Essay.

Privacy & The Internet

What Lies Beneath?

Kirsten Sadler

The Internet is a tool that much of society in the twenty first century would now not be able to live without. It is hard to think that this revolutionary technology that we use in everyday practices has only been available for general public use since the mid 90’s. Though since then the Internet has taken off it and has never failed to generate innovative, new, experiences and systems, for the ever-growing communities worldwide that live off its very means.

As we all know, the Internet assists us in the everyday means of human life. It allows us to communicate without being in the same room or country as another, it allows us to create revenue and an income, it allows us to follow world news and events and it also allows us to share our lives with others through social networking.

Social Networking is a large part of the Internet today. There are thousands upon thousands of countless social networking sites that feed off the use of people’s desires to communicate. Boyd and Ellison, authors of, ‘Social Networking sites: Definition, History and Scholarship’ state that social networking sites, ‘ have attracted millions of users, many of whom integrate these sites into their daily practices.’ Although using these social networking sites daily seems perfectly safe to many users this can prove to be a different story.

In the recent outburst of social networking popularity, many concerns have been raised in relation to the amounts of privacy that social networking sites uphold. Social networking sites such as Facebook and Myspace have come under speculation for not providing adequate privacy settings for its users. This has amounted in many controversial stories including suicide, Internet bullying, hacking and spamming. So, just how easy is it to become a victim of the failed privacy laws of social networking?

Earlier this year a debacle concerning Facebook privacy settings occurred, where over 171 Million Facebook accounts were uploaded into a single torrent for illegal downloading over the Internet. Ultimately Facebook’s public profile directory, containing millions of Facebook user’s profile information was scanned and made available to anyone over the Internet. According to Ian Paul’s article, ‘The Facebook Data Torrent Debacle’ 2923 people have downloaded the file since its release and another 9473 people are actively downloading it today. With occurrences like these happening users of social networking sites should be questioning their privacy. Though a recent study from the Centre of Applied Research states that specifically ‘students are unaware of the actual audience viewing of their information.’ Whilst privacy is a contentious issue for adult aged users it is a miniscule concern for young adults and teenagers.

It is no secret that since the Internet has become universally popular among school aged children and young adults, especially in relation to the use of social networking sites. Since the use of social networking sites has skyrocketed over the past couple of years, it has made way for new forms of bulling, this includes Internet bulling, and hacking and spamming of individuals account information and exploitation of people’s private details.

In September of this year, eighteen-year-old Tyler Clementi committed suicide after a video of him being intimate with another male was released on the Internet. His fellow roommates recorded the event on a webcam and later uploaded it to the social networking site, Youtube. Clementi was unaware the event was being recorded and had not came out about his sexuality to his fellow college colleges. Ultimately, Tyler Clementi was a victim of Internet bullying and his personal information was wrongly exploited. The incident makes aware how easy it is for anyone to upload unauthorized material onto social networking sites.

Incidents like Tyler Clementi’s represent the danger of social networking sites and the lack of privacy that they withhold. The fact that the video could be uploaded without the consent of Tyler and without any obligation in relation to Youtube’s privacy settings is why much of society are now questioning the safety of social networking sites.

In regards to Facebook’s policy, it states that, ‘You own all of the content and information you post on Facebook, and you can control how it is shared through your privacy and application settings. Although if the information is covered by Intellectual Property Rights, you give Facebook, ‘permission to your privacy and application settings: you grant a non-exclusive, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, worldwide license to use any IP content that you post on or in connection with Facebook."

These Privacy settings set by Facebook are similar amongst many social networking sites. There are millions of users of social networking sites, the question is, how many would have actually read and understood the privacy laws and settings? A study by Michele Ybarra and Kimberly Mitchell states that, 33 percent of youth who use social networking sites have reported online harassment. (Ybarra, Michele, Kimberly, Mitchell 2007, p. 2) With eighteen percent of social networking site users being teenagers (Royal Pingdom, 2010) the risks they face with Pedophiles, identity theft, bullying and unethical distribution of private information is a major growing concern.

Privacy is such a contentious issue amongst Internet users and more largely users of social networking sites as the protection they use is inadequate to what the standards of privacy should be on the Internet. As the Internet increasingly expands, so does the amount of predators seeking private information of millions of Web users. As long as social networking sites such a Facebook and Youtube allow for distribution of individuals private content the concerns surrounding those of privacy and the Internet will remain.

