. They made over $1.8 million dollars by selling e-waste, including toxic TV and monitor components that must be approved for shipment by the EPA.

Dumping incidents such as this have caused several environmental problems overseas. According to reportsfrom Chinese Shantou University, the air in Guiyu contains the highest level of cancer-causing dioxins in the world. Air pollution, groundwater contamination and pond waste are everyday realities for the region’s workers. Some of the villagers are unaware of the risks involved, but others have noticed the more obvious effects. The toxic extracts that leak into the river have made it taste foul, and workers use a pipeline to import fresh water from another region.

Despite the proven negative effects of selling e-waste to developing countries, it isn’t easy to convince recyclers – even well-intentioned ones – that keeping e-waste inside the U.S. is in their best interest. Without legislation, manufactures don’t have to adopt industry-wide business models based on sustainable electronics rather than ones that are phased out systematically. It’s no coincidence that Apple has released a new iPhone every year since 2007.

So far, 25 states have passed laws to manage e-waste and place the burden of tossed electronics on manufacturers rather than recyclers. One way of doing this is to force producers to offer “takeback” programs, so paying for proper disassembly and disposal becomes the manufacturer’s responsibility. Dell, for example, has been offering a free returns program since 2004, and it audits its partner recyclers to make sure used goods are handled correctly.

Some recycling firms also take it upon themselves to undergo auditing and demonstrate their commitment to safe, local processing of e-waste. Leaving electronics with recyclers that are certified by accredited auditors will increase the likelihood that old devices will be disassembled with minimal harm to workers and the environment. But until the federal government completely outlaws hazardous e-waste dumping, the fate of recycled electronics – and my mother’s old Compaq – may be difficult to control.

 

Paulina Haselhorst Paulina Haselhorst was a writer and editor for AnswersMedia and the director of content for Scholarships.com. She received her MA in history from Loyola University Chicago and a BA from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. You can contact Paulina at PaulinaHaselhorst@gmail.com.

Cyber-shills and the problem with authenticity

 

We are a culture hooked on the idea of authenticity. This is nothing new, but the Internet has altered the way we measure and define authenticity. But an obsession with equating crowd approval with dependability impacts the way we choose where to shop, what brands to favor, and any host of other consumer decisions.

This reliance on the opinions of digital others, of avatars we’ve never met, puts us in a fragile position. Since a basic Google search will reveal mistakes and misrepresentations, we assume that people are being honest because they can so easily be found out. If you say you did something or went somewhere, your credentials are often double-checked on the Internet. So in that way your physical self requires backup verification from the Internet. Yet the Internet allows for massive amounts of manipulation. When people primarily interact through digital avatars, it allows the kind of identity jujitsu shown on MTV’s “Catfish,” which examines what happens when people to pretend to be something that they aren’t online.

Baz Lurhmann’s “The Great Gatsby” film adaptation arrived in theaters this spring, and Lurhmann’s version is set in a Day-Glo approximation of Fitzgerald’s 1920s. But transpose Gatsby’s setting to today, and he wouldn’t make his fortune schlepping bootlegged alcohol from drugstore counters. Now, Gatsby might be a malevolent hacker, a denizen of the dark side of the Internet, siphoning money from dubious schemes that include cyber-shilling operations. Gatsby mutated his personality and backstory with the tools at his disposal – imagine what he would have done with the Internet.

When Fitzgerald wrote “a new world, material without being real, where poor ghosts, breathing dreams like air, drifted fortuitously about,” he could’ve been talking about the shady climate of cyber-shilling businesses. Where recommendations and affirmative content drift into existence after the poor ghosts of Late Capitalism churn whatever they’re being paid to say onto websites.

And what is cyber-shilling? It’s the act of endorsing a product for money, regardless of quality. It’s the digital snake oil business. And it’s booming.

We look online to validate our choices now, seeking comfort in the wisdom of crowdsurfed opinion. But businesses are taking advantage of the obsession with following the wisdom of the crowd and creating their own false crowds to follow. And with the rise of review-centric consumer sites and social media, businesses now have a robust array of platforms onto which they can disseminate endorsements they paid for without making it obvious that the positive reviews are planted.

Cyber-shills: the new century’s snake oil peddlers

Sifting through dung to find well-researched, authentic information is often difficult for consumers. Online shoppers often confront how difficult it is to verify honest reviews and endorsements. Even expertly written testimonials cloaked in thorough facades of legitimacy can be empty shills, typed from the dank rooms of cash-strapped freelancers. These false endorsements are very different than obvious spam, which is still a problem that websites must endure – the type of spam that promises thousands of dollars a day working from home, that type of thing – because deceptive shills expertly simulate authenticity and confound consumers.

Buying reviews is big business, since people want to check out products that others have already given a stamp of approval. And if you can’t get that stamp organically, it’s smart business to put it on there yourself. Bing Lui, a data-mining expert at the University of Illinois-Chicago, told the New York Times that many five-star reviews are created, and he estimated that one-third of consumer reviews you see online are fraudulent.

The Guardian investigated the scourge of fake reviews and uncovered “almost an industrial scale” to the shilling business. Websites like Freelancer.com provide a marketplace where organizations that want fake reviews written pick from eager bidders. The Guardian spoke to a prolific shill from Bangladesh who says he gets approached by numerous western companies, and has so much work he subcontracts it out to other workers in Bangladesh and India.

The proliferation of paid endorsements tarnishes crowd review sites like Yelp and diminishes potential for trustworthy consumer advice online, even from individuals whose connections to the products they endorse are not immediately apparent.

False endorsements extend far beyond a few written reviews – some companies apply a sort of “scorched earth” campaign to boost their digital profile. Researchers at UC Santa Barbara looked at the practice of “crowd-turfing,” a portmanteau between crowd-sourcing and astro-turfing that describes how some companies employ shills to blanket certain corners of the Internet with positive content about their products. The researchers examined how fake endorsements occurred on the popular Chinese social network Sina Weibo, which most closely resembles Twitter in setup. There are three main ways to spam Weibo: sending users instant messages, sending a tweet-style status update, or posting to a message forum. And while sending an instant message seems more blatantly spammy than anything else, the other two types of behavior can be passed off as genuine enthusiasm for a product.

What the researchers found underscores how rampant and insidious this shilling behavior is online – and many companies with shills on U.S. sites employ an international workforce comprised of low-paid workers.

Cyber-shills have infiltrated many different platforms for consumer-based reviews, including social media. The practice is prevalent on Twitter, and even Twitter users without particularly robust follower counts can sign up to promote products they’ve never used for a price. Celebrity endorsements wield even higher profits for the famous, and though tweets trumping the benefits of certain products may seem more meretricious than truly valuable, organizations keep springing up to provide connections between willing shills and businesses with products that need at least a veneer of crowd support.

Stopping Cyber Shills

Cyber-shilling is an unsavory practice, but it’s not a huge ethical departure for advertising and marketing culture. It’s an extension of the desire to jump on the zeitgeist and sugarcoat attempts to imbue products with an aura of grassroots support – and when that support isn’t present, it’s invented.

The FTC is taking note of how easy it is to plant endorsements, and have updated their guidelines to prevent this type of behavior. The updated guidelines stress the importance of disclosure and include a section focusing on paid celebrity endorsements on social media like Twitter. But these guidelines are not always followed, particularly by celebrities paid to promote products.

A group of researchers at Cornell published a study that rooted out what they call “opinion spam” – another term for fictitious reviews planted to boost digital standing. They developed a classifier to detect deceptive opinion spam that was 90 percent accurate, according to their work. The average consumer is unlikely to take the time to apply their findings – which outed many reviews on popular sites like TripAdvisor as the work of shills – the fact that people are developing ways to detect the problem means websites like TripAdvisor may have the tools they need to substantially reduce the problem.

Preying on people who hold the naive idea that social media connotes authenticity is certainly not an honest practice, but other practices are equally worthy of scrutiny. After all, U.S. courts will prosecute you for paying for fake reviews, and sites like Yelp and Amazon penalize users they suspect of hiring or being shills. Yelp even publicly “named and shamed” certain businesses soliciting false positive reviews.

However, despite efforts to curb the practice, it’s not going anywhere. One glance at popular services marketplace Fiverr illustrates how open people are about their desire to shill. “I will create a video testimony positively reviewing your business, website, or product for $5” reads one ad currently gracing the website’s front page – from one of the website’s top sellers. And her comment list reveals over 600 pleased clients.

What does the next generation of cyber-shills look like?

The most problematic element of cyber-shilling is how effectively shills disguise themselves as “real” opinions. The individuals who solicit fake reviewing gigs on sites like Fiverr are especially valuable because they take pains to make their shilling look authentic – they appear far more trustworthy than spambots, and have real photos and the ability to elaborate on products in an authentic-sounding way.

However, less thoroughly deceptive forms of shilling can also blur the lines between content and advertisements online in a way that harms consumers and netizens.

For instance, although many people understand how targeted ads work, it’s not fair to assume that everyone who uses sites like Facebook understand that the ads they’re seeing aren’t random. The banner ads on Facebook are targeted, but there’s no blatant notice that that is the case. Obviously, the potential deception that an ad just randomly appeared is less egregious than the lie of a review that appears genuine but is actually a shill, but the practice of targeting ads still reeks of manipulation.

Another common online marketing tool online that’s not quite as sneaky as straight-up shilling but often blurs the line between appropriate advertising and unscrupulous tactic is the advertorial. Many advertisers pay for sponsored content on websites, which is fine – as long as an article is clearly marked as affiliated with a company, there’s no reason why that company can’t pay to put up a content-based advertisement. But some advertorials are disguised too well under the veneer of an editorial. And with recent updates to Facebook that make visual content more prominent, advertisements are becoming a more organic-looking element to the website, which makes it harder to tell if what you’re looking at is a picture from a friend or from an organization you follow, or if it is a targeted ad.

While individuals can profit from work as shills for businesses and organizations, people can also employ devious tactics to build their personal brands. While most people do not have the resources or inclination to pay others to write about them positively online, there’s a cottage industry of service cropping up to amplify perceived social influence. These services offer opportunities to purchase more Twitter followers and Instagram followers – an example of how individuals also attempt to circumvent organic loyalty-building to quickly establish a positive online reputation. Sometimes people use services that bulk up their followers with bots, but other sites have a cadre of people who are willing to follow you for a price. Either way, it’s a problematic method of obtaining heightened Twitter legitimacy because it erodes the value of having many Twitter followers in the first place – if you can simply buy them, then they’re not valuable for social capital.

The original form of cyber-shilling – writing fake reviews – is just the beginning when it comes to unscrupulous marketing behavior online. While the scourge of fake ads continues to be a problem, the rise of social media as a forum for paid endorsements and the concurrent growth of social media as a platform for integrated ad content also threaten to undermine the aura of authenticity we ascribe these mediums. This type of behavior is not likely to go away anytime soon unless major changes are made to existing laws or people become much less gullible.

 

Kate Knibbs Kate Knibbs is a writer and web culture journalist from the southwest side of Chicago. She probably spends too much time on the Internet.

Drone Warfare: Remote Control Killing

 

It's cheap, neat and efficient — but not entirely — and it saves U.S. lives while taking the lives of our enemies: drone warfare.

Drone warfare is the use of unmanned, remote-controlled armed aircraft for targeted assassinations of terrorists. The tactic has been used with great success by the U.S. in its ongoing war on terror.

Targets are identified either by the military or intelligence authorities and a strike is launched by the CIA, which is currently authorized to conduct the operation. President Barack Obama, however, said in a recent speech that plans are under way to transfer drone operations to the military.

Although these pilotless air strikes have been reasonably precise, collateral damage is inevitable. Critics of the program point out that innocent people have been killed in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan and Yemen, the countries in which drone warfare has been most concentrated.

Drone attacks have caused an estimated 3,000 deaths — including untargeted collateral deaths — since 2001, not counting those in Iraq or Afghanistan.

In one instance of a targeted drone assassination, a U.S. citizen in Yemen — believed to be a terrorist — was killed on September 30, 2011, without due process of law, including a trial, to which he was entitled under the Constitution.

The victim was Anwar al-Awlaki, the first known American to be targeted and killed by a drone. Another U.S. citizen named Samir Khan, identified as a terrorist, was also killed in the attack. Al-Awlaki's death was characterized by Obama as "a major blow to al-Qaida's most active operational affiliate."

A wave of protests ensued after the killings, which demonstrators denounced as illegal. But U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder later declared the attack lawful.

With the sanction of America's top legal authority, other than the Supreme Court, Americans who fit the terrorist profile could be targeted.

The drone program began in response to the terrorist attacks of 9/11 and has continued under the Obama Administration.

So far this year, as of the end of May, 13 drone strikes have occurred in Pakistan and 10 in Yemen, according to The Long War Journal website, which tracks drone warfare.

On May 29, a targeted drone assassination killed the deputy chief of the Pakistani Taliban, Wali ur Rehman. Six other people were also killed in the attack.

Pakistan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs denounced the assassination and charged that it violated "the principles of national sovereignty, territorial integrity and international law." He also declared the strike "counterproductive" since Rehman was viewed as a moderator in some quarters and a potential broker of peace between the government and the Pakistani Taliban.

Rehman’s assassination came in the wake of a recent announcement by Obama that U.S. drone attacks will now be limited to targets "that pose a continuing and imminent threat to the American people."

As U.S. drone use over the years has become more frequent, along with the unintended killings of civilians, domestic and worldwide critics of the counter-terrorism program have become more vocal and militant in their opposition.

Citizens of Pakistan, where many of the drone attacks occurred, have become especially outraged, demanding an end to the program. Anti-U.S. sentiment in the country has been growing since the drone attacks began.

Afghan president Hamid Karzai, who once condoned drone killings of Afghani insurgents in Pakistan, has also called for an end to their use.

Perhaps as a consequence of these complaints — although the Obama Administration has not yet acknowledged it — U.S. drone policy has recently changed.

In a speech delivered by Obama on May 23 at National Defense University, the president announced the imposition of new and more rigid limitations on targeted killing, while at the same time pointing out how successful the drone program has been.

The new criteria for being identified as a drone target requires that an individual person pose a "continuing and imminent threat" to U.S. persons.

Previously, persons were targeted who posed "a significant threat to U.S. interests." These targets included al-Qaida commanders, bomb makers and terrorists plotting against international aviation, U.S. transit systems, European cities and American military forces in Afghanistan, Obama said in his speech.

Despite what Obama has characterized as the new restrictions on targeted killings, drone attacks in Pakistan have continued with an average of about two attacks per month, as of the end of May.

Regarding the killing of American citizens by drones without due process, which had previously occurred, Obama said:

"For the record, I do not believe it would be constitutional for the government to target and kill any U.S. citizen — with a drone or a shotgun — without due process. Nor should any president deploy armed drones over U.S. soil."

There are exceptions to these rules, however, Obama pointed out.

"When a U.S. citizen goes abroad to wage war against America and is actively plotting to kill U.S. citizens — and when neither the United States, nor our partners are in a position to capture him before he carries out a plot — his citizenship should no more serve as a shield than a sniper shooting down on an innocent crowd should be protected from a SWAT team," he said.

"That's who Anwar Awlaki was — he was continuously trying to kill people," Obama said. "He helped oversee the 2010 plot to detonate explosive devices on two U.S.-bound cargo planes. He was involved in planning to blow up an airliner in 2009. When Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Christmas Day bomber, went to Yemen in 2009, Awlaki hosted him, approved his suicide operation and helped him tape a martyrdom video to be shown after the attack. His last instructions were to blow up the airplane when it was over American soil. I would have detained and prosecuted Awlaki if we captured him before he carried out a plot. But we couldn't. And as president, I would have been derelict in my duty had I not authorized the strike that took out Awlaki."

In announcing a more limited use of drone attacks, Obama also said, "To say a military tactic is legal, or even effective, is not to say it is wise or moral in every instance. For the same progress that gives us the technology to strike half a world away also demands the discipline to constrain that power — or risk abusing it."

