Final Essay

Why privacy is such a contentious issue for internet users particularly for young people who use social networking sites such as MySpace and Facebook


Privacy is not a new issue, long before the digital age of technology and prior to the invention of social media sites young people were concerned about who knew their confidential information. In the school yard we worried about who we told our secrets to and only certain stories we divulged to our parents. Parents were also concerned, their children had strict curfews and we were always warned as children, never to talk to strangers and never to hang out with the wrong crowd. So why are we so obsessed with privacy in recent times? This essay will examine why in our technological age, privacy has become such a debatable issue, particularly due to concerns with the internet and social networking. This paper will look at two social networking sites commonly used by children in Australia, MySpace and Facebook and if the growing concern is warranted.


Social networking sites have arguably changed the way young people in Australia interact. According to influential social media researcher Danah Boyd ‘Socialisation is forced to shift out of shopping centres and parks, and into “networked publics” (Boyd, 2007). Social networking is the norm for young people today; not participating can make them feel isolated. Senior lecturer at Griffith Brady Robards conducted a small research project on the Gold Coast. He explains ‘abstaining can often equate to social exclusion, given that many offline social events are organised through social network sites (Robards, 2010). This means that parental responsibilities and concerns are different today is different compared with those in the past. Nowadays parents have less concerns about their children’s whereabouts, they have to worry of knowing what their child is up to on social networking sites in the home.


The media has played a huge role in bringing the privacy on social networking sites debate to the forefront of our attention. Just this month the Courier Mail ran a story headlined “Queensland Premier Anna Bligh speaks out on the unsuitability of Facebook for pre-teens” this story explains how the premier advises parents to be vigilant as children may pose as adults to sign up for an account. In the article John Fison (2010), Chairman of Brisbane IT firm NetboxBlue explains how social media can be a great tool for young people, however warns of the hazards ‘Social networking can be a great tool, it is a lifesaver for children at boarding school or in remote areas but there can be serious dangers’. The internet can prove to be a very dangerous place, not because social networking sites themselves are perilous rather it is simply the volume of people who can potentially connect with yourself or your child. Dwyer et. Al (2007) begs the question ‘Is it possible to join a network of millions of people and be able to trust all of them?’ We would to be naïve to think so.


Social networking in Australia is extremely popular ‘On a per capital basis Australia has one of the highest uptakes of social media in the world’ (Social Media News, 2010). As mentioned earlier this is where the issue of privacy becomes extremely important as exposure to large audiences has associated risks. Until recent years Australia was reality unscathed in the online social networking revolution however some tragic horror stories have emerged in our own backyard as a result of using social networking sites. A 15 year old girl, Carly Ryan was murdered after being lured by an older predator posing as an alter ego on MySpace. Carly Ryan’s mother is now campaigning for parents to exercise extreme caution with what their children are doing on social networking sites ‘They need to be more actively involved and checking their children’s websites’ she said (Adelaide Now 2010). Danah Boyd agrees with this notion in her presentation at the annual Music, Film & Interactive Conference however, she draws a fine line between parent’s being concerned for their child’s privacy and invading it themselves. Ms Boyd suggests opening the issue for discussion rather than being totally against social networking, ‘please consider the value of opening up a dialogue’ (Boyd 2010) she says.


Strangers are not the only individuals who put our children at risk by invading privacy on social networking sites. A Melbourne teenager Allem Halkic, committed suicide after he was a victim of cyber-bullying by a former best friend on MySpace. This particular case was a landmark prosecution in Australia. In an interview with the ‘Australian Newspaper’ Police Prosecutor Glenn Collins referred to bullying on social networking sites as ‘a plague in our community’ (The Australian 2010). The dangers with social networking are very real, so as expert researchers have suggested parents need to engage in active monitoring of their children’s involvement in shared media on the internet. Privacy is always jeopardised on the walls of social networking sites as the content is public. Young people can read conversations between their peers and draw whatever conclusions they like from them. They are also free to write whatever they like about each other, a perfect platform for bullying. This case highlights the need for parent’s to exercise vigilance over their children’s privacy. Young people need to be educated on the dangers of writing certain things on their MySpace or Facebook.