For every user of Facebook, Myspace, Twitter and Youtube comes the chance that they too will become a victim of incidents such as the Facebook Torrent Download and with the increasingly easy methods of the sharing of information over the internet comes the story of those like Tyler Clementi, victim of the failed privacy laws of social networking.

References:

Boyd Danah, Ellison Nicole 2008, ‘Social Network Sites: Definition, History, and Scholarship’, Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, vol. 13, no. 1, pp. 1-10

‘The Facebook Data Torrent Debacle’, PC World, 30 July. 2010, p. 1. Retrieved 16 October 2010 from PC World Today

Rutgers Student Suicide 2010, ‘Huffington Post’ 29 September. 2010, p.1. Retrieved 16 October 2010 from The Huffington Post

Facebook: Facebook Privacy Policy 2010, information concerning the Privacy content of Facebook, viewed 17 October 2010, http://www.facebook.com/policy.php

Ellison, N 2008, ‘Social Networking Sites 6’, Retrieved 17 October from Centre of Applied Research

Ybarra, Michele & Mitchell, Kimberly 2007, ‘How Risky Are Social Networking Sites? A Comparison of Places Online Where Youth Sexual Solicitation and Harassment Occurs’, vol. 121, no.2, pp.350-352. Retrieved October 19^th, 2010 from Official Journal of American Academy of Pediatrics.

URLS:

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1083-6101.2007.00393.x/full

http://www.pcworld.com/article/202167/the_facebook_data_torrent_debacle_qanda.html

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/09/29/dharun-revi-molly-wei-charged_n_743539.html

http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/cgi/reprint/peds.2007-0693v1

http://www.facebook.com/policy.php

http://www.socialcapitalgateway.org/R%20Internet%20Ellison%20(2008)%20-%20Social%20networking%20sites.pdf

Week 10: Evaluation

Overall I think the course was interesting. I have gained lots of knowledge of communication technologies and the way they influence today's society.

In relation to the blogs, I found that they were a great way to go over notes and lectures again, helping to gain information and further understanding of what was presented at the start of each week. Although, I did find the blogs to be very time consuming, they were inevitably effective in increasing research and understanding of content.

As for the lectures, on the most part they were informative and very organised. Though sometimes it was hard to grab some concepts of computer technology and theories, the lectures were made exciting with media examples and powerpoint presentations that helped with the understanding of certain topics.

In summery, I believe New Communication Technologies to be a successful subject in representing the understanding of technology and communication technologies in modern society.

Week 9: Essay Question

My chosen essay question is question 3.

Why is privacy such a contentious issue for internet users? Discuss with reference to at least ONE social network service (or other web2.0 service).

Research and Essay Plan:

My essay will focus on incidents in which individuals have been affected by lack of internet privacy.

This includes suicide, bullying, hacking, spamming and distribution of peoples personal information.

In addition I will also research the rights of social networking site in conjunction with the sharing of personal information.

Week 9: Cyberpunk & William Gibson

Week 9's lecture was a follow on from week 8.

This week the topic was on cyberpunk and one of Cyberpunks most famously known writers, William Gibson.

First of all, what is cyberpunk?

Cyberpunk can be described as a social and political theory that explores and studies urban society, cultural theories and sociology of the future. Cyberpunk revolves around the notion that world will become a technological dystopian age in the near future.

Who is William Gibson?

William Gibson is the face of Cyberpunk, having written an amounting number of books Gibson's career is focused on many notions of the science fiction sub-genre.

Gibson's first short story, 'Burning Chrome' in fact created the notion of cyberspace.

His most recognised work though would be his book, 'Neuromancer' written in 1984 that expands on the notions represented in, 'Burning Chrome.'

Gibson's works to be seem like they would present some interesting concepts, although I believe they would appeal mostly to individuals interested in science fiction.

As for the notions and theories for Cyberpunk, I think are more universal. In my opinion I think that the theories of the fusion of man and machine and the world as a technological dystopian future are both interesting and questionable, as anything seems possible with technology in this age.