Many military and intelligence analysts now believe that major drone targets are diminishing, that drone use is becoming counterproductive and that the attacks have resulted in the enrollment of new warriors in the terrorist cause.

But while the military use of drones decline, they may have a bright future in civilian applications.

Among the potentially benign uses of drones are in the search for missing persons by law enforcement. Farmers can use drones to identify land in need of water and or pesticides. Drones can search out people who need rescuing from rooftops or anywhere on the ground in the event of fires, hurricanes, tornadoes, earthquakes or other disasters. Traffic congestion and patterns can be precisely mapped and televised. Highways, bridges, railways and waterways could be inspected and monitored for safety or hazardous conditions. Pipelines and power grids could be similarly monitored. Environmentalists, geologists, map makers and other professions and industries could use unmanned aircraft for aerial plotting and monitoring of large land areas.

So far, however, civilian use of the drone has languished. Public fears about the abuse of drone technology, and the absence of government safety regulations for what could be a very crowded and dangerous sky with too many drones in the air, have shortstopped the development of this potentially profitable and useful industry.

 

Marc Davis Marc Davis is a veteran journalist and published novelist. His reporting and writing has been published in numerous print and online publications including AOL, The Chicago Tribune, Forbes Online Media, The Journal of the American Bar Association, and many others. His latest novel, Bottom Line, was published in 2013.

Chefs vs. Cell Phones

 

You’re on vacation, and you’ve just made it to that restaurant that you’ve heard so much about. You’ve anxiously awaited the well-known dish. It arrives, and all of your senses are enticed. The aroma is intoxicating, and it looks too good to eat. But before you dig in, do you pull out your phone and snap a quick picture of it? Do you change your status on Facebook or Twitter to something like, “Can’t wait to dig in to this! #delicious”?

It’s not a surprise if you answered “yes” to the above questions since, according to a Mobile Etiquette Survey for Intel Corp., one in five U.S. adults say they share something online while eating a meal. Ironically enough, that same survey also revealed that 81% of U.S. adults believe mobile manners are getting worse. And some chefs could not agree more.

Renowned Chef Grant Achatz, known for his molecular gastronomy at Chicago’s Alinea, says he cringes a bit when he sees diners that “snap the meal away," and he understands why celebrities “punch the paparazzi out when they get the chance.”

Michael Roux Jr., chef at Le Gavroche in Mayfair, London is on the same page as Achatz and says while it’s flattering, he finds it annoying.

“It’s disruptive for the people around them, and it spoils that person’s enjoyment of the meal,” Roux said.

Daniel Galmiche, of Vineyard restaurant in Berkshire, agrees. “Dining in a restaurant used to be a special, intimate experience, but that’s been lost somewhere along the way,” he said.

No cell phones, please

Many chefs have expressed that they are sick of the constant phone use during a dining experience. Chefs work hard to create a certain atmosphere and meal for their guests, and tweeting photos takes away from it.

This is exactly why RJ Cooper, owner of Rogue 24 in Washington D.C. has decided to ban cell phones and cameras from his restaurant.

“If everyone brings out their phones, it distracts from the experience,” Cooper said.

Chef Martin Burge from the two Michelin-starred Dining Room at Whatley Manor has also banned cameras after his patience with them finally broke when other customers started complaining.

“I couldn’t believe it when one diner got out an SLR camera, put the flash on and started taking pictures of the dishes from every angle. It was astonishingly brash,” Burge said.

And it isn’t just the picture taking that infuriates chefs and aggravates other diners, it’s the tweeting, the checking in at Four Square, the status updates on Facebook and so on. So much so that Graham Elliot, Master Chef Judge and owner at many popular Chicago dining establishments, kicked out food journalist Steve Dolinskyduring a meal at his restaurant, G.E.B. last April. Despite Dolinsky being a James Beard award-winning food writer and ABC 7 Chicago’s Hungry Hound, Elliot would not allow him tweeting during his meal.

“When he ate at Charlie Trotter’s and live tweeted through the whole meal how shitty it was, to me that’s so egregiously over the line that I absolutely will not have someone like that at my establishment,” Elliot told Eater when the news broke.

Between the tweets, the photos and even the phone conversations, it finally prompted Julie Liberty of Miami to create the Facebook page, “Ban Cell Phones From Restaurants” in February 2012.

“I myself would be embarrassed to take pictures of my food, but then, I’m also too embarrassed to have personal conversations in a public place on my cell,” Liberty said. “It seems like good manners got left behind with the old fashioned land line.”

A picture’s worth a thousand words

While a cell phone might ruffle some chef’s feathers, they can’t deny its link to business. More than 90 percent of smart phone users search for restaurants with their phones, and 70 percent say it’s important for restaurant menus to be mobile friendly.

Food blogger and photographer Bonjwing Lee’s professional life revolves around taking photos in restaurants. Lee was inspired to start taking photos of his food because of its beauty, creativity and artistic flare.

“I just wanted to remember what I ate,” Lee said.

And 30,000 photos later, Lee has documented what he’s eaten for years, some of which at the most renowned, sought-after restaurants in the world. Not only for himself, but he says these photos on his blog, the ulterior epicure, are a resource and an inspiration for chefs around the world that can’t get to these restaurant themselves.

Lee believes a lot of the reasoning is foolish as to why chefs won’t allow photos since it only takes a few seconds.

“I want to take a memory with me. If you won’t let me, I won’t go,” Lee said.

Lee, like many other diners, would simply not go to a restaurant that didn’t allow it. Photojournalist Karen Kring feels it’s not generous or hospitable to ban cell phones.

“Only a rare restaurant could pull off a cell cam ban without alienating patrons,” Kring said.

Besides feeling that it takes away from the meal and is distracting to other diners, chefs feel that these photos could be a misrepresentation of their food and even using their image without their consent. They want their food to be captured in the best way possible. But Kring says that is just the way it is.

“When creatives – chefs, artists – release our work to our patrons, into the world, it is out of our hands. It’s the nature of the beast,” Kring said.

Chef Sarabeth Levine of Sarabeth’s in New York City is part of the group of chefs that welcome pictures and feels the tweets and photos being posted is essentially free advertising. Tom Kitchin, of The Kitchin in Leith, appreciates the feedback.

“People are engaging more with food and that can never be a bad thing,” Kitchin said.

Taking photos and blogging about restaurants is how Eric Isaac helps small businesses that may have not otherwise been recognized and shares his experiences with others. The professional photography posts beautiful photos of his meals on his award-winning food blog, Snapfood.

“I’m not so great with words so most of my blog posts are succinct but filled with photographs,” Isaac said.

These photos are the way he tells the story and are essential to his blog.

“One can only describe a dish so much”, he said.

The consensus among food photographers and blogger is if you’re going to take a photo of your food, tweet, check-in, change your status, or one of the other plethora of reasons why people use it, be respectful. Bonjwing Lee says he is careful to make sure no other patrons or wait staff is in the photo, and he does it quickly. People standing on chairs to get the best shot, setting up tripods and constant shuttering are just a few of the things he’s witnessed while taking his own photos. Not using a flash, asking those you are dining with for permission and using discretion are a few things to keep in mind.

Eric Isaac’s advice is to remember why you’re there in the first place.

“At some point you just have to put down the phone and just enjoy the experience of being out to dinner, with real people, who are there with you at this moment.”

 

Kristen Kuchar Kristen Kuchar is author of Mac n’ Cheese to the Rescue and writes about food, beer and culinary travel for a variety of publications.

Social Media Rules for Teachers

 

Teachers in our society are in an odd position. On the one hand, they are, in theory, being paid to convey information. On the other hand, teachers are not really trusted to speak freely. The classroom materials they use are often regulated or censored. Their exams, quizzes, lesson plans and curriculum are increasingly designed by bureaucrats or administrators. And through restrictive rules on participation in social media, even teachers’ private discussions and actions outside of the classroom, on their own time, have become subject to oversight and control.

Even without regulations, there are many reasons for elementary, secondary, and college teachers to be careful online. Anyone who stands in front of classrooms full of people with access to Google is going to want to limit the amount of information about themselves on the Web. At the Hooded Utilitarian, a comics and culture website I edit, I've had a teacher or two post under pseudonyms to write about sexual content.

Some teachers do abuse social media or other forms of digital communication. Last summer, for example, there were two incidents in the Washington D.C. area involving inappropriate sexual conduct on the part of teachers. In one case, a high school teacher solicited students for sex using his cell phone; in another, a teacher was arrested for "exchanging inappropriate messages with a student" according to a story in the Washington Examiner.

Social media rules for teachers, though, often go much further than simply advocating rule-of-thumb discretion. For example, recent guidelines released by the city of New York's Education Department suggest that teachers should have separate personal and professional web pages, and should not “friend” students' personal pages. The guidelines also say that teachers must get administrative permission before setting up a professional page, and require students to get a signed consent form before they can participate on those pages.

Darrell M. West, a vice president at the Brookings Institution, commented that many of the guidelines "sound like best practices on how to avoid getting sued, as opposed to thinking about how to use social media to broaden the learning experience." The goal of administrators seems to be to set up a series of checkpoints and a raft of paperwork in the interest not so much of the educators, but of the school system's lawyers. And when the Education Department guidelines state that teachers can "have no expectation of privacy" on social media and that administrators will be watching teachers closely, one gets the sense that the bureaucratic ideal is the panopticon, with teachers, even more than students, constantly observed, evaluated and regulated.

You can also see the outlines of the panopticon in Angie Miller's article at The Washington Post. Miller was the 2011 New Hampshire Teacher of the Year, and her article describes the social networking rules at her school as follows:

“Besides the obvious — don’t be inappropriate with students through texting and Facebooking (which no teacher in their right mind would do) – we were further directed to ‘always think and write like an educator’ (boring) and ‘never use a blog…to comment about your job duties’ (like this?) and ‘never blog or write about extremely personal subjects’ (is my homeless mother, whom I write about, extremely personal?)."

Miller is afraid to show a picture of herself on Facebook drinking alcohol, or even a picture of herself on Facebook with someone near her drinking alcohol. The rules at her school proscribing personal revelations, suggest that she is not allowed to share anecdotes from her childhood with her students. She is also, apparently, not supposed to speak in public about her job, which technically means that the essay about the problems with social media rules at her school is actually in violation of the social media rules at her school. If such guidelines were to go into effect en masse, and were enforced, all teachers would effectively be barred from participating in national debates about education.

Miller concludes, "teachers are expected to live their average lives behind hushed, closed doors." They are always overseen, and every part of their lives micromanaged. The ever-increasing demand for "accountability" shades imperceptibly into totalitarianism. The ideal teacher becomes not an adventurous thinker and communicator, but someone who is completely acquiescent to discipline.

None of this is to say that these kind of social media guidelines are wrong in and of themselves. On the contrary, such guidelines are useful and necessary. When they aren't in place, many teachers request them. Social media is new; using it in the classroom presents many challenges. Teachers can use help in negotiating these challenges.

Moreover, there are plenty of examples of reasonable guidelines in other professions. Social media rules for doctors, for example, are generally presented as aids for both doctors and patients, rather than as a way to police either party. Thus, social media guidelines encourage doctors to remind patients that emails are not secure, which is rather different than telling the doctors that they can have no expectation of privacy online. Similarly, it's one thing to tell lawyers that they need to abide by their professions' code of ethics online. It would be another to tell lawyers that they can't ever be photographed with a beer.

A controversy in Manatee School District in Florida casts a depressing light on the problem with current teacher guidelines. Thomas Tryon of the Herald Tribune reports that in 2010, one teacher in the district made racially insensitive remarks online, while another, who was “friends” with some students on a Facebook page, used foul language on the site. As a result, the district decided it needed to establish social media guidelines. So, it put forward a social media policy that would have prevented teachers from posting comments or pictures that negatively portrayed students, teachers or the district. That's a pretty sweeping abridgement of free speech. Sure enough, when the teacher's union challenged the policy in court, the school district decided to withdraw it. So Manatee School District now provides no guidance to teachers on how to handle social media.

Tryon suggests the school district and the teacher’s union should sit down together and work out a social media policy. If social networking guidelines were intended to help teachers safely and productively interact with students, this would be the ideal solution.

Unfortunately, as we've seen, social media guidelines don't usually seem aimed at helping teachers communicate. Instead, they appear to be intended to keep teachers' words and actions under more complete control.

 

Noah Berlatsky Noah Berlatsky edits the comics and culture website the Hooded Utilitarian and is a correspondent for the Atlantic. He is working on a book about the original Wonder Woman comics.

Ethical Binds in a Digital World

 

In this new digital age, information travels fast. The only limitations are the speed at which reporters and whistle-blowers can type and send their respective correspondence, and the speed at which we read them, often with a certain impotent rage. And ours is a culture where misinformation travels with the same vivaciousness. So how do we decide what’s important? With a torrent of unsettling scandals and discrediting news items now forefront in the national consciousness, how do we begin to make sense of what is happening in this country? Maybe the answer rests somewhere in the noise, somewhere in between the lines.

In the calm eye of this hurricane, Bradley Manning — accused of disclosing classified information to WikiLeaks — stands trial for aiding the enemy. It’s not a topic that has been forefront in our national discourse, perhaps because so many disturbing things have come to light as of late: the sexual assault epidemic occurring in the military, the massacre in Afghanistan committed by U.S. soldier Robert Bales and the recent revelation that the National Security Agency has been collecting the phone and Web information of American citizens. But amid these scandals, Manning’s fate is all the more significant.

“This is a case about what happens when arrogance meets access to sensitive information,” Capt. Joe Morrow said about Manning in his opening statement. Morrow is a prosecuting attorney in the trial. He goes on to paint Manning as an attention-craving, desperate man seeking notoriety by any means, even the endangerment of his fellow soldiers. Morrow lays out a plethora of evidence to be presented against Manning — evidence which, Morrow argues, proves that Manning knowingly released classified documents into the hands of the enemy. Among the many items of evidence to be presented are: chat logs with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, sets of data collected from Manning’s computer, and testimony from various government officials, computer forensic analysts and even a few of Manning’s fellow soldiers. But much of this evidence has been called into question as the trial has progressed.

“Young, naive, but good-intentioned,” is how defense counsel David Coombs characterized Manning in his opening statement. The statement began with an anecdote about Manning’s hellish experience during his first deployment in Iraq. It was Christmas Eve, Dec. 24, 2009. There was an explosively formed penetrator (EFP) alert, indicating something had happened involving a roadside bomb. EFPs had killed many soldiers, and the alert sent Manning’s unit into a panic. He was sent to get information about the alert, but none was available. A few moments after Manning returned to his unit, news came back that, despite a U.S. transport being hit by an explosive, no soldiers had been harmed or killed. His unit rejoiced. But later, a report surfaced, indicating that there was a civilian car ahead of the transport--a car that was carrying two adults and three children. The driver pulled over to the side of the road to let the convoy pass, unfortunately right in front of where the bomb exploded. All five civilians were injured and one eventually died. And all of the soldiers celebrated that night, so the story goes — everyone, that is, but Manning. He couldn’t stop thinking about the person that was killed and everyone that was affected by the explosion. The defense also claimed that Manning was put under a lot of pressure at the time he made the release of classified documents. Manning was especially concerned about the safety of his unit. As an informations analyst, it was his responsibility to ensure that the command had been properly informed about the day to day operations in Iraq. Coombs also pointed out that Manning had customized dog tags that indicated he was a humanist, a philosophy that places high value on human life and agency.

The defense went on to detail the various documents Manning released and why he released them. Coombs claimed that Manning specifically chose information that could not be used against the United States. For instance, he leaked many SigActs (i.e., reports that took into account the day-to-day activities in Iraq, things that already happened). Furthermore, SigActs typically documented engagement with the enemy; as such, the enemy would already be well-informed of those incidents. Coombs explained that by definition these documents couldn’t strategically harm the United States. They did, however, reveal to the American public “the true nature of 21^st century asymmetric warfare,” Coombs argued in his opening statement. This revelation was Manning’s intention all along. It’s also why he chose to release the video of the 2009 Granai airstrike in Afghanistan, an attack that killed an estimated 140 innocent civilians. In addition, Manning released a video of the 2007 airstrike on Baghdad, an attack that left two Reuters employees dead. These videos, along with the release of the SigActs, gave the American public a needed dose of reality — a realistic picture of what was really happening in Iraq and Afghanistan at the time.