This essay has examined privacy concerns associated with social networking sites such as MySpace and Facebook. There are many risks related to the use of both of them, however youth of today must utilise and engage them in order to have a feeling of belonging and social acceptance among their peers. This essay concludes that there are significant benefits as well as risks for young people engaging in social networking. This notion is well summarised by German sociologist Giddens as follows ‘for today’s teenagers, self-actualisation increasingly includes a careful negotiation between the opportunities (for identitiy, intimacy and sociality) and risks (regarding privacy, misunderstanding, abuse) afforded by internet-mediated communication (cited in Livingstone p12). The issue of privacy and risk on social networking on sites such as MySpace and Facebook is only predicted to grow further in the future. Parent’s and young people should exercise caution and utilise privacy settings so they can successfully use these sites without threat and realise the social rewards from using them.



Bibliography:

Boyd, Danah 2007, ‘Why youth (heart) social network sites: The role of networked publics in teenage social life’, in D. Buckingham (ed.) MacArthur foundation series on digital learning – youth, identity and digital media: 119-142

Boyd, Danah 2010, ‘Making Sense of Privacy and Publicity’ SXSW Music, Film & Interactive Conference’ Austin, Texas, March 13 2010

Livingstone, Sonia 2008, ‘Taking risky opportunities in youthful content creation: teenagers’ user of social networking sites for intimacy, privacy and self-expression. New Media & Society, 10(3): 393-411

Robards, Brady 2010, ‘Randoms in my bedroom: Negotiating privacy and unsolicited contact on social network sites’, PRism, 7(3)

Sinnerton, Jackie 2010, ‘Queensland Premier Anna Bligh speaks out on unsuitability of Facebook for pre-teens’, Courier Mail October 10 2010, viewed October 10 2010 <]http://www.couriermail.com.au/news/queensland-premier-anna-bligh-speaks-out-on-unsuitability-of-facebook-for-pre-teens/story-e6freon6-1225936496248 ‘Social Media Stats in Australia – Facebook, Blogger, Myspace’ Social Media News.com.au June 11 2010, viewed 5 October 2010 http://www.socialmedianews.com.au/social-media-stats-in-australia-facebook-blogger-myspace/

Further references:

Boyd, Danah 2008, ‘Facebook’s Privacy Trainwreck: Exposure, Invasion and Social Convergence’ Sage Publications, London, Los Angeles, New Delhi and Singapore Vol 14(1): 13–20

Baumgartner J, and Morris, J 2010, ‘MyFace& YouTube Politics, Social Networking and Political Engagement of Young Adults’ Social Science Computer Review, 28(1)

Cassell, J and Cramer, M 2007 ‘High Tech or High Risk: Moral Panics about Girls Online’ MacArthur Foundation Series on Digital Media and Learning. (pp. 53-75) MIT Press

Dwyer, C. , Starr R. & Passerini K. 2007, ‘Trust and Privacy Concern Within Social Networking Sites: A Comparison of Facebook and Myspace’ Americas Conference on Information Systems , Colorado August 09 -12 2007

Dunlop, W.G 2010, ‘Privacy a priority, says Facebook director Randi Zuckerberg’, viewed October 18 2010 http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5hiIK2tpygMx0K3NMwARTZ0DwHMCQ?docId=CNG.39d86b87288610357aedef0bdb96a13e.4f1

Evans, David and Felt Adrienne 2008, ‘Privacy Protection for Social Networking Platforms’, Workshop on Web 2.0 Security and Privacy. Oakland, CA. 22 May 2008

Fewster, Sean 2010, ‘I won’t let Carly’s death be in vain’ Adelaide Now January 30 2010, viewed 8 October 2010, http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/south-australia/i-wont-let-carlys-death-be-in-vain/story-e6frea83-1225824877039

Hunt, Elissa 2009, ‘Jordan Parker jailed for sex with underage girls after befriending them on Myspace’, Herald Sun December 3 2009, viewed October 8 2010, http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/jordan-parker-jailed-for-sex-with-underage-girls-after-befriending-them-on-myspace/story-e6frf7jo-1225806546765

McDonald, Brendan 2010, ‘Don’t revel in virtual reality’, Herald Sun, July 21 2010, viewed 8 October 2010 http://www.heraldsun.com.au/opinion/dont-revel-in-virtual-reality/story-e6frfhqf-1225882005697

Pearson, Erika 2009, ‘All the World Wide Web’s a stage: The performance of identity in online social networks’, First Monday, 14(3).