Week 8: Tutespark Cyberpunk

Cyberpunk: Fusion of Man and Machine.

Combining of 1999 film Bicentennial Man and the article 'Intuitive Human-Machine-Interaction and Implementation of a Household Robot Companion.'

Service robots or robot companions that interact with humans require a special form of Human-Machine-Interaction (HMI).

Based on a typical household scenario, we have developed a framework for integrating several human-robot modalities into one robot system, the NBR 114.

We see our robot, The NBR 114 being useful in typical household scenarios.

The robot observes the human during his movements and ac- quires the information necessary for repeating this task.

After the initial learning phase the robot is asked to repeat the task several times for a complete table of e. g. six place settings. By analysing this scenario we have chosen the following HRI com- ponents for implementation and integration into our robot system: Speech Input / Out- put, Gesture Recognition and Remote Control. Additional components are the “tradi- tional” functionalities of mobile robots like navigation, manipulation, object recognition and the like. While a remote control is not necessarily needed for the sce- nario above, our robot integrated into a household environment also incorporates control of the house itself. It can be considered as a household appliance, designed to serve humans.

We chose reliable, working implementations of the components of The NBR 114 listed, adapted to our special needs of service robotics. Our focus is on the development of an integration household robotic appliance.

http://www.service-robotik-initiative.de/download/publicationen/IPA/Parlitz-Intuitive_HMI-final070213.pdf

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0182789/

Week 8: Virtual Philosophy and Cyberpunk

Week 8’s lecture was focused on the topic of virtual philosophy.

Virtual Philosophy, I found was a hard concept to understand. Though it can be explained as the links between humanities dependence on technology and the ability to tell the difference from what is real and what is not.

Interestingly, Virtual Philosophy and the theories of cyberpunk coincide.

To elaborate, the study of virtual philosophy also deals with the concept of humanities dependence on technology in the future and how machines may dominate the way we live, in centuries to come.

In addition, the idea of virtual philosophy plays with the concept of the fusion of man and machine, the creation of a technological dystopian future and the idea that one corporation will govern society, much like the theories of cyberpunk.

Most likely the most famous movie that deals with the concept of virtual Philosophy is The Matrix. The Matrix represents the theories of the fusion of man and machine and the idea of a technological dystopian future.

Although the Matrix might be the most successful cyberpunk, there are thousands more books, movies, websites and videos that deal with the ideas of virtual philosophy.

Week 7: Creative Commons & Open Source Software

Week 7's lecture on Creative Commons and Open Source Software, was a follow on from week 6 and the discussion of ownership rights over the internet.

The main idea of the lecture was to research the variations of Copyright laws on the Internet and to gain an understanding of these laws in relation to material that individuals view, manipulate and create specifically for the web.

Many people have heard of Copyright laws and regulations, but what about other licences that allow the general public access and manipulate content freely. Yes, there are such laws and these are known as Creative Commons and Public Domain licences.

Creative Commons is a non-profit organisation that, 'makes available standard licences and tools that enable creators to make their works available on more flexible terms.'

Initially this means that any work on the internet that lies under a creative commons licence, in certain terms, can have its content used again, manipulated or expanded by others. In other words, compared to a Copyright Licence a Creative Commons licence has 'some rights reserved' as opposed to 'All rights reserved'

Following the Creative Commons licensing is Public Domain content. Content that comes under Public Domain is not covered by intellectual property rights, which means its content can be manipulated and recreated without breaking or coming under any laws or reserved rights.

Where did Creative Commons initiate?

Creative Commons and the relaxing of copyright laws came from the Free Software Movement.

The Free Software Movement is a movement that was created by Richard M Stallman, which allows individuals the freedom to copy, study and improve software.

Stallman founder and creator of the Free Software Foundation had a goal and this goal was to provide 'A completely free Unix-like operating system made totally from free software.'

This free software was allowed for sharing and changing of software codes in order to improve program reliability and succ

essfulness. Thus, open source programs were born.

In addition, this movement and creation of open source software comes under 3 principles.

0: The freedom to run the program, for any purpose.

1: The freedom to study how the program works, and adapt it to your needs.

2: The freedom to redistribute copies so you can help your neighbour.

3: The freedom to improve the program, and to release your improvements to the public, so that the whole community benefits.