Manning also released diplomatic cables, the importance of which was significantly downplayed by Manning’s defense counsel. Coombs argued that these cables didn’t require a special login or password, and it was available to anyone who had access to SIPRNET — at least a million people. It was information that could only be widely shared across the various government agencies. As such, the sensitivity of these documents was quite low and unlikely to aid the enemy in real terms. “He was 22 years old. He was young,” said Coombs, concluding the defense counsel’s opening statement. “He was a little naive in believing that the information he selected could actually make a difference. But he was good-intentioned in that he was selecting information that he hoped would make a difference.”

With all the arguments laid out, it’s difficult to maintain a sense of context. There must have been a lot for Manning to consider when he decided to release all those documents. How do we reconcile the respective pictures painted of Manning? Is he a hero or a villain? A naive pawn manipulated by outside sources or a devious brat who just wanted his 15 minutes of fame? Maybe it’s not our job to give him a label. Only Bradley Manning truly knows why he did what he did; everything else is speculation. Despite media depictions, it is entirely possible to refrain from attacking the man’s character while still having reservations about what he did. And it is possible to hold the position that perhaps he went a little too far with what he released, without disrespecting his beliefs and defaming his reputation. If arrogance is the most damning quality the prosecution has come up with, that’s not a very convincing argument. Similarly, the naivety argument is not a particularly solid defense of a man who is undoubtedly quite a bit more thoughtful than the media makes him out to be. A conversation has begun because of Manning. What happens to him now — good or bad — will be a clear indication of how our society values whistle-blowers.

The Guardian newspaper recently exposed a court order that allows the NSA to collect the telephone and Internet records of millions of Verizon customers in the U.S. In fact, it has been revealed that operatives in the United States government are collecting various kinds of information from Facebook, Google, Skype, Microsoft, Yahoo! and AOL— all as part of an NSA program called PRISM. “I welcome this debate,” President Barack Obama said in a press announcement in early June, arguing that the very presence of this conversation is a sign of maturity in the public discourse. The condescending tone of this statement must have been lost on the president. A thought occurs to me, one that may be reactionary and extreme, but also one that Manning might himself espouse: maybe we should be listening to their phone calls. Maybe we should be reading their emails and collecting their “metadata.” Edward Snowden, a former employee of an NSA contractor, risked a six-figure income and a fruitful life in Hawaii to make this revelation. In his interview with The Guardian, Snowden said, “I can’t in good conscience allow the U.S. government to destroy privacy, Internet freedom and basic liberties for people around the world with this massive surveillance machine they’re secretly building.”

There is a sacred trust between the people of the United States and our government. And whatever you think of Manning — whether you think he’s a media whore basking in his own notoriety, or a patriotic hero who has sacrificed his freedom and well-being for the greater good of free information — our government betrayed that sacred trust long before Manning did. The only real conclusion to be drawn from this entire debacle is that the system has failed us. It fails us every time innocent civilians are actively targeted and belittled as their corpses lay on the ground, as shown in the videos released by Manning. The system fails us whenever a soldier like Manning feels he has been forced to choose between his conscience and his country. It fails us every time another member of our armed forces is sexually assaulted and, furthermore, every time these crimes go unpunished. It fails us every time the military doesn’t identify one of its soldiers going through a difficult time before he or she does the unthinkable. And the system fails us on a grand scale, our trust is betrayed, every single time a warrantless search is performed, every time a piece of private data is collected, every phone call, Web log — without us knowing about it. It fails us because all of these things are simply not in the best interest of the people. They are definitively and fundamentally against everything for which the United States ought to stand.

This essay began as a follow up to “Bradley Manning and the Ethics of Secrecy,” a piece that attempted to identify the ethical justifications behind Manning’s release of classified documents. But it’s become obvious that the problem is bigger than Manning. It’s bigger than the NSA, the sexual assault epidemic and all of the incidents in which our soldiers have acted maliciously toward innocent people. It’s bigger than the United States. The problem is human nature. People instinctively protect their own interests and as such there is no incentive for our system to change until public opinion changes in a dramatic, sweeping fashion. And as long as there is only a tepid media reaction to the PRISM surveillance program, the administration has no reason to eliminate or even curtail the program’s scope. As long as people remain complacent and believe that if they’re not doing anything wrong, there’s no need to worry, the government will always put security before privacy concerns. And until the system is such that transparency is in everyone’s best interest, a harmful kind of secrecy will thrive.

Something has to spur that change. It doesn’t just happen by itself. The very fact that this conversation is happening is testament to the merits of whistle-blowing. But whether or not Manning has actually initiated change is up to us. We have to decide how much violence can occur before it becomes too much. We have to decide where to draw the line when it comes to privacy and security. We can take an active part in the conversation. Or we can, the majority of us, remain complacent. Would that we consider Manning’s moral struggle, and indeed the turmoil he endured to maintain an identity in the Iraqi barracks, as a metaphor that keenly represents the plight of the American people. In light of the sheer incompetence and apparent brutality of our system, let’s ask the question that Manning asked, the very same question that the prosecution facetiously asked in their opening statement: “If you had unprecedented access to classified networks 14 hours a day, seven days a week for eight-plus months, what would you do?” Think about it.

Update: On July 30, Manning was convicted of 17 of the 22 charges brought against him, including espionage and theft, though he was acquitted of aiding the enemy. During Manning's sentencing hearing, he said the following in a statement: "I am sorry that my actions hurt people. I'm sorry that they hurt the United States...I’m apologizing for the unintended consequences of my actions. I believed I was going to help people, not hurt people." Manning faces up to 90 years in prison.

 

David Stockdale David Stockdale is a freelance writer from the Chicagoland area. His political columns and book reviews have been featured in AND Magazine. His fictional work has appeared in Electric Rather, The Commonline Journal, Midwest Literary Magazine and Go Read Your Lunch.  Two of his essays are featured in A Practical Guide to Digital Journalism Ethics. David can be reached at dstock3@gmail.com, and his URL is http://davidstockdale.tumblr.com/.

The Morality of the NSA’s PRISM Program

 

Edward Snowden, current fugitive and former government intelligence employee, gave the press classified information about a surveillance program known as PRISM. Snowden’s motivations, justifications, credulity and credentials are all being heavily scrutinized, and his global game of Carmen San Di-leaker has turned him into a high-profile man, his ethics picked apart.

Snowden’s decision to release information should be -- and is being -- examined. But the amount of scrutiny leveled at Snowden’s choice to leak has been more intense than the amount of scrutiny aimed at the program itself. This is problematic, since the program itself is a flagrant violation of the U.S. Constitution, and a disturbing indicator that the government has prioritized an agenda to ensure all possible data is collected regarding terrorist activity before an agenda that protects personal freedoms.

Initial reports surrounding the NSA’s surveillance programs painted a positively dystopian portrait, with op-ed writers comparing the U.S government to George Orwell’s omnipresent Big Brother.

Reading passages from “1984,” it’s not hard to see why the leak piqued the interest of readers: “It was even conceivable that they watched everybody all the time,” Orwell wrote. “But at any rate they could plug in your wire whenever they wanted to. You had to live — did live, from habit that became instinct — in the assumption that every sound you made was overheard, and, except in darkness, every movement scrutinized.”

Now, every movement is not being scrutinized, and there is no malevolent team of Thought Police lurking menacingly over projections of your diary, contemplating your arrest for critical entries. But the amount of information the NSA has access to through the PRISM program -- and other programs, including UPSTREAM, which monitors telephone metadata and offers the NSA direct access to Internet and phone traffic data -- is certainly robust enough to inspire shivers in the spines of speculative fiction writers as well as ordinary citizens opposed to living under what amounts to a digital panopticon.

So to what extent is the NSA spying on American citizens? The Electronic Frontier Foundation provides a comprehensive portrait of the program’s depth on its website, using information provided by former AT&T technician Mark Klein.

“It works like this: When you send an email or otherwise use the Internet, the data travels from your computer, through telecommunication companies’ wires and fiber optics networks, to your intended recipient. To intercept these communications, the government installed devices known as “fiber-optic splitters” in many of the main telecommunication junction points in the United States (like the AT&T facility in San Francisco). These splitters make exact copies of the data passing through them. Then, one stream is directed to the government, while the other stream is directed to the intended recipients.”

But who is the NSA spying on?

While proponents of the program took pains to note that there weren’t eyes on every single person’s Facebook pages or phone records at all times, remarks made by NSA deputy director Chris Inglis made it clear that this surveillance network is extensive. In Congressional testimony, Inglis revealed that the NSA looks at information from people “two or three hops” away from a suspected terrorist.

“Two or three hops” might not sound like much, but it can amount to up to 27 million people under the surveillance umbrella due to just one suspect. Assuming there is more than one person of interest, this means the whole nation could reasonably fall under the umbrella. It’s ludicrous scope creep, in which the original objective of targeting terrorists is completely superseded by a program that paints almost anyone on a computer in the U.S. as a potential suspect worthy of examination without warrant.

Because the current “three hop” system gives the NSA permission to look at basically anyone with a computer or phone, the amount of data the agency has would be impossible to analyze on a case-by-case basis. This is deeply problematic, even if the NSA only resorts to these “hops” if they have a concrete lead. It is unclear how often the agency pursues connections to suspects, so the exact level of data collection and analysis is unknown.

James Bamford delves into the history of the NSA’s surveillance programs in an excellent article in The New York Review of Books. In it, he points out that PRISM and UPSTREAM may merely be smaller programs within an even more comprehensive surveillance apparatus. This line of thinking fits in with claims made by Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., that the program’s boundaries extend beyond what was previously thought. As a member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Wyden is privy to classified information about PRISM.

Bamford also cites the information Snowden released to paint a picture of the scope of PRISM. “According to a recent slide released by Snowden, the NSA on April 5, 2013, had 117,675 active surveillance targets in the program and was able to access real-time data on live voice, text, email or Internet chat services, in addition to analyzing stored data.” Now, the NSA is supposed to be required to contact the Federal Intelligence Surveillance Court if it wants to delve into the contents of an email, Facebook message or other personal communication -- but that step is waived if dealing with a person under suspicion or someone connected to that person.

Keeping in mind the “three hops” policy, that number of active surveillance targets suggests that the NSA couldjustify keeping tabs on just about anybody. And for people outside of the U.S., the NSA doesn’t even have to justify their surveillance methods with hops, so the possibility for electronic eavesdropping is nearly ever-present.

So we know who the NSA has the ability to spy on, and it’s pretty much everyone.

That we do not know how they use the information they are able to collect, or their methods for selecting targets, is largely irrelevant. The fact that this agency is equipped to continuously monitor the digital movements of so many people is morally problematic.

The NSA is violating the Fourth Amendment just by exercising its ability to engage in this type of surveillance, whether or not its actual analysis is as in-depth on an individual basis as many fear. This kind of mass surveillance denigrates civil liberties and establishes a baseline in which ordinary citizens can have their private communications examined as evidence of wrongdoing without a warrant or their knowledge.

And make no mistake: This kind of mass surveillance is happening. The Associated Press makes that very clear in an article examining the larger history of surveillance in the United States:

“The NSA is prohibited from spying on Americans or anyone inside the United States. That’s the FBI’s job and it requires a warrant."

Despite that prohibition, shortly after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, President George W. Bush secretly authorized the NSA to plug into the fiber optic cables that enter and leave the U.S., knowing it would give the government unprecedented, warrantless access to Americans’ private conversations.

Tapping into those cables allows the NSA access to monitor emails, telephone calls, video chats, websites, bank transactions and more. It takes powerful computers to decrypt, store and analyze all this information, but the information is all there, zipping by at the speed of light.

“You have to assume everything is being collected,” said Bruce Schneier, who has been studying and writing about cryptography and computer security for two decades.

This level of surveillance obliterates the concept of privacy by asking people to accept that their actions may be recorded and monitored at any time, regardless of what kind of behavior they are engaging in. This is a controversial concept when you bring in the CCTV installed in many major cities, but those cameras only point at public places. The NSA’s program looks at communications that are explicitly meant to be private, such as emails between lovers. The idea that people do not deserve or have a right to privacy when they are using an electronic device is absurd, especially as these devices become primary means of communication.

And this level of surveillance is clearly at odds with the Fourth Amendment, which requires that the government demonstrate valid individualized suspicions before collecting information on a subject. If these programs are allowed to continue they will undermine the value of the entire Constitution, not just the Fourth Amendment.

Kenneth Roth, a former federal prosecutor, puts forth a cogent outline for what needs to change.

“The government’s new and intrusive capacities should prompt a rethinking of the law. The rationale that we have no privacy interest in our metadata because we share it with phone or Internet companies to route our communications was always a fiction. After all, this routing information is in the same stream of electrical data that includes the contents of our communications. Both are shared with phone and Internet companies by necessity, but for a purpose: to enable our communications in the modern era, not to share them with anyone but their intended recipients. These companies should not be understood as random third parties to whom in choosing to expose our electronic activity we can be said to forego legitimate expectations of privacy. Instead, they should be viewed as custodians of today’s dominant forms of communication with a duty to protect their confidentiality. Only if the government has been able to demonstrate extraordinary circumstances — generally, by obtaining a targeted court order reflecting probable cause to believe that the communications in question contain evidence of criminal activity to which access is needed — should this confidentiality be broken.”

Roth’s statement is especially important because it identifies the technology companies as information custodians. Google, Facebook, AT&T and the other companies the NSA taps for data are on the hook with their users. It is a reasonable statement to make that people who use these services did so in the past understanding that their information may have been monitored in some way, but the scope of the NSA program far exceeds the amount of potential surveillance one would expect (now that we know about PRISM, of course, people may have to change their assumptions).

Companies like Google and Facebook, which frame themselves as progressive, people-oriented agents of innovation, have engaged in their own extensive data brokerage that collects information from users and bundles it in a way that makes the information meaningful to marketers -- an ethically dubious practice.

But however problematic their private data collection practices are, these technology companies are now a citizen’s potential ally when it comes to putting up a buffer between the NSA and data. Unfortunately, considering the history of many of the major telecommunications and digital companies involved in the PRISM program and other government surveillance programs, a robust defense from these companies is unlikely. Google, for instance, does not believe that Gmail users have a legitimate reason to expect privacy.

There are two ways the NSA’s program can be neutered to protect citizens: Companies can resist cooperation, and legislators can change laws to prohibit the current level of surveillance.

Unfortunately, the people of the United States cannot count President Obama as a champion of their right to privacy, as the president has hemmed and hawed on the subject, using what New Republic writer Jeffrey Rosen called “Clintonian equivocations” to explain away the depth of these programs.

Legislators attempted to fix the situation by introducing the Justin Amash Amendment to shut down the surveillance programs, but the bill was voted down. Still, Congress’ continued high level of interest might spur similar bills that make it through and re-establish the importance of upholding the Fourth Amendment.

Until then, American citizens and people all over the world who use the Internet need to assume that the U.S. government has access to a disturbingly broad swath of personal information about them based on emails, browsing histories and other online activity.

 

Kate Knibbs Kate Knibbs is a writer and web culture journalist from the southwest side of Chicago. She probably spends too much time on the Internet.

The Ethics of Facial Recognition Software

 

"OMG, you guys, it's Burpy Snorkleface!" your friend exclaims (at least that’s what it sounds like). We've all been there: Someone’s excited about a famous-person sighting or the latest morsel of celebrity gossip … and you have no idea who it is.

Who cares, right? It's easy to remedy and has virtually no consequences. It’s not like you’re going to lose your job or something. Unless you’re Lauren Twisselman, an employee at a Los Angeles boutique who didn’t recognize actress Mindy Kaling when she popped into the store. Twisselman wasn’t fired, but she sure could’ve used celebrity facial recognition software, suggested NPR recently. British company NEC IT Solutions has created “VIP-identification software” to help employees such as Twisselman spot and serve celeb shoppers. The software is modeled after the company’s existing criminal and terrorist facial recognition tools. (The technology is already being tested in at least 10 hotels and high-end stores.) But using facial recognition technology on an unsuspecting public when reducing danger isn’t the main concern raises some ethical hackles.

The technology

First, how’s it work? According to NPR:

If a face is a match, the program sends an alert to staff via computer, iPad or smartphone, providing details like dress size, favorite buys or shopping history.

The software works even when people are wearing sunglasses, hats and scarves. Recent tests have found that facial hair, aging or changes in weight or hair color do not affect the accuracy of the system.

So be afraid, Real Housewives of Lithuania — gaining weight, hiding behind cantaloupe-sized sunglasses, or pulling an Amanda Bynes can’t stop retail associates from chasing you down with this season’s Prada handbag. The idea sounds useful and almost cute at first. After all, no one with a life can know every celebrity, and retailers shouldn’t be expected to rush home from a day of refolding wadded-up clothes and plop down with a stack of flashcards and a DVR full of all the latest shows.

A culture of fame

Plus, celebs profit handsomely from their fame. People like Paris Hilton and Kim Kardashian seem to have no talent whatsoever, being paid instead for party appearances and maintaining their empires based on being recognized. The recent media orgasm over the royal baby — as seen in entire articles devoted to his name, his star sign and whether he’ll be circumcised — are weary proof that some people don’t even have privacy as a fetus. Why should people whose success, in part, is measured by how much airtime and how many magazine covers they land get some illusion of privacy?

And technically, such video surveillance is legal. According to New Media Rights, “You can legally record video without consent, unless it violates the privacy rights of others,” such as in bathrooms, dressing rooms, bedrooms and other places where you expect more privacy than usual.

Useful for us plebeians

Facial recognition software in a threat-free context can even be useful for us non-famous consumers, not just businesses. Finnish startup Uniqul is toying with a "pay by face" system that would connect your credit card and PIN to your facial features, and security company Diebold designed an ATM that authenticates users based on their face. Any seconds spared punching in your PIN are seconds you could spend, hypothetically, sleeping or watching a “Veronica Mars” marathon.

At first glance, Americans seem to vastly support public facial recognition software: "79 percent of Americans are in favor of using facial recognition at various locations and public events, and 81 percent support expanded camera surveillance on streets and in public places," Biometric Update reports. However, the original poll question stipulated that the facial recognition was to detect suspected terrorists — not, say, help a business pick you out as a former child star and foist your favorite color scarf onto you.

Hackers and other concerns

Facial recognition is far from hacker-proof too. Apps like FastAccess Anywhere that let you unlock your smartphone or computer with your face can be rendered useless if someone has a photo of you and a little time to guess your “secret shape.” And against Google’s policy, a hacker recently managed to install facial recognition software on Google Glass. Such powerful technology in the hands of ill-intentioned people is the stuff dystopian action movies are made of.

Ultimately, analyzing shoppers’ faces without their knowledge or consent, then matching them with a database, seems creepy and Big Brother-esque. Privacy is an increasingly elusive commodity. As The Atlantic wrote of facial recognition software in 2011:

No matter what you choose to do or not do, your life exists in the cloud, indexed by Google, in the background of a photo album on Facebook, and across thousands of spammy directories that somehow know where you live and where you went to high school … You may be able to change your name, … but you can’t change your face. And the cloud never forgets a face.

These concerns are echoed slightly less ominously by Jennifer Lynch of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Although she said facial recognition can help solve crimes, it “can also perpetuate racial and ethnic profiling, social stigma, and inaccuracies throughout all systems and can allow for government tracking and surveillance on a level not before possible,” Lynch testified before the Senate. Human rights nonprofit Witness suggests in a blog post that facial recognition could be a tool for supporting human rights, but that its lack of regulation and silence from technology companies is extremely worrisome. “We can — and must — all do better to make the best of this powerful new technology — and to protect us all from the worst,” Witness urges.

Helen Nissenbaum, in particular, took a strong stance on privacy in public back in 1998. P. Brey writes in a 2004 piece in the Journal of Information, Communication & Ethics in Society, “Helen Nissenbaum has argued that even if the expectation of privacy is diminished in public places, people still have justifiable privacy expectations even when they are in public. She argues that surveillance in public places that involves the electronic collection, storage, and analysis of information on a large scale often amounts to a violation of personal privacy.” As Brey writes, simply going out in public is a far cry from volunteering to be part of a police lineup — but facial recognition in public gives people no choice.

Ethical guidelines going forward

Disclosing that your business is using facial recognition software, particularly when it’s not to make anyone safer, seems essential. In a piece on the ethics of face recognition in retail, Carl Gohringer of Allevate Limited suggests it’s only the first step. “As part of the process of informing, organizations should also be direct and open in disclosing not only the existence of the systems, but the scope, intent, and purpose of the solutions,” Gohringer writes. “Why are you utilizing an individual’s biometric data? What benefit does it serve? What is the scope of the use of this data?”

Thankfully, the Federal Trade Commission, too, has proposed some ethical guidelines for companies employing facial recognition:

First, companies should maintain reasonable data security protections for consumers’ images. … Companies that store such images should consider putting protections in place that would prevent unauthorized scraping, which can lead to unintended secondary uses …

[C]ompanies using digital signs capable of demographic detection — which often look no different than digital signs that do not contain cameras — should provide clear notice to consumers that the technologies are in use, before consumers come into contact with the signs …

[Further,] companies should not use facial recognition to identify anonymous images of a consumer to someone who could not otherwise identify him or her, without obtaining the consumer’s affirmative express consent.

Oh, interesting. Because in that case, Lauren Twisselman will have to learn to recognize Mindy Kaling the way the rest of us do: by watching “The Mindy Project.”

 

Holly Richmond Holly Richmond is a Portland writer. Learn more at hollyrichmond.com.

RIP Trolling

 

There are good reasons for turning on the comment feature of a website: It’s a place for users to engage with content. It promotes discussion and feedback. The comments are sometimes good for a laugh. And they indicate that people are actually visiting a website. But the merits are overshadowed when trolls enter these modern-day public spheres.

Stories on news sites, blog entries by novice writers and public pages on Facebook all succumb to this form of cyberbullying. Trolls are people who purposefully post provocative messages and images in the comment sections of websites to fuel arguments and provoke mayhem.

Sometimes these nasty notes cause little more than mildly hurt feelings and embarrassment. But a special class of Internet troll called a “RIP troll” elicits emotions much stronger.

This troll targets a type of website most would deem sacred — not a place for joking, let alone crude tormenting. It’s a type of website increasingly common in the digital age: one that memorializes the deceased.

Like the Westboro Baptist Church members who picket military funerals, or thieves who study obituaries for funeral information so they can rob families who are away from home, RIP trolls target people who are mourning their loved ones.

The media has reported several cases of RIP trolling. In August, The Chicago Tribune spoke to the angry family of a 15-year-old boy who drowned. His memorial page was vandalized with photos of people drowning.

A 2011 article in the British newspaper Daily Mail detailed the abuse of a 14-year-old girl’s Facebook tribute page. Her mother saw “an image of a horse and cart pulling her daughter’s coffin with the words ‘Happy Mother’s Day.’” Later, a photo appeared of her daughter with a caption that read, “Help me, Mummy. It’s hot in hell.”

Researchers have investigated trolling communities to try to understand the motivations of RIP trolls. But to do that, one should examine the relatively recent phenomenon of online memorial pages. In the digital era, these websites are becoming natural destinations for people grieving the loss of loved ones.

Google “memorial page” and countless options pop up. ForeverMissed.com, Legacy.com and MuchLoved.com are just a few of the providers that provide a venue for the bereaved to share their feelings, memories and condolences.

"For many individuals it’s about connecting with other people who are experiencing loss,” explains Jed Brubaker, a digital identity researcher who focuses on death, social media and post-mortem identity.

Facebook, of course, is also a popular destination for commiseration. After receiving proof of death, the social media site will turn a user’s profile into a memorial page. Brubaker studied interactions on these pages in a paper called “Beyond the Grave: Facebook as a site for the expansion of death and mourning.”

“There’s a type of exposure that a Facebook profile creates that is quite new to the bereaved,” he says. “There used to be a specific time and a place where we came together to grieve. It did a nice job of consolidating those interactions and also gave us norms for what was appropriate and not appropriate in this setting.”

At a funeral, a deceased person’s family and friends mourn together, in person. On Facebook, where a person often has thousands of “friends,” perhaps many of them superficial acquaintances, the grieving process becomes less intimate.

“A broader network, people who don’t even know the deceased, sometimes learn about the deceased and get involved. It’s actually a way of being supportive to their friends who are grieving,” Brubaker says.

But devastated family members and friends might not welcome comments posted by people from this broader network — people they don’t know or like. Privacy settings can control who sees and posts comments on memorial pages. But not everyone knows how to delete insensitive posts or restrict strangers from the sites.

And then RIP trolls enter the scene, posting offensive messages and photos to highly emotional audiences. Throughout his research, Brubaker has never encountered a RIP troll who actually knew the deceased person. Instead, the trolls are taking advantage of pages open to the public.

“Their motivations have actually far less to do with the fact that someone has died and far more to do with their ability to provoke and upset and frustrate a community in a particularly vulnerable position,” Brubaker says.

Whitney Phillips, author of academic paper “LOLing at tragedy: Facebook trolls, memorial pages and resistance to grief online,” studied RIP trolls’ behavior and talked to some of the perpetrators. In the paper, Phillips points out that many trolls draw the line at memorial pages — like most people, they deem it “downright distasteful.”

Some RIP trolls she talked to claim they don’t target family members. Instead, they aim their efforts at “grief tourists” — people who don’t know the deceased but participate on the memorial sites because they’re bored and want attention. Other RIP trolls say their actions are a critique of the mainstream media’s racial and socioeconomic bias — their tendency to “theatricalize” the death of a pretty white girl above others.

In summary, there are a multitude of reasons RIP trolls do what they do: Some get a rise out of provoking — they want to unnerve people. Others are making an indirect, convoluted social commentary. And some are just being mean. But dissecting the motivations behind RIP trolling won’t comfort the genuinely shattered parents and best friends of the deceased.

Stopping them might. Punishing them might. But under American law, RIP trolls aren’t usually considered criminals.

“The victim is dead. We can’t say ‘they’re harassing the family.’ There has to be a specific victim in order for us to serve a subpoena to the online service,” explains Detective Rich Wistocki, an Internet crimes investigator. With a subpoena, detectives could get the IP address needed to identify people behind anonymous posts.

According to Wistocki, RIP trolls don’t have complicated motives. “In my experiences, these are usually kids with nothing to do. Their parents are not monitoring their computers and what they’re saying,” he says. “It’s kids who get a charge out of thinking they’re anonymous. They know they won’t get caught for attacking the deceased.”

So how can RIP trolls be stopped? Memorial pages could go the route of some online publications and disable the comment sections altogether. But that defeats the main purpose of these sites. Instead, users should learn how to customize privacy settings. Make the page invite-only. Or require that visitors enter a password to view and post comments and pictures.

Another option: monitor comments. A website administrator should approve each one before it appears on the page for everyone to see. Of course, that administrator will still have to encounter trolls’ messages and the emotional ramifications that come with them.

“The person who should be stewarding these spaces probably should not be the [deceased person’s] mom,” Brubaker advises. “This steward is going to have to act at very volatile moments. It should be someone who’s close to the family, but not too close. Someone who is perhaps just enough removed that they won’t be overwhelmed with grieving.”

Ethics of Revenge Porn

 

While she was attending Lamar University in Texas, Meeghan Falls sent countless nude photographs to her boyfriend. Two months after their two-year relationship ended, Falls found out that her ex-boyfriend had posted many of the images, along with identifying information, on the Internet. "My stomach dropped," Falls said. "I started shaking. I started crying immediately. I felt like the whole world had seen me naked."

Falls was the target of "revenge porn" — the distribution of naked or sexual images of other people online without their consent, generally by ex-romantic partners. Revenge porn can be emotionally devastating to the victims, as Falls' story shows. It can have serious other consequences as well. Teachers who have had nude pictures posted online have lost their jobs. Revenge porn can affect custody disputes. In some cases it can damage relationships with families or spouses. Kayla Laws, for example, sent a topless image to a friend considering plastic surgery. When her email was hacked, the picture was stolen and placed on a revenge porn site. Soon after receiving harassing emails at work, someone sent the photo to her sister. She was afraid she would be fired from her job as a real estate agent.

Revenge porn is obviously cruel and unethical, whether the images in question are actually stolen or posted by an ex in a betrayal of trust. But addressing it legally is difficult. The main barrier is the First Amendment, which protects free speech even in extreme cases. In addition, in 1996 Congress passed the Federal Communications Decency Act, which protected websites from prosecution for user-submitted content. This means that YouTube or Facebook can't be prosecuted if someone posts pornography to those sights. But it also means revenge porn sites aren't responsible when a guy posts a nude image of his ex. 

There are some legal remedies. Victims of revenge porn can bring lawsuits, forcing websites to disclose the users who posted the images, and then sue those users. Such lawsuits can be difficult, since those who bring suit may have to make their names public, possibly resulting in further harassment and embarrassment. Nonetheless, some victimshave publicly sued revenge porn site Texxxan.com and its host GoDaddy for violation of privacy, though it's unclear whether they can win.

More hopefully, California recently became the first state to pass a law specifically targeting revenge porn by making it a misdemeanor for an individual to take and circulate sexual images online with the intent to harass or annoy. Even this law, however, has serious limitations. Since it only outlaws images taken by others, it does not address "selfies," images snapped by an individual her or himself and sent to a significant other. It also doesn't address images placed on revenge porn sites for money or gain, rather than with an intention to harass.

Because revenge porn has so far proven difficult to regulate legally, it is important to think about non-legislative ways to address the problem. Educating people about the dangers of sending nude photos is a logical step. But how much effect such education will have is uncertain. A study at the University of Rhode Island found that 56 percent of college students have received sexually suggestive images, and more than two-thirds have sent sexually suggestive messages. In short, sexting and sending sexual selfies have become an established part of college life for many. Perhaps education could encourage people to be more careful when engaging in such practices, but eliminating the sharing of compromising pictures seems unlikely.

Conor Friedersdorf at The Atlantic approaches the issue from another perspective. Friedersdorf doesn't address revenge porn sites in particular, but he talks about a number of related phenomena. Specifically, he points to an incident in Tennessee in which several high school boys pretended to be romantically interested in female classmates and convinced them to send naked pictures of themselves. The boys then threatened to distribute the photographs to parents and friends if the girls did not continue to send nude pictures. 

Friedersdorf argues that this kind of blackmail could be substantially reduced if we did not have such a stigma against nudity. That stigma, he argues, is both pervasive and nonsensical. "In so many instances of nude photo blackmail, there's no sex, just a grainy nude image. And nudity alone, without even a provocative pose, is enough for stigma and blackmail." If nudity were as acceptable as it is in Continental Europe, Friedersdorf suggests, it would be much more difficult to shame and harass people simply by putting a nude picture online.

There's obviously something to this. If people saw nude images as moderately embarrassing rather than catastrophically evil, revenge porn victims wouldn't have to worry about losing their jobs. They might feel less emotional distress as well. Perhaps, in some cases, this change is already underway. Writer Nikki Yeager, for example, wrote a cheerful post about how she really didn't care that her ex had placed a picture of her vagina on a revenge porn site. Admittedly, the image was not identifiable as hers — but, on the other hand, she did tell the whole Internet it was out there. Her blasé reaction, more amused than traumatized, seems like something we might hope for more of in Friedersdorf's imagined future of unstigmatized nudity.