What is Open Source Software?

Open Source Software is initially 'free software'.

Open Source software is usually created due to lack of interest or successfulness of propriety software programs. For example Internet Explorer is a propriety software program, it's Open Source software competitor is Firefox, a free internet browsing system.

The difference between Open Source Software and Propriety software is that Propriety software's contents is disclosed and not available to the general public. Whereas, Open Source Software is openly available to the public and unlike Propriety software the source code is freely shared.

In conclusion, without the introduction of Creative Common licensing and Open Source Software, the ability for individuals to have a choice, to share and to collaborate would not exist in the world of the World Wide Web and computer based age we live in, in society today.

Week 7: Tutespark: What is better?

The Tutespark this week following the lecture of creative commons was to download and explore free software.

In order to do this students were advised not to use generic computer software such as, Internet Explorer and Garage Band, just to name a few and instead were instructed to replace common software with competitive open source software, which was to be used to three days.


I choose to use Firefox and Audacity in this trial and was surprised with the results.

Firefox compared to Internet Explorer and Safari seemed to have a faster downloading speed, with easy to use functions.

Usually I use Safari to browse the Internet, but when I replaced this with Firefox, I found that there were less downloading errors, a quick connection speed and no annoying updates popping up on the screen.
Overall I believe that Firefox is a great open source program that proves to be more successful than Safari and Internet Explorer.


The second open source software I used to Audacity, a free music editing program.
I compared Audacity to the Mac music editing software known as Garage Band.

These two were hard to compare. I found that Garage Band was better for making songs and music featuring lots of different instruments. Whereas, Audacity was good for making sound art and 'out of the normal' music complications.

Audacity unlike Garage Band does not have the feature of importing instruments, I can see many sound editors not taking to the structure of Audacity as much as Garage Band.

Although, I did find Audacity easier to use with its simple layout and editing techniques.
The better software I found was Garage Band because of its ability to make professional sounding songs.

In concluding, I believe that all people who use generic software should take on the test of using open source software. Many would benefit from using these unfamiliar programs and in addition may even save money.

Week 6: Tutespark- Who owns it?

Who owns what we post on the Internet?

It is a question that many do not think about and with the ever growing amount of users on the internet, everyone should know who owns and controls what they post and the rights they have to the content they put on the internet.






Who owns your Facebook content?

Facebook states that,
"You own all of the content and information you post on Facebook, and you can control how it is shared through your privacy and application settings. In addition: For content that is covered by intellectual property rights, like photos and videos ("IP content"), you specifically give us the following permission, subject to your privacy and application settings: you grant us a non-exclusive, transferable, sub-licensable, royalty-free, worldwide license to use any IP content that you post on or in connection with Facebook."

So in a way we partly own what we put on Facebook, we can choose specific privacy settings but any content that is covered by intellectual property rights, is the ownership of Facebook.

Who owns blogger content?

Much like Facebook, Blogger states that you are responsible for what you post on your blog, although Blogger in relation to intellectual property rights state that,
" You acknowledge that Google owns all right, title and interest in and to the Service, including all intellectual property rights."

MySpace ownership:

MySpace ownership is adversely different to that of Facebook and Blogger. In Myspace's term and conditions it is stated that,
"you own the Content posted by you on, through or in connection with the MySpace Services, or otherwise have the right to grant the license set forth in this Section 6, and (ii) the posting of your Content on, through or in connection with the MySpace Services and/or Linked Services does not violate the privacy rights, publicity rights, copyrights, contract rights or any other rights of any person or entity. You agree to pay for all royalties, fees, and any other monies owing any person or entity by reason of the use of any Content posted by you on or through the MySpace Services and/or Linked Services."

Although many users of the Internet think that posting a Facebook status or sharing a blog is a harmless act, the reality is that they really don't know who has the rights to the internet content they post. It is purely a simple act of viewing the terms and conditions of the site that is being used, in order to view this information and have the knowledge of the ownership rights granted to your work.

URLS:

http://thenextweb.com/2009/02/16/facebook-owns-literally-put-facebook/
http://www.facebook.com/terms.php
http://www.blogger.com/content.g
http://www.blogger.com/terms.
http://www.myspace.com/Modules/Common/Pages/TermsConditions.aspx

Week 6: Media, New Media & Social Media

Week 6 lecture was all about media and media types.