Even in such a future, though, revenge porn would still be a problem. That's because revenge porn isn't really about nudity, or even necessarily about sex. Instead, as Jill Filopovic argues, "The purpose of revenge porn [is] to shame, humiliate and destroy the lives and reputations of young women." Men, as Filopovic's comment suggests, are rarely targeted. Filopovic describes her own experience in law school, when she was constantly harassed through a site called AutoAdmit. No one had naked pictures of Filopovic to post — so people just posted descriptions of her clothing or repeated what she said in class that day, juxtaposed with crude sexual commentary. According to Filopovic:

It's hard to explain the psychological impact these kind of anonymous posts have, when these people know your name, face and exactly where you are during the day. You can't walk down the hall at school without wondering if that guy who just made eye contact with you is going to go home and write something disgusting about you on the internet, or if anything you say in class is going to be quoted on a message board as evidence that you are a stupid cow, or if any one of these anonymous commenters is going to take their sexually violent urges offline and onto your body.

Along the same lines, Caitlin Seida recently wrote about how her picture was posted online without her consent. The image wasn't nude or sexual; it just showed Seida in a Laura Croft costume for Halloween. Hundreds of strangers then took the opportunity to comment on her weight (she has a thyroid condition) and abuse her for, basically, not looking sexy enough in their opinion.

Revenge porn, then, isn't an isolated phenomenon. Rather, it's part of a general Internet milieu in which women, especially, are viewed, targeted, policed and "punished" for breaking up with someone, or for being too naked, or too sexual, or too outspoken, or too heavy or really for just being women. The web has made it possible to crowdsource misogyny. Revenge porn in which women are identified has even made it possible to crowdsource stalking.

Since revenge porn is an outgrowth of misogyny, and since that misogyny takes a number of forms online, reducing the stigma of nudity seems unlikely to be helpful. For that matter, teaching women and girls not to send nude pictures of themselves to their boyfriends seems like it would have a limited effect. Again, Seida and Filopovic didn't take or send nude pictures of themselves, but they were still targets of humiliation and harassment.

Instead, if there needs to be education, it seems like it should be focused on guys. Obviously not all men harass women, online or off, but a certain number do, and they need to be told to stop. Schools and parents should teach boys (and girls too) that harassment like this is unacceptable. And society needs to tell people it's unacceptable too — which involves passing laws. The measure in California is a good start. Hopefully other states will pass more effective legislation soon.

 

Noah Berlatsky Noah Berlatsky edits the comics and culture website the Hooded Utilitarian and is a correspondent for the Atlantic. He is working on a book about the original Wonder Woman comics.

Take this job … and post it.

 

On September 28, 2013, Marina Shifrin posted a video on YouTube called “An Interpretive Dance For My Boss Set To Kanye West's Gone.” The video opens with a close-up of Shifrin’s face and a caption: “It’s 4:30 am and I am at work.” It ends with the words “I QUIT” superimposed over Shifrin dancing in front of a row of empty cubicles. Then she walks to the door, turns off the lights and the screen goes black: “I’m gone.”

Most of the one-minute, 45-second video features the former Next Media Animation staffer bobbing, shimmying and gyrating in a sound booth, a bathroom stall and in front of those cubicles, her employee ID badge swaying around her neck.

“For almost two years I’ve sacrificed my relationships, time and energy for this job,” she writes in the video. “And my boss only cares about quantity and how many views each video gets. So I figured I’d make ONE video of my own.”

Ironically, Shifrin’s unorthodox resignation has gone viral. In two weeks, it received more than 15.8 million views on YouTube — certainly enough to make most bosses happy.

The majority of viewers have responded positively. There are more than 93,000 “thumbs up” votes on YouTube, more than 23 times the number of “thumbs down” votes. A sampling of the 18,000 comments includes praises such as “What an awesome, creative, getcha way of quitting a job!” and “good for you!!”

Shifrin’s efforts garnered plenty of media coverage, too, and even earned her a job offer from Queen Latifah. On her talk show, Latifah asks Shifrin if she has any regrets.

“No, sometimes I think that you need to forcefully close one door in order for the other one to open a little easier,” explains the 25-year-old aspiring comedian. Her response was met by claps and whoops from the studio audience and an understanding smirk from Latifah.

Of course, not everyone has loved Shifrin’s video — quite a few YouTube commenters criticize her dance moves, for instance. In response to a story about the viral video, one reader writes, “Just another member of the lost generation without a backbone (not facing boss to actually deliver the news) and feeling entitled…”

Another says, “I've been in management for close to 20 years, and I'd NEVER hire her. If she did this to her last company why wouldn't she do it to us?”

Actually, it’s likely that Shifrin’s popular video will land her multiple job opportunities. But will she set precedent for others who follow her lead? Her video may seem like a novelty now, but future video quitters could ruin their professional reputations and lose prospects for future employment.

There are also moral considerations. Was it ethical for Shifrin to quit her job through this channel — a public video? Not only did she deride her employer, she did it using company equipment and facilities. If she hadn’t been resigning anyway, there’s a chance Shifrin’s video would be reasonable cause for termination.

Many employers have policies that prohibit using company property for personal pursuits. These codes can get murky in the digital age. (Is an email address considered property? What about a Twitter handle?) But a video camera used to film a silly, “stick it to the man” interpretive dance sequence isn’t so debatable. It’s a material object in the same vein as a company computer or phone.

Some employees sign a contract upon hire that explicitly forbids using property this way. If they break the rule, then they can be fired on legal grounds. Not all companies have such a clause, but one can argue that an employee crosses an ethical line by using company property for activities unrelated to the job.

Is all personal use of company property equal? Is checking Facebook for 10 minutes as unpardonable as taping a YouTube video bashing your boss? Keep in mind that Shifrin didn’t make her video in the privacy of her own home. She did it at work, in a space belonging to the company and intended for business-related activities.

Even in a country that lauds free speech, Shifrin’s video is ethically contentious. While condemning her employers is her right (in the United States — not necessarily in Taiwan, where Next Media Animation is based), the virtues of the way she chose to do it are not as clear-cut.

These ethical points are important to consider when looking at this trend — posting public videos to share personal announcements — on a larger scale. In addition to resignations, people have made videos to announce pregnancies, come out of the closet and to circulate marriage proposals.  Teenagers taking part in a craze called promposing tape themselves elaborately asking their dates to prom. Some rack up millions of YouTube hits for their efforts.

Promposing may seem harmless to all but a few disgruntled educators, but the stakes will be higher if YouTube quitting becomes the next big thing. Not all companies will react like Shifrin’s former employer did: with a video of their own.

Three days after Shifrin’s move, Next Media Animation, a 3D animation studio headquartered in Taipei, Taiwan, responded with a close imitation of the original. In addition, a rep from the company sent an email to Gawker, addressing Shifrin’s allegations.

“I do not think she intended to hurt anyone, but it has happened,” wrote Mark Simon, a commercial director at the company. Later he adds, “There is an image now of a sweat shop, we are not.”

In a Q & A with The Washington Post[i], Shifrin backtracks a bit, and says the company treats employees well.

“They understand that the video was a joke and a tip of the hat to my time there,” she sums up.

In the end, the quit video was good marketing for both parties involved. Shifrin has amused millions of YouTube fans. But she didn’t take the high road.

 

Deceptive Entertainment: The Ethics of Video Manipulation in the Online Arena

 

In his 1896 book "In the South Seas", Robert Louis Stevenson famously concluded that, “The picture of an event (on the old melodramatic principle that ‘the camera cannot lie, Joseph,’) would appear strong proof of its occurrence.” I wonder what Mr. Stevenson would make of the dancing Pepsi Next baby or the pronouncements of the E*TRADE stock-selling wunderkind.

In the last decade there has been a proliferation of images that can no longer be called approximations of actual events. Over the years, providers of visual media have struggled to earn the public’s trust and endow visual images with credibility. In today’s atmosphere of distorted video and slick computer animations, however, commercials and videos no longer need to caution “do not try this at home” because today’s audiences could never hope to re-create the physical world that digital technology offers up. Modern consumers are regularly bombarded with images that stretch the fabric of reality to the breaking point. Companies are eagerly lined up to channel new digital technologies that alter images to provide maximum excitement, increased entertainment value and higher impact.

But should they be?

There are many ways in which a corporation or individual can alter video: by adding or subtracting content; through the composition of several images into one; by depiction of events with audio or video that are created artificially; and through animations. Modern digital video producers have added another component to their well-stocked bag of tricks — the creation of video that appears amateur, but is really a well-thought-out commercial endeavor aimed at convincing consumers they are viewing a production of their peers.

While the Radio Television Digital News Association’s (RTDNA) Code of Ethics clearly states, “Professional electronic journalists should not manipulate images or sounds in any way that is misleading,” the Advertising Self-Regulatory Council (ASRC) doesn’t have a similar guideline. Should it? Should online advertisers be held to the same ethical standards as electronic journalists or can today’s production companies consider the sky the limit under the guise that advertising is an artistic endeavor?

An example of professionals posing as amateur, grass-roots consumers can be found in the grainy, home-shot look of a popular YouTube video, “Bike Hero,” that featured the popular “Guitar Hero” video game played with a BMX bike. The video was allegedly posted by “Kevin” from the demographically average town of Fort Wayne, Ind., complete with a comment from the poster that exclaimed, “Can’t believe how many times it took to make this work, but it was a lot!” While that statement may have been true in the technical sense, as no professional video is ever shot straight through on the first try, it leads you to believe that Kevin and his friends (called the Brierwood Vandals in the post) really struggled to create their homemade clip — that it was a true labor of love. In actuality, the piece was shot by the professional production team Droga5 in North Hollywood. When the video was discovered to be the brainchild of media giant Activision, the chief creative officer, Brad Jakeman, was queried about the deceptive nature of the clip. He was confident — arrogant even — in his response, saying, “It’s not meant to be deceptive. It’s meant to be fun.” He further argued that he and his team expected people to figure out that it was something “in the marketing realm” and that, in itself, would generate conversation. He was correct. The “Bike Hero” clip was the fifth most watched YouTube video in 2008.

In another work of corporate viral marketing, the “Amazing Ball Girl Catch” video appears to be a newsreel clip shot during a Triple-A baseball game between the Tacoma Rainiers and the Fresno Grizzlies. It captures the incredible catch of a foul drive by a ball girl who scales the outfield wall in spectacular, super-hero-like form to catch the ball.

This video was released to YouTube and garnered millions of views in an incredibly short time. While it seems like an authentic video news clip, it is, in fact, a commercial for the sports drink giant, Gatorade. If you look closely, you can see a bottle of the drink near the ball girl’s chair when she sits after the catch.

Purportedly, Gatorade sought out the advertising agency Element 79 to produce the clip and then shelved it, along with its relationship with the agency, shortly thereafter. They adamantly claim they never intended to use the video, yet somehow the clip was “leaked” to YouTube. Gatorade representative Jill Kinney remarks, “We were not planning to release the ball girl video, however, now that it’s out there, we’re thrilled with the response it’s getting.” Gatorade and Element 79 both deny having knowledge of who posted the clip. 

The best part of the deal for Gatorade is the fact that they reaped double exposure from this “oops” moment: once when the clip first emerged and wowed viewers with its amazing content and again when people discovered the ruse and online conversation that ensued across social media channels. Sounds less like a mistake and more like a savvy marketing move, doesn’t it?

Companies hiding their credentials behind faux user-generated content are trying to capture the momentum being spawned by companies like Frito-Layand Chevrolet as they adopt true amateur content for their big television spots such as Super Bowl commercials. The strategy of using crowdsourced advertising comes in response to consumers’ affinity for products and services that they have been introduced to by word of mouth. Rated as the number one reason for buying a product in 20 to 50 percent of all purchases, word of mouth is a powerful marketing tool. Interestingly, the second most important factor in determining whether a consumer will make a purchase based on a word-of-mouth recommendation is the identity of the message sender. It must be a trusted source — ideally a user of the product or service. This is why the “Bike Hero” fake amateur video is so seductive. Players of “Guitar Hero” and similar games would definitely find trust in the “recommendation” of what appears to be an average guy enamored of the game enough to spend time making a video about it.

 Joseph Turow, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania’s Annenberg School for Communication correctly points out that it is not easy to separate amateur from professional work. “Someone posting on message boards or blogs may be representing a company. Is that an amateur?” The answer is no. The problem is the same one posed by “Bike Hero,” “Amazing Ball Catch Girl” and similar videos: transparency. 

So who benefits from this kind of deception? In an article titled, “You Didn’t Make the Harlem Shake Go Viral — Corporations Did,” MIT engineer and energy tech company owner Kevin Ashton shows how companies cashed in on “free” advertising based on the meme “the Harlem Shake” that went viral when some teenagers released their version of Albert Boyce’s drunken dance at Harlem’s Rucker Park basketball court. As the craze for Harlem Shake videos exploded, many of the imitations were not created by enterprising youths looking to express their creativity, but rather large enterprises like advertising agencies, the Miami Heat and Sports Illustrated. One of the most successful Harlem Shake knock-offs featured Time Warner-owned Maker Studios staff. Their promotion of the video through YouTube and Twitter channels led to record label owners, deejays and others further promoting it across social media. Who was the ultimate winner in this cascading marketing ploy? Google, of course, whose increasing YouTube views and ad revenue helped make investors like Fidelity, T. Rowe Price and JPMorgan Chase happy enough to want to do the Harlem Shake.

All of this visual sleight-of-hand smacks of a new kind of astroturfing. Astroturfing, for the uninitiated, is an insidious, relatively recent practice that gives a message the appearance of coming from a disinterested party when it is, in fact, created by an entity that is very much interested in the message’s reach: an advertiser, a corporation or even a political party. While the FTC requires the endorsements of reviewers or bloggers that create such messages in return for payment (either monetary or in-kind) to be disclosed, there is no disclosure yet required on adverts that merely give the appearance of being consumer-created.

Besides capitalizing on consumers’ attraction to home-grown video, savvy video marketers are busy creating advantages in other ways. Among notable emerging trends in video in the 21st century is the ability to more rapidly “engage, educate and entertain” for the purpose of selling an idea or product. To many, this means an increase in digital manipulation to the point of fantastical proportions, like that seen in the Pepsi Next and E*TRADE commercials.

So what’s the problem with a few talking babies? It depends on what the producer is trying to achieve through manipulation. If they’re just trying to enhance the creative nature of the video or amp up the entertainment value, then perhaps a little digital enhancement is not such a bad thing. After all, everyone knows the E*TRADE babies aren’t really discussing the finer points of stock trading. However, if a company sets out to portray a video as a truthful depiction of an event but uses manipulated images to “fool” the public, then there is a deeper, less ethical overtone.

Video holds special credibility with audiences, since it is recorded in real time and not just heard or photographed. Since the Christian Holy Bible first chronicled the parable of Doubting Thomas, we’ve lived by the mantra “Seeing is believing.” So do audiences really believe that the 8-month-old Pepsi baby is blissing out on an electric guitar? Probably not. The real issue is that digital technology allows advertisers to craft scenes that would be impossible to create in the real world. This technique extends beyond the realm of absurdly hyper-talented toddlers in ways that make the incredible, credible. Constant exposure to over-the-top scenes in some way dilutes our ability to perceive real from faux, and keeps us from skepticism in cases in which video producers are trying to deliberately mislead us.

Take J. Lo’s trip back to her humble Bronx beginnings in her commercial for the Fiat 500. While “Jenny from the Block” was filmed driving her subcompact Fiat around the streets of Los Angeles, a digital production studio was hired to make it seem like she was cruising through one of the poorest areas of New York City. Her voiceover purrs, “This is my world. This place inspires me. They may be just streets to you, but to me they’re a playground.” The New York street scenes J. Lo passes by have a gritty, down-to-earth vibe that fairly bursts with vibrant culture — an impression Fiat very much wants to convey. There’s the requisite boy drumming on overturned pails, some graffiti artists practicing their skills, casual hoops-playing and even some hip-hop and double-dutch jump rope moves thrown in for realism. The advertiser wants you to believe that with all her fame and fortune, Ms. Lopez still longs for, and returns to, the modest comforts of a lower-middle-class life. Sadly, the trip Fiat takes us on is a compilation of disparate scenes separated not just by socioeconomics, but miles and miles of countryside. Yet through the wonders of digital technology, Ms. Lopez didn’t have to leave the sunny streets of LA to convince us she’d returned to the Bronx for a little drive down Memory Lane. This distorted version dupes viewers into believing that Ms. Lopez risked her safety (or didn’t think it was unsafe) to return to her hometown that, in reality, is crime-ridden and less than idyllic. This little lie allowed the producer to associate the product, Fiat, with both success and humility at the same time — a powerful marketing mix.

And that’s all well and good — if only it were true.

Fiat owner Chrysler Group LLC acknowledged the undisclosed switch, but defended it by saying, "The commercial tells the story of how the simple elements of our upbringing can help explain who we are, where we’re going and serve as a source of inspiration to achieve our goals in life. One does not need to be in a specific location to be inspired or continue to be inspired.” While true, the entire premise of the Fiat commercial hinges on J. Lo’s implied love of her old neighborhood. A place which, as of this writing, she’s set foot in approximately one time since she shot to fame 26 years ago, and only after her phony commercial was exposed and vilified in the media.

Video producers, corporations and individuals should be held accountable for their productions. Transparency is the cornerstone to any truthful marketing campaign and the key to not only advertisers, but also media venues like Google, YouTube, Vine and Twitter being able to maintain a credible image with consumers. Entertaining videos can still achieve viral status even when they are released as part of a known marketing venture. After all, the popularity of the Super Bowl commercials confirms this every year.

A recent study tracking entertaining ads’ effectiveness on consumer buying habits showed, “Entertainment evoked before the consumer is aware of the brand being advertised slightly reduces purchase intent … Conversely, entertainment evoked after the consumer sees the brand increases purchase intent.” This strongly demonstrates that a little transparency of authorship might be a good thing for consumers and advertisers alike.

Ultimately, the ASRC should formulate regulations to define what constitutes truth-in-advertising for online video. Certainly, releasing professionally produced clips under the guise of amateur videos should not be considered ethical — lying never is. Online entities such as YouTube, Google and other social media should have strict guidelines and penalties for falsifying authorship and should work to encourage transparency across platforms. And while the Pepsi Next baby may just brighten your day (and get you to consider a Pepsi Next the next time you’re thirsty for soda), commercials like the J. Lo Fiat spot should be required to make full disclosure in a way similar to those commercials that post, in small print, “professional driver” when a suburban dad drives like Mario Andretti through the grocery store parking lot.

 

Nikki Williams Bestselling author based in Houston, Texas. She writes about fact and fiction and the realms between, and her nonfiction work appears in both online and print publications around the world. Follow her on Twitter @williamsbnikki or at gottabeewriting.com

Surveillance on Aisle 3

 

You’re grocery shopping as usual when one of the shelves starts talking to you. “Would you like to try our new fudge-center Chips Ahoy cookies?” it says. “They’re very popular with women in their late 20s like yourself.

Ugh, what? This creepy encounter sounds like something out of “Minority Report,” but it could be coming to your favorite supermarket in 2015. The Washington Post reported in mid-October that new, sensor-laden shelves will analyze shoppers' facial features in grocery stores in order to sell them more junk food.

The Washington Post explains:

“The shelf, which is hooked up to Microsoft's Kinect controller, will be able to use basic facial features like bone structure to build a profile of a potential snacker. … 

“The company expects the shelf to help funnel more of the right products to the right consumers, and even convince undecideds to commit to an impulse buy by offering well-timed in-store commercials or coupons when the embedded weight sensor learns they've picked up an item. The move is almost certain to make it more difficult to resist junk foods.”

What the heck? Supposedly these smart shelves won't store actual photos of your face, but they’re still troubling on a gut level and an ethical level … not to mention that the information is vulnerable to hackers.

Supermarkets have a hacker problem

Shopping in person seems inherently more anonymous than shopping online. If you use cash, no loyalty card and the self-checkout, the only record of your visit could be the store’s security camera. It’s not like you’re handing over your home address, credit card number and other personal information, like you do when buying something from an e-commerce site. Shopping online makes you more vulnerable, right?

Maybe not. California shoppers got an unpleasant surprise when criminals put “sniffers” on credit/debit machines in 20-some Lucky supermarkets two years ago, recording at least 80 shoppers’ card numbers. Arizona chain Basha’s was hit early this year, with more than 400 customers reporting fraudulent use of their credit or debit card. Finally, the Schnucks family of stores in the Midwest was the victim of a hacker who used a “malicious computer code” to steal customers’ payment info.

So without carrying a hefty wad of cash with you everywhere, most purchases have some risk attached. But until now, at least we had the reassurance that the ubiquitous ad-targeting of the Internet couldn’t follow us into the store.

Privacy is disappearing — and these shelves would only contribute

In this day and age, you have to go to extreme measures to avoid being tracked. A recent piece on Fast Company about living anonymously tackled this very issue. Titled "Think you can live offline without being tracked? Here's what it takes,” the piece explores how people are grasping at privacy in a post-NSA-scandal world. Bottom line? To be truly anonymous, you basically can’t drive, need a fake credit card and must cut off friendships. Living in 2013 means conceding that corporations and the government are virtually following you, ostensibly for your good (at least some of the time).

But just because everything is tracked nowadays doesn’t mean it’s acceptable — or that these encroachments have to become increasingly invasive. These interactive shelves seem like a creepy new way to erode our quickly disappearing privacy. Are the shelves the end of shopping anonymously? In reality, shopping anonymously ended when stores installed security cameras. That said, consumers can stand up and protest when our personal data is used for less-than-innocuous reasons.

Mondelez’s history makes this more troubling

It would be one thing if pro-social causes were secretly using personal data — like how New York City reads your toll pass at random times to compile real-time traffic data. Situations such as that are different (and possibly acceptable) compared to using personal info to encourage unhealthy eating. Mondelez International is the company behind the shelves, and it owns a slew of well-known brands including Oreo, Nabisco, Teddy Grahams, Cheese Nips and Trident. So you won’t be pressured to buy more apples and zucchini, just preservative-laden, artificially flavored snacks.

And Mondelez doesn’t have the best track record to begin with. In May, consumers filed a class action lawsuit against the company for its claims that Fig Newtons are “made with real fruit,” when the cookies actually contain “mechanically processed fruit purée, which is not ‘real fruit,’” according to the plaintiff. (However, a judge dismissed the lawsuit this fall.)

Earlier this spring, the International Union of Food workers filed a formal complaint against Mondelez International for multiple human rights violations, such as union-busting and firing a worker after a machine chopped his thumb off. Incidents such as these seem to indicate that Mondelez cares more about profits than fairness to employees or transparency for customers.

Stores should use informed consent

Whether it’s Mondelez or any of the snack food companies that will inevitably follow suit and implement face-tracking shelves, it’s absolutely vital for them to use informed consent. As Treehugger writes, "Customers deserve to know when they're the target of a marketing campaign.” Adds Robin Shreeves on Mother Nature Network:

“It’s important that we’re aware of insidious marketing schemes like this. It’s good to know when you’re being targeted; it helps you to make informed decisions. I also think that as consumers, we do have the power to influence the stores we shop in. If this is something that makes you uncomfortable, let stores know.”

Sure, informed consent could be a headache for snack giants using these shelves, and may even bite into their profits. But better — and far more ethical — to be up front with consumers rather than face their wrath later, right? It doesn’t have to be hard, either. A simple handwritten sign in a neighborhood boutique lets me know to smile, I’m on camera. A sign posted at supermarket entrances explaining the facial analysis software wouldn’t be enough to turn all hungry shoppers away, even if it did drive away more privacy-conscious ones.

 The Microsoft Kinect[ion]

 Another reason informed consent is so important in this case is that Mondelez’s shelves use Microsoft Kinect technology, adding another layer of ethical concern. I can’t help but wonder whether Mondelez International will be sharing the consumer data with Microsoft. At least Microsoft recently issued the following statement, after rumors that it made the Xbox One with advertising in mind:

“[We] will not target ads to you based on any data Kinect collects unless you choose to allow us to do so. Furthermore, we will give you a clear explanation of what is collected and how it will be used. Importantly, we do not collect your personal information to share or sell to third parties, and you are fully in control over what personal data is shared.”

Whether or not you believe Microsoft, at least that statement is a step in the right direction. Let’s hope Mondelez follows suit.

 

Holly Richmond Holly Richmond is a Portland writer. Learn more at hollyrichmond.com.

The Ethics of Access

 

The Internet, the network of networks, is about connecting. It is about sharing and accessing information. Or is it?

In the last few decades, information and communication technologies revolutionized the world of communication to the point at which we often refer to an information society in discussing our modern social and technological structure. Many of us — digital literates living in developed countries — regularly experience the Internet as the groundbreaking forefront of a digital revolution. The Internet enables me to communicate for free with friends and family who live across Europe. It makes it easy to order food while streaming a movie in the comfort of my living room. It helps my students to access articles and books without having to physically wander through the aisles at the library. More importantly, the Internet is a powerful tool able to ease public and political participation, and to facilitate the circulation of information enabling the spawning of revolutionary movements, such as the Arab Springs. In this sense, the Internet may be an important vehicle for free speech that contributes to the well being of a democratic society. In this sense, we may agree, the Internet is indeed a revolutionary tool. But who is benefiting from such a revolution? Also, the Internet is often described as a globally distributed, decentralized, democratic and non-hierarchical network. But, is it?

In 2012, there were approximately 2.4 billion Internet users — roughly 34 percent of the world population, meaning that the remaining 66 percent of the world was digitally excluded. In other words, 5.6 billion people never had the chance to access the Internet. They never had the luxury to browse the Web searching for information. They never enjoyed the opportunity to talk for free to their loved ones thousands of miles away. If we think of the Internet in terms of digital inclusion and digital exclusion, then our perception and understanding of today’s digital revolution might assume slightly different features.

We, in the developed Western world, do not consider access to technology as a luxury good. To us, digital technology is an essential tool of social participation that may fundamentally influence human relationships. We use the Internet to craft our own networks. We share and search for information. We participate in blog activities. We update wikis. We post reviews. We access and build knowledge. We connect and interact. In one word, we access, turning the Web into a reflexive medium of cognition, communication, and cooperation where users take on a crucial responsibility. These fundamental components contribute to building, understanding, reinterpreting, and constantly reshaping the Web. And yet, 5.6 billion people do not have such a power.

What does this mean for the digitally excluded? It means unpaired access to information and knowledge, lack of technological literacy, disadvantage in the job market and weakness of social and political participation. It means having fewer sources of inspiration. Less freedom to connect, share, speak up and be active members of today’s information society. If the Internet is a necessary tool for social connection, an important instrument for public participation and civic engagement, and a basic component that may facilitate democracy, then it should also be considered a fundamental human right rather than a luxury good. Digital exclusion, in 2013, is a socially constructed disability that affects two out of three people.

The Web is pervading human life. It conveys and re-creates knowledge, questioning values and bringing conflicts between fundamental rights such as intellectual property and freedom of speech. The growth of information technology generates and enhances a number of important ethical issues. Among those, the ethics of digital access become even more problematic as the Internet is a constant presence in our lives. By now, to the digital included, accessing the Web means, literally, existing in the real world. Our needs are increasingly addressed through digital icons such as national insurance numbers, bank accounts and credit cards. We increasingly share sociality and personal growth through mediated practices that oftentimes cross social media platforms. These digital footprints are essential for us to be considered — or to consider ourselves — part of the “real world.” Lacking a digital presence, to many of us, means risk becoming invisible “non citizens.” Does our presence on social network sites or on online communities affect our likeness of having offline friends, communities and social skills? Perhaps not. But the Web is a unique domain that may facilitate access to a potentially globalized social environment. Online networks can be small and intimate or broad and impersonal, and they can impact our social settings in a variety of ways. Considering these premises, is the price of being excluded from the network socially acceptable? Should the Internet still be considered a luxury good?

In the information society, digital access includes three major components. First, we must have access to the technology — a computer or a smartphone to connect. Second, we must have access to the information itself — news stories, forums or blogs. And third, we must have adequate literacy to deal with the information we access — which often means technical literacy as well as language proficiency as the vast majority of documents are in English. Access, in other words, is a layered argument. It has to do with technical skills and with the understanding of the potentialities of the Internet. But it also relates to the selective spread of technological innovation. Alas, source inequality is an inherent (and unethical) feature of the Internet. Education and economic systems are crucial components of access. Western countries invest huge capital in digital information technology. With large investments frequently comes a focus on profit. The ethics of access, unfortunately, is often left aside as nonprofitable. Habitually, educational media are not accounted for in the financial agenda of information technology.

Perhaps, then, the Internet may not always be considered an instrument of democracy. The Internet, in fact, can be a channel of discrimination and power inequality. It can be a tool for oppression and control. The Internet can — and often does — enhance the disparities between rich and poor. Access to knowledge and information is often directly related to success in the job market. The Internet can stimulate the growth of dominant cultures against diversity. But, undoubtedly, the Internet also has an inherent democratizing potential. Granting access would be a first step toward the fulfillment of such a potential. Democratization, in other words, would mean making the Internet accessible worldwide, fighting the information gap and the digital divide. It would mean contributing to the spread of the wealth of information by increasing literacy, practical training and technical access.

Needless to say, digital inclusion is a complex issue. It entails physical access to computers, electricity, Internet connection and bandwidth. It entails technical literacy. It entails the ability to use and perhaps reinterpret, reshape, and renegotiate the content, or the infrastructure, or both. It entails fighting against discrimination and power inequalities.

A first important step toward supporting access would be asking our governments to build sustainable infrastructures dedicated to the economically impaired and, perhaps, to compel powerful online companies — who are enormously benefiting from the digital revolution — to invest part of their profits in boosting digital inclusion. This would involve the creation of centers where the digitally excluded could have access to technology and to quality education to become informed and skilled digital citizens. Where they could build connections, enjoying the benefits of online and offline social networks. Where they could receive quality education to learn how to access the Web more effectively, how to create content, how to improve their knowledge, how to become proficient and connected digital citizens. Some of these centers have begun to surface. Many have proven proficient. Unfortunately, these initiatives are still peripheral phenomena.

The challenge is crucial and complex. But developing and supporting educational structures that facilitate digital access is fundamental for the future of the Web, for fully developing its potential to become a powerful and unprecedented democratizing tool and, perhaps, to start making the world a better and more inclusive place.

 

Federica Fornaciari Federica Federica Fornaciari is a Ph.D candidate in Communication and an IGERT fellow in Electronic Security and Privacy at the University of Illinois at Chicago. Reach her at fforna3@uic.edu or follow her on Twitter @fedefo.

Privacy and the NSA

 

Lauded on the international film circuit at the time of its release in 2005, Austrian film director’s heady thriller, “Caché” (“Hidden”), is — at least initially — a film about paranoia. In it, a well-to-do Parisian couple (played by Daniel Auteuil and Juliette Binoche) and their young son find their otherwise ordinary lives disrupted by an anonymous intervener who begins leaving unmarked VHS tapes on the family’s doorstep. The tapes show surveillance video of the exterior of the family’s home (filmed from a hiddenvantage point), with the visuals sometimes disrupted by crass, child-like and apparently meaningless crayon drawings.

Because there is no explicit threat of violence, the police can’t help. The invisibility of the antagonist(s) and the cryptic intentions of the tapes thus plummet the couple into desultory blame games and ineffectual self-reflection. On one hand, they believe their domestic sense of safety has been violated, though because the perceived threats of this surveilling ambiguity never materialize, it is merely the semblances of the family’s safety that have been contravened. Dread is uncovered, or revealed, but life — by all appearances — is as ordinary as ever.

The recent controversy surrounding Edward Snowden, the USA Freedom Act and, principally, the NSA seem to grate a psychological nerve similar to the one piqued by Haneke in “Caché.” Generally speaking, the revelation of the allegations that the NSA is spying on its citizens “reads” like an unmarked video sitting on the front steps of our sense of privacy. And while the NSA may indeed be in violation of the law (when it’s not acting outside the law outright), that the activities of the agency pose a perceived threat to our sense of privacy might also dispel the nebulousness around which this sense of privacy has been constructed, developed and taken for granted both in our actions in the world and in our relationships with others. In other words, the sense of privacy we suspect and believe to be violated by these allegedly illegal NSA activities might indeed be a misrepresentation of privacy, which in turn has a direct ethical implication on how we are in the world, and who we are with others.