The lecture was taken by Adam Muir, who explained the many in and outs of the Internet, media and the adverse worlds they create for individuals.

Media and the internet:

In the twenty first century the Internet is considered a necessity, many individuals rely on the Internet as their primary source of communication. These people are known to belong to a virtual community and in addition due to their reliance on the internet, as a primary source of communication, form an individual identity that allows them to express who they are through the web.

Writer and teacher Howard Rheingold explains a virtual community to be, ' people carrying on public discussions long enough, with sufficient human feeling, to form webs of personal relationships.'

The creation of virtual communities is very common in Internet social communication today. Take Facebook for an example, one status can produce a mass amount of feedback that can transform into a discussion, lasting a long period of time. In adding, blog posts such as this one can have the same effect, sparking a large amount of viewer interest that can easily hold the characteristics of the creation of a virtual community.

In relation to virtual identity the same principle applies, through an individual’s use of the Internet and the way they communicate, comment and portray themselves, they can adversely recreate themselves to form a virtual identity. The creation of a virtual identity can be as easy as changing age, gender or ethnicity on a social networking site.

Social Media:

Social media is a significant part of the World Wide Web and always has been. The early Internet allowed for people in different geographic locations to communicate with others over a larger amount of space.

Though primarily this is still happening, the focus from groups of people has moved away and allowed for the individual to become the, 'common thread', sharing and consuming the content of the Internet to create Ego-Centric Social Network.

Without the Internet, where would communication be?

It is a scary thought that the virtual world we have all become accustomed to might not have existed only some decades ago.

Week 6: Media, New Media and Social Media

Week 6 lecture was about the internet, media and technology in conjunction with it's users, to create a virtual community and identity.

A virtual community can be explained as, a group of people who communicate via the internet. This includes

To be completed...

The Culture Jam

This is the video for week 5 culture jam.

When planning the culture jam, my group partner and I (Hayley) decided to focus on an issue that is close to many of our fellow students hearts. This was the issue of poor university students and the effects of not being eligible for Centrelink.

Though this issue is very realistic, we used creative licence to employ certain strategies that 'stretch the truth' of the effects of not receiving Centrelink.

We have also uploaded our Culture Jam to Youtube and CNN iReport, to see how effective the world of citizen journalism really is.

CNN Ireport link:

http://ireport.cnn.com/people/Kirstcherie?numResults=10&view=documents

Youtube video below:

Week 5: The culture jam.

Culture jamming and the influence of the individual in the world of information technology and broadcasting, this is the subject of week five New Communication Technology.

In the lecture it was all about consumption and production and how the influence of technology allows for anyone, anywhere to either produce or consume news and information of the twenty first century.

With the advancement technologies such as mobile phones, Internet and television, news and information is readily available at an astronomical rate. I am talking about mobile phones that record video and the Internet in conjunction with world news. Without these technologies the information that is available to the general public of today would not exist and ultimately the influence of the individual in turn using these technologies to spread information would not exist. Now it is all about culture jamming and the way in which general society can contribute to the news and events that happen around the world.

Culture jamming can be explained as, citizen journalism. Where everyday people use the technologies available to them to broadcast news and information. A culture jammer can be a person that uses a mobile phone to record an event also known as a mo-jo (Mobile journalist) or someone that specifically looks for events to cover (Independent journalist).

Some examples of culture jams and citizen journalism are posted below:

Current culture jam that shows the effects of the UNSW fires, posted August 29^th August 2010. Shot by a by standing person watching the smoke rise from the building.

A university student, who documented the effects of the 2008 Sichuan Earthquake, shot one of the most influential culture jams. The culture jam was so successful that it was shown on many global news programs.

The most damaging culture jam to date would be that of Senator George Allen calling campaign volunteer a racial slur known as ‘macaca’ This video was spread virally and effectively destroyed the senators campaign, earning him masses of negative exposure.

Without the wonders of technology, culture jamming would not be present today. The way we view and receive information would not be as easily accessed or consumed. Without culture jamming and citizen journalism we would have missed out on vital events and world information. In fact, culture jamming is to thank for making the production and consumption of news and politics so vital to society today.