To shed some light on how our sense of privacy might be appropriated, a recent letter written and addressed to the Senate Judiciary Committee, signed on behalf of AOL, Apple, Facebook, Google, Microsoft and Yahoo, provides a strong endorsement of the USA Freedom Act, which would provoke an on-paper reformation of the NSA surveillance programs that were originally instated following section 215 of the Patriot Act, itself amending Title V of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 by adding sections 501 and 503, though language from section 501 is the most telling:

“The Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation or a designee of the Director (whose rank shall be no lower than Assistant Special Agent in Charge) may make an application for an order requiring the production of any tangible things (including books, records, papers, documents, and other items) for an investigation to protect against international terrorism or clandestine intelligence activities, provided that such investigation of a United States person is not conducted solely upon the basis of activities protected by the first amendment to the Constitution.”

The vagueness of “other items” has been problematic for many, largely because it has allowed the NSA to reach out to various telecommunications corporations in the interest of garnering American phone call metadata (who calls who, using what, from where and for how long), which — for intelligence purposes — can be incredibly fecund, yet still within the bounds of First Amendment legality. The USA Freedom Act would be an attempt to curb this surveillance initiative.

We’d like to laud the collaborative efforts of these six big tech companies, using their collective public stance to hopefully sway the senate in favor of an increased sense of privacy. But the great irony here is that many of these have also allegedly been complicit in other similar NSA surveillance activities— which is now how we can start to get at the true instability upon which our sense of privacy is founded. If we look at the letter, we see that it first begins with a “for the people” framing: “As companies whose services are used by hundreds of millions of people around the world, we welcome the debate about how to protect both national security and privacy interests.” And as it reads on, the letter largely advocates for transparency in the policy-making process: “Allowing companies to be transparent about the number and nature of requests will help the public better understand the facts about the government’s authority to compel technology companies to disclose user data.”

While we’d be hard-pressed to disagree with the letter’s sentiments, the underlying motive in this cooperative pushback against NSA surveillance procedures is founded far less on principles than it is on profit. If this pushback were truly founded on principles of privacy, it would have come far sooner in the surveillance process. But the minute these surveillance policies turn back on those who helped strategize and implement these policies, we run into this type of policy intervention, authored by corporations whose collective fear is great enough that they are willing to sidle their competitive differences in service of their common raison d'être — profit (which then masks itself by fighting for “increased transparency”). The most telling sentence in the letter is thus also the most opaque: “Our companies believe that government surveillance practices should also be reformed to include substantial enhancements to privacy protections and appropriate oversight and accountability mechanisms for those programs.”

In the same way that “Caché” initially seems like a film about paranoia, this controversy with the NSA initiallyseems like one about privacy. In this sense, it’s encouraging to have big tech companies apparently speaking on behalf of the common person. But for the conversation to have arrived at this point, our sense of privacy must have already necessarily been altered (or compromised). Though perhaps not an orthodox source, “The Onion” satirizes this shift in a June 11, 2013 headline: “Area Man Outraged His Private Information Being Collected by Someone Other Than Advertisers.”

What if we consider, for a moment, that the things to which we’re entitled to hold private are in fact only nominally private? Take phone call metadata, for instance. When the phone was an emergent technology in the early 20^th century, it created the possibility of long-distance communication that — by virtue of the mechanisms of the technology at the time — required the use of a human mediator, or operator, on public lines (see “Speaking into the Air” by John Durham Peters). As the technology evolved and was continually altered by the relevant social groups of private commercial industry and public policy, phone conversations became increasingly private — though party lines were a common telephone subscription option until the 1950s. During and since that time, telephone companies have set the standards of privacy for telephone calls (and now, cell/mobile calling), but the point remains that privacy emerged as a convenience for telephone usage and was later why party lines were outmoded altogether. Privacy was not an a priori right for telephone usage. Instead, privacy is nominally assured, though we take this assurance for granted and thus get upset when this nominal assurance caves at the slightest breeze.

Of course, as people in the world, we should have a right to privacy, though we’re living in an age of information (or what some simply call “the Information Age”), which is largely defined by the use and effects of technology on social, commercial and political human interaction. This historical-paradigmatic transition has, in turn, called for a redefinition of privacy, though as J. J. Britz suggests in his essay, “Technology as a Threat to Privacy: Ethical Challenges to the Information Profession,” these definitions go beyond mere policy and into the realm of freedom and human autonomy. The Information Age, in other words, has upset previously granted notions about privacy. In consideration of private communications, privacy of the body, personal information and information about personal possessions, Britz suggests that the main ethics of the Information Age concern what personal and private information should be accessible, how confidentially this information should be treated, how accurate this information is, what purposes the information is used for, and what rights a person has to his or her own personal and private information.

If we follow Britz’s logic in thus attempting to understand “privacy” under our present historical (and technological) paradigm, we must also recognize the primacy of truth, freedom and human rights in defining this privacy to which we have a right. This is because, at a fundamental level, how we define privacy will in turn have a direct effect on our interpersonal relationships, or how we relate to one another as people. As an example, I’d like to again consider “Caché”: Georges, the character played by Daniel Auteuil, who seems to be the one most affected by these anonymous affronts of surveillance, is forced to confront some of the perceived demons of his past in the interest of uncovering a possible perpetrator. This search leads him to a former childhood relation, an Algerian named Majid (Maurice Bénichou), who harbors a deep-seated resentment toward Georges, which later leads to the sole (and incredibly shocking) violent act in the film, in which Majid slices his own throat with Georges watching — an event itself only incidentally connected to Georges’ own paranoia about the ambiguous surveillance tapes. Though Majid is perhaps unstable, it is clearly Georges’ reintervention in Majid’s life that reawakens those old ghosts and leads him to commit the suicide act — though Georges’ intervention in Majid’s life is less a result of healing old wounds than it is of trying to uncover this anonymous, surveilling threat (in a simplistic way, Georges’ motives are selfish).

Applied to the present conversation, Georges’ paranoia is a metaphor for our own, and what Georges is unable to see is that he might himself be perpetrating these affronts by trying to correct what he sees to be a violation of his sense of privacy. Technology frames information, itself a synecdoche of our own intelligence. An assault on privacy is likewise a psychological assault, but only if the boundary transgressed is granted a reality greater than what it actually is (like phone call metadata). Anxieties about privacy affect what we reveal about ourselves to others, and how we reveal this information. Whether this affectation is for better or worse remains to be seen, though as Michael McFall suggests — in his 2012 “Ethics and Information Technology” essay titled “Real character-friends: Aristotelian friendship, living together, and technology” — friendship and interpersonal relationships are directly impacted by our appropriations of technology in day-to-day life. To that, I add that these appropriations are moderated by privacy and other related policies. (As an aside, I can at this point identify a slight shortage of literature relating information ethics to interpersonal relationships. This is something that has time and room to be corrected.)

The controversy of the NSA is the newest chapter in the log of our longstanding, collective fear of clandestine governmental activity. Even if the NSA controversy goes away, it will be replaced by something equally shrouded. But lurking behind this fear is the anxiety of the unknown, and that if we were in some way violated by this hidden entity, there would be nothing we could do. This creates a heightened sense of suspicion and paranoia that can subvert, damage or inhibit our actions as autonomous individuals among others. However, some ethical insight can be culled from a greater knowledge of the historical contingencies of the ideas — like privacy — that we like to take for granted in much the same way that we take the authority of secretive governmental organizations for granted.

 

Benjamin van Loon Benjamin van Loon is a writer, researcher, and communications professional living in Chicago, IL. He holds a master’s degree in communications and media from Northeastern Illinois University and bachelors degrees in English and philosophy from North Park University. Follow him on Twitter @benvanloon and view more of his work at www.benvanloon.com.

The ethics of crowdfunding

 

Crowdfunding, the raising of funds from a large pool of donors in a time-limited campaign on an online platform, has grown exponentially since today's biggest brands — Kickstarter and Indiegogo — emerged in the last six years. The earliest popular experiments in crowdfunding were in the music industry, often by artists who had struggled to find funding from record labels or disliked the terms they were being offered. But as crowdfunding has expanded into a very wide range of sectors, from electronic hardware to film-making, it has largely shed its image as a way to fund the unfundable, and has become an attractive alternative funding strategy in its own right. In 2013, the industry is expected to raise $3 billion, driven both by the proliferation of the number of platforms and the emergence of multimillion dollar campaigns, some of which have been organized by celebrities such as Spike Lee and Zach Braff.

This simultaneous expansion of the ideas being considered, the participants involved and the speed and scale at which ideas can be realized magnifies many of the ethical questions that presently exist around who is entitled to fundraise, and for what purpose. None of these questions are unique to crowdfunding, but by calling on individuals to contribute to the fundraising process and making it transparent suggests that crowdfunding is in some ways a quasi-public activity and therefore should be held to different standards than an entirely private one.

A small number of crowdfunding campaigns have raised explicitly legal-ethical questions. The founders of the online magazine Gawker started an Indiegogo campaign in May to finance the acquisition of video footage purporting to show the Toronto mayor smoking crack cocaine that had previously been reported on by the Toronto Star newspaper. At the time the campaign was criticized for two reasons: its implications for the judicial or disciplinary process Rob Ford was likely to face, and the fact that the funds raised were expected to be donated to a gang widely reported to be involved in organized crime. Six days into the campaign the organizers warned visitors to the campaign Web page that they had lost contact with the gang and that “our confidence that we can consummate this transaction has diminished.” Less than two weeks later, Gawker reported that a source had told them the video had disappeared. Neither outcome seemed to affect the campaign: it raised $201,204, exceeding its $200,000 target. Gawker has since donated the proceeds to four Toronto-based nonprofit organizations that work on substance abuse issues. Although the video has not been found, Ford has publicly admitted smoking crack cocaine. The campaign was by no means the first example of a media outlet paying for information from a dubious source, but Gawker's use of crowdfunding gave the practice an unprecedented publicness and involved the audience directly.

Beyond instances that have obvious legal implications — such as funds being directed to criminal activity — there are many cases in which crowdfunding raises broader ethical issues. These typically fall into two categories: cases that pose potential harm to individuals and cases that pose potential harm to existing institutions or processes. Our reading in either case may be politically oriented and is likely heavily contested.

Two of the most strongly criticized crowdfunding campaigns on ethical grounds raised the question of harm and offense to individuals. The American Freedom Defense Initiative, a radical anti-Islamic group, raised $41,500 on Indiegogo (of a $50,000 target) in May for an advertisement campaign warning against what it calls "the threat of jihad and Islamic supremacism.” The organization, which is classified by the Southern Poverty Law Center as a hate group, had previously attracted controversy for its posting of anti-Muslim advertisements at subway stops and on buses. Indiegogo representatives responded to several public calls for it to remove the campaign by saying that the views of campaign creators did not reflect those of the platform. It's not clear why the campaign was deemed to be within the platform's terms of service, which prohibit campaigns from "promoting terrorism, abuse, libel, hate, personal injury, property damage, violence, racial intolerance or financial exploitation.”

Kickstarter plays a much more active role in moderating projects that appear on the site, and says that one of its staff members reviews every campaign proposed. But the platform faced somewhat similar moral questions after it approved "Above The Game," a guide claiming to help men seduce women. The controversy began after Somerville, Mass.-based comedian Casey Malone blogged about the campaign and posts by the project's author Ken Hoinsky on the website Reddit that appeared to encourage men to make unwanted sexual advances toward women. The material was not posted on the Kickstarter page, but critics suggested the platform should take into account the tone of the proposed book and the likelihood it would promote misogyny. Kickstarter's terms of service prohibits campaigns that are "threatening, abusive, harassing … or invasive of another's privacy." Kickstarter declined to stop the campaign during its funding period, later citing a lack of time to investigate and an inherent "bias … towards creators" that caused staff to be cautious about canceling the project. Hoinsky raised and received $16,369, eight times his original funding goal. Kickstarter later said it had made a mistake in allowing the campaign to continue, banned seduction guides from the platform and donated $25,000 to an anti-sexual violence organization, the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network (RAINN). "We take our role as Kickstarter’s stewards very seriously. Kickstarter is one of the friendliest, most supportive places on the web and we’re committed to keeping it that way," the platform's representatives wrote in a blog post.

The extent of the responsibility that crowdfunding platforms feel toward donors and project creators varies greatly. Even more variable are platforms' perceptions of their ethical and moral responsibility toward existing institutions and broader social impacts. One of the most common criticisms of crowdfunding is the notion that its expansion will “crowd out” other forms of investment, particularly from the public sector. Daren Brabham, an assistant professor at USC Annenberg who studies crowdsourcing, suggests that the success of crowdfunding will undercut and disincentivize public funding for the arts: Kickstarter’s published figures showed that the platform raised more in 2012 for the arts than the National Endowment for the Arts. The rise in the number of crowdfunding projects that supply public goods or overlap with services governments might be expected to provide has added weight to this critique. Last month three campaigns appeared on the Crowdtilt platform to fund private security forces in three neighborhoods in Oakland, Calif. Two of the campaigns reached or exceeded their target, and the trio collectively raised $60,101. While private security forces are common in the city, the campaigns were criticized for encouraging their growth and, due to the ease of creating and “cloning” crowdfunding campaigns, causing a contagion effect that could undermine the role of policing. For the libertarian, this may be an encouraging development that supports the reduction of government spending. For the progressive, it is a threat to the nation state that risks widening existing social inequalities.

The publicness and transparency of crowdfunding suggests that its regulatory and ethical framework needs to mirror that publicness. Platforms will increasingly be called on to account for their actions as the volume of campaigns increases. How platforms respond to ethical questions raised both at the level of individuals and at a broader level will likely depend on their business models. Platforms that are seeking to boost volume may prefer to adopt a legally-driven approach to content, excluding only those projects that pose the threat of litigation. Platforms that aim to cultivate particular user communities may decide to impose guidelines that provide ethical frameworks salient to them. As the cases mentioned suggest, the ethical contours of crowd funding are often determined by users of a platform just as much as they are by the platform's organizers. Most platforms encourage users to assist in regulation by reporting campaigns that may violate the platform's terms of service, although users who are dissatisfied with a campaign often turn to online mass media to press their case. Those dynamics don't always work perfectly, either, since large organized groups of users may argue for their interests and preferences in a way that disadvantages minority groups. But when managed effectively, they can help to establish a system of ethics that is participatory and highly responsive. For the crowdfunding industry to establish and retain a sound ethical footing, it should embrace the interplay of community and platform to develop conversations and opportunities that are productive and avoid harm to individuals and institutions.

 

Rodrigo Davies Rodrigo Davies is a researcher at MIT’s Center for Civic Media, founder of the Civic Crowdfunding Research Project and a master’s candidate in Comparative Media Studies. Contact him via rodrigodavies.com or on Twitter @rodrigodavies.

Big Brother in the Workplace

 

Has the American workplace become an Orwellian fishbowl where Big Brother bosses watch our every move? So it seems.

Employer surveillance of employees has become rampant at many of America's top corporations and at smaller firms all the way down the ladder to the so-called mom-and-pop shops.

Snooping bosses can see your emails, outgoing and incoming. They can read their content, see the names and email addresses of who you've emailed, and who has emailed you.

Nosy bosses can also access software that captures every keystroke made on a computer keyboard to determine what a worker is writing. 

Your employer can also monitor computers to track website visits to see if an employee is frittering away valuable time playing games, watching porn, searching for another job, or browsing Facebook or You Tube, Twitter or other social media.

Beyond keeping tabs on worker Internet activity, employers have placed bugs in cubicles and in some cases on phones. Or an eye-in-the-sky camera may be silently observing worker conduct through the day.

Surveillance and spy ware technology keeps improving. It's readily available and relatively inexpensive, which accounts, in part, for its growing use in the workplace.

Employers who monitor their personnel claim it increases productivity and safety and reduces theft. They also argue that it protects proprietary information and various company secrets and is an invaluable tool for investigating workplace harassment and discrimination.

Blue-collar workers are also monitored. There may be a video camera in the break room, and a GPS tracking device on company trucks. Assembly line or factory workers may be observed through video cameras.

Laws governing the taping of phone conversations differ from state to state — some states require the consent of both parties to a conversation to give approval before the exchange may be taped or monitored.

Some states permit employees to sue for invasion of privacy, intrusion on seclusion and other violations of privacy protection. But if employees sign waivers or employment contracts that grant the employer certain surveillance permissions, there may not be legal remedy for the workers.

If an employer issues an employee handbook, areas and devices that are monitored may be indicated. Frequently, workers may also be asked to sign a waiver or similar document, granting spying rights to an employer and acknowledging that they're aware they’re being watched.

Employees who know they're being watched may be exemplars of good on-the-job behavior. But employees aware that they’re being spied on increases their stress levels, resentment and anger, and generally lowers workplace morale, according to a report dated September 29, 2013, from AOL.

Is such surveillance of workers legal? For the most part, yes.

Is it ethical? From my perspective, sneak peeking at workers is an ethical breach. But proponents of employee monitoring insist that it's necessary. Others hold that the act of spying inhabits an ethical no man's land.

Do spied-upon employees have legal remedy? In most cases, no.

Although there is only a small body of case law on worker privacy and no federal government regulations, as yet, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals has an email privacy case on its docket concerning email messages sent back and forth between a husband and wife. Still, without statutory protection, workers, when on the job, have little or no right to privacy.

Some progress is being made, however, toward protecting the social network privacy of employees and job applicants. In January of this year (2013) Illinois became the nation's third state to enact a law prohibiting employers from obtaining usernames and passwords of people using social networks.

But workers may not even be safe from employer snooping beyond the workplace. The employee handbook may spell out the circumstances by which an employee may be watched, and on what devices, when not working.

In some instances employers may look at a worker's medical records and or doctors’ notes. A worker's specific medical diagnoses may not be disclosed. But when an employee files a workman's compensation claim, or asks for a medical or family leave, or claims a disability, the employer may be legally permitted to request medical records.

Numerous cases of egregious spying on employees and its consequences both for the spy and the spied-upon have been reported in the media.

For example, the CEO of a publishing firm fired several employees who posted negative comments about the company on their Facebook pages. Obviously, workers' Facebook pages were being monitored.

In another case of alleged employer "spying,” Harvard was accused of an illegal look at faculty computer records to determine how an important document was leaked, and who was the leaker. The rules permit system administrators to access the records for maintenance purposes, to prevent damage and to ensure compliance with university rules. Some Harvard partisans said the alleged peek at the faculty computer records was "reasonable."

In Seattle several years ago, Boeing Co. was accused of secretly monitoring employees to protect its proprietary information, according to a November 18, 2007 report from Aero-News Network, an online publication reporting news of the aerospace industry.

Hewlett-Packard was fined $14.5 million some years ago for investigating leaks from its board of directors by allegedly secretly monitoring their emails and instant messaging, that was also reported on the article cited above by the Aero-News Network.

A Google search revealed many additional instances of employers violating worker privacy.

The solution to this situation may now be making its way through the U.S. House of Representatives in the form of a privacy protection bill. If enacted, the bill would provide some degree of protection to employees by restricting employer monitoring.

Privacy advocates are also working against excessive spying in the workplace including the not-for-profit Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC).

According to their web site, EPIC is a public interest research center in Washington, D.C., established in 1994 to focus public attention on emerging civil liberties issues and to protect privacy, the First Amendment and constitutional values.

How will it end?

As employer spying and the war against it continues,technology now also exists to monitor regions of the brain connected to pleasure, hunger, the flight-or-fight phenomenon and other states of mind. So the capability to read a person's thoughts, in a general sense, is now also available. Will the labor force of the future be wired to a device that monitors their most secret thoughts? Let's hope not.

But who watches the watchers?

In light of all the illegal misdeeds of so many corporations of late, perhaps the employees should be monitoring their employers, rather than vice versa.

 

Marc Davis Marc Davis is a veteran journalist and published novelist. His reporting and writing has been published in numerous print and online publications including AOL, The Chicago Tribune, Forbes Online Media, The Journal of the American Bar Association, and many others. His latest novel, Bottom Line, was published in 2013.

Oh No. I’m on Google!

 

Have you ever Googled yourself?

You should. You might find some interesting information.

I found the results of an old writing test, an empty photo album and my (slow) finish time for an 8K charity race. Luckily, this year’s results were also posted, so you can see that I’ve improved. Perhaps more disturbingly, I came across some previous addresses, a list of companies I “liked” on Facebook and the value of my home. I have a hard time remembering these things, but apparently Google doesn’t.

I will not search for ways to have these facts removed. The information is not malicious, nor was it meant to destroy my reputation. If anything, the people who posted it were just trying to bolster their company image by congregating a large quantity of new content. The innocuousness of it all is part of what makes it so frustrating. It may be invasive, it may be inconsiderate, but that does not make it wrong in the eyes of the law.

Unfortunately, it is possible that I gave someone the right to post it. I am embarrassed to admit it, but at some point, I become a mindless waiver robot. I simply lost sight of who had access to my personal information. At best, I skim through online user policies. Almost every game and every app or digital mode of communication is accompanied by a long waiver form, and I don’t have the patience to read them all. Considering so many marketers advertise product convenience, it sure is complicated to get going.

Perhaps naively, I just assume businesses have the decency to keep my information private. Companies or organizations that publish race times are mildly irritating, but ultimately harmless. Those that seek out and post old home addresses, email addresses, an individual’s age and the names of relatives push privacy boundaries to a new level.

WhitePages.com is a major offender when it comes to facilitating the distribution of private information, so it deserves special attention. Like its behemoth in-print version, the free online person search offers basic facts such as an individual’s name, current address and a landline phone number. But the website also lists additional content, including age, “associated” individuals and links to affiliates that, for an extra charge, provide information about bankruptcies, liens, household members, email addresses, neighbors, background checks and more.

Some of this information is already publicly accessible, but affiliated companies compile it and supplement it to create detailed, easy-to-acquire online profiles. According to the WhitePages privacy policy, the website gathers information that, “(i) you provide to us or authorize us to collect from your social media account(s) and (ii) information about your use of our products and services.”

I have yet to send WhitePages an authorization form. The website’s content collection policy is pretty vague, and it lends itself to further questions. What social media companies (if any) work with the website? Are WhitePages employees utilizing content they themselves find on social media websites? And most importantly, how are we authorizing them to share our information?

It is unsettling to know that a public records website, social media provider or any other digital resource can publish information about you without your knowledge – especially if that information leads to unfortunate or unforeseen consequence. Posters may not realize (or consider) that some benign references can affect a person’s image or employment potential. This is particularly true of details that hint at someone’s religious beliefs, handicaps or other individual demographics.

Take age, for example. Older individuals are at a disadvantage when they seek work, and their long-term unemployment rates are higher due to preconceptions about pay expectations and understanding of technology. The Age Discrimination in Employment Act protects those aged 40 and older from discrimination in job advertisements and during the hiring decisions, but the legislation is less effective if a quick name search reveals an applicant’s age before they get the chance to interview.

The government has taken some steps to safeguard online privacy and limit accessibility to personal information. This year, President Obama unveiled a blueprint for a “Consumer Privacy Bill of Rights”which serves to clarify and standardize digital privacy policies. The bill calls for website security measures that are transparent, easy-to-access and enforceable. Furthermore, it suggests that users should have the right to update their information and prevent some personal data from being posted.

To draw up the bill, the Commerce Department will meet with companies, privacy and consumer advocates, international partners, State Attorneys General, federal criminal and civil law enforcement representatives and academics who will work together to establish model policies that can make Internet users feel more secure. Among the bill’s priorities are creating policies that give users control over the way their data is used and disclose personal information in the context within which it was provided. That way, the phone number you used in your sports blog profile won’t show up on a person search listing.

Once the policies are created, the Obama Administration plans to encourage companies, privacy advocates, consumer groups, and other relevant representatives to collaboratively enforce them. The bill will also be sent to Congress for approval, so the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and Attorneys General have the power to enforce it.

Some consumer data privacy regulations are already in place, but not all information sharing guidelines are subject to the same enforcement regulations. Federal laws ensure the privacy of health records, education, financial services and personal information about children under the age of 13, but most digital privacy policies are subject to self-regulation. The motivation behind adopting model FTC policies and honestly regulating them is the idea that a trustworthy reputation can ultimately translate into profit (and vice-versa).

I’m not sure that I trust companies with limited oversight to create and follow optimal privacy policies, but I’m also unwilling to cut myself off from the world of digital communication. (How else am I supposed to see what you’re having for lunch?) So until new laws make privacy policies legible, I will need to start forcing myself to read through the fine print. Remembering to keep private information private is a “live and learn” lesson, and I am still learning.

 

Paulina Haselhorst Paulina Haselhorst was a writer and editor for AnswersMedia and the director of content for Scholarships.com. She received her MA in history from Loyola University Chicago and a BA from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. You can contact Paulina at PaulinaHaselhorst@gmail.com.

Ethics of Revenge Porn

 

While she was attending Lamar University in Texas, Meeghan Falls sent countless nude photographs to her boyfriend. Two months after their two-year relationship ended, Falls found out that her ex-boyfriend had posted many of the images, along with identifying information, on the Internet. "My stomach dropped," Falls said. "I started shaking. I started crying immediately. I felt like the whole world had seen me naked."

Falls was the target of "revenge porn" — the distribution of naked or sexual images of other people online without their consent, generally by ex-romantic partners. Revenge porn can be emotionally devastating to the victims, as Falls' story shows. It can have serious other consequences as well. Teachers who have had nude pictures posted online have lost their jobs. Revenge porn can affect custody disputes. In some cases it can damage relationships with families or spouses. Kayla Laws, for example, sent a topless image to a friend considering plastic surgery. When her email was hacked, the picture was stolen and placed on a revenge porn site. Soon after receiving harassing emails at work, someone sent the photo to her sister. She was afraid she would be fired from her job as a real estate agent.

Revenge porn is obviously cruel and unethical, whether the images in question are actually stolen or posted by an ex in a betrayal of trust. But addressing it legally is difficult. The main barrier is the First Amendment, which protects free speech even in extreme cases. In addition, in 1996 Congress passed the Federal Communications Decency Act, which protected websites from prosecution for user-submitted content. This means that YouTube or Facebook can't be prosecuted if someone posts pornography to those sights. But it also means revenge porn sites aren't responsible when a guy posts a nude image of his ex. 

There are some legal remedies. Victims of revenge porn can bring lawsuits, forcing websites to disclose the users who posted the images, and then sue those users. Such lawsuits can be difficult, since those who bring suit may have to make their names public, possibly resulting in further harassment and embarrassment. Nonetheless, some victimshave publicly sued revenge porn site Texxxan.com and its host GoDaddy for violation of privacy, though it's unclear whether they can win.

More hopefully, California recently became the first state to pass a law specifically targeting revenge porn by making it a misdemeanor for an individual to take and circulate sexual images online with the intent to harass or annoy. Even this law, however, has serious limitations. Since it only outlaws images taken by others, it does not address "selfies," images snapped by an individual her or himself and sent to a significant other. It also doesn't address images placed on revenge porn sites for money or gain, rather than with an intention to harass.

Because revenge porn has so far proven difficult to regulate legally, it is important to think about non-legislative ways to address the problem. Educating people about the dangers of sending nude photos is a logical step. But how much effect such education will have is uncertain. A study at the University of Rhode Island found that 56 percent of college students have received sexually suggestive images, and more than two-thirds have sent sexually suggestive messages. In short, sexting and sending sexual selfies have become an established part of college life for many. Perhaps education could encourage people to be more careful when engaging in such practices, but eliminating the sharing of compromising pictures seems unlikely.

Conor Friedersdorf at The Atlantic approaches the issue from another perspective. Friedersdorf doesn't address revenge porn sites in particular, but he talks about a number of related phenomena. Specifically, he points to an incident in Tennessee in which several high school boys pretended to be romantically interested in female classmates and convinced them to send naked pictures of themselves. The boys then threatened to distribute the photographs to parents and friends if the girls did not continue to send nude pictures. 

Friedersdorf argues that this kind of blackmail could be substantially reduced if we did not have such a stigma against nudity. That stigma, he argues, is both pervasive and nonsensical. "In so many instances of nude photo blackmail, there's no sex, just a grainy nude image. And nudity alone, without even a provocative pose, is enough for stigma and blackmail." If nudity were as acceptable as it is in Continental Europe, Friedersdorf suggests, it would be much more difficult to shame and harass people simply by putting a nude picture online.

There's obviously something to this. If people saw nude images as moderately embarrassing rather than catastrophically evil, revenge porn victims wouldn't have to worry about losing their jobs. They might feel less emotional distress as well. Perhaps, in some cases, this change is already underway. Writer Nikki Yeager, for example, wrote a cheerful post about how she really didn't care that her ex had placed a picture of her vagina on a revenge porn site. Admittedly, the image was not identifiable as hers — but, on the other hand, she did tell the whole Internet it was out there. Her blasé reaction, more amused than traumatized, seems like something we might hope for more of in Friedersdorf's imagined future of unstigmatized nudity.

Even in such a future, though, revenge porn would still be a problem. That's because revenge porn isn't really about nudity, or even necessarily about sex. Instead, as Jill Filopovic argues, "The purpose of revenge porn [is] to shame, humiliate and destroy the lives and reputations of young women." Men, as Filopovic's comment suggests, are rarely targeted. Filopovic describes her own experience in law school, when she was constantly harassed through a site called AutoAdmit. No one had naked pictures of Filopovic to post — so people just posted descriptions of her clothing or repeated what she said in class that day, juxtaposed with crude sexual commentary. According to Filopovic:

It's hard to explain the psychological impact these kind of anonymous posts have, when these people know your name, face and exactly where you are during the day. You can't walk down the hall at school without wondering if that guy who just made eye contact with you is going to go home and write something disgusting about you on the internet, or if anything you say in class is going to be quoted on a message board as evidence that you are a stupid cow, or if any one of these anonymous commenters is going to take their sexually violent urges offline and onto your body.

Along the same lines, Caitlin Seida recently wrote about how her picture was posted online without her consent. The image wasn't nude or sexual; it just showed Seida in a Laura Croft costume for Halloween. Hundreds of strangers then took the opportunity to comment on her weight (she has a thyroid condition) and abuse her for, basically, not looking sexy enough in their opinion.

Revenge porn, then, isn't an isolated phenomenon. Rather, it's part of a general Internet milieu in which women, especially, are viewed, targeted, policed and "punished" for breaking up with someone, or for being too naked, or too sexual, or too outspoken, or too heavy or really for just being women. The web has made it possible to crowdsource misogyny. Revenge porn in which women are identified has even made it possible to crowdsource stalking.

Since revenge porn is an outgrowth of misogyny, and since that misogyny takes a number of forms online, reducing the stigma of nudity seems unlikely to be helpful. For that matter, teaching women and girls not to send nude pictures of themselves to their boyfriends seems like it would have a limited effect. Again, Seida and Filopovic didn't take or send nude pictures of themselves, but they were still targets of humiliation and harassment.

Instead, if there needs to be education, it seems like it should be focused on guys. Obviously not all men harass women, online or off, but a certain number do, and they need to be told to stop. Schools and parents should teach boys (and girls too) that harassment like this is unacceptable. And society needs to tell people it's unacceptable too — which involves passing laws. The measure in California is a good start. Hopefully other states will pass more effective legislation soon.

 

Noah Berlatsky Noah Berlatsky edits the comics and culture website the Hooded Utilitarian and is a correspondent for the Atlantic. He is working on a book about the original Wonder Woman comics.