Raynes-Goldie, K. 2010, ‘Aliases, creeping and wall cleaning: Understanding privacy in the age of Facebook’, First Monday, 15(1) http://firstmonday.org/htbin/cgiwrap/bin/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/2775/2432


‘2010 Australian Social Media Compendium’, Australian Media Blog, viewed 7 October 2010 http://digitalmarketinglab.com.au/index.php/2010/03/28/2010-australian-social-media-compendium/


‘Satanist uses MySpace to feed desire for teen girls’, The Daily Telegraph October 30 2009, viewed October 8 2010 http://www.news.com.au/technology/satanist-uses-myspace-to-feed-desire-for-teen-girls/story-e6frfro0-1225792626406

Course evaluation

Overall, I have to say I have really enjoyed the New Comm Tech Course!

I did learn alot about the digital world that I never knew existed.. and I had underestimated the power things like culture jamming. I do feel that there was too much time spent discussing certain themes such as cyberpunking and culture jamming. I was really lucky to meet a great group in our tutorial and we all worked really well together on our set activities.

In my opinion the course could be improved by teaching us more practical skills and letting us put them in to practice in tutorials...rather than the weeks where we spent most of the tute time just discussing themes and ideas e.g cyberpunk it is really just a sci-fi genre ...I thought the short interactive tasks like making a film and uploading it to the net.. and setting up our blogs were the things I found most useful. I would suggest some website building or photoshop tutorials... things like that.

I also must add that I only enjoyed about half of the lectures I attended. I enjoyed the lectures given by Josh and Jules... but the guest lecturers were as exciting as watching grass grow or paint dry. The guest lectures focused a little too heavily on conspiracy theories and speculation rather than actual facts and knowledge we will take with us to the workforce.

I think with a little tweaking the course could be slightly better.. but you guys have still done an amazing job!

Cheers,

Sherie :)

Creative Commons *S*p*a*r*k*

Creative commons are a type of licence that enable the legal sharing, reixing and reusing of content such as images, knowledge, text, music.

They can cover everything a copyright can like can you reproduce it, can you alter this, can you put this in an assignment or text book. An individual or organisation can tailor creative commons to suit their individual needs.

"Creative Commons is much needed ammunition in the battle against digital theft or “borrowing”." — =SeverinaSnape, deviantART

"Each Creative Commons licence comes with the same baseline user rights and restrictions. These allow the material to be copied, distributed and reused, at a minimum in its current form, for non-commercial purposes, and as long as the original creator/s are credited". (Creative Commons.org)

You would already be using some of the biggest creative commons licence users and not even know it..

think:

WIKIPEDIA!

Here's an awesome video that easily explains CREATIVE COMMONS

I found this really great article by a Griffith University Academic Paul Draper called "Who’s really doing the stealing? How the music industry’s pathological pursuit of profit and power robs us of innovation". http://www29.griffith.edu.au/imersd/draper/publications/research/draper_whos_really_doing_the_stealing.pdf. Paul explains how difficult it is to teach music studies at a university with all the contrainsts, copyrights and licences put on music due to it's commercialisation.

Paul is an advocate for creative commons licences, he states: "CC licences have provided a efficient pathway into understanding the basic rights of creators and have been successfully used in Conservatorium classes and projects" (Draper, 2006).

It is absurd to think that academics themselves must check each and every peice produced by a student against licence databases and copyright checks to ensure that their work is legal. Society has gone made with its ownership of things.. a company can patent a colour for crying out loud!

I struggled to find an academic article which discussed online journals or databases however I did find a really great article analysing the benefits and pitfalls of creative commons licensing:

http://law.unh.edu/assets/pdf/idea-vol46-no3-katz.pdf
This article concludes that creative commons may prove negative for the owner of content as it may be reproduced in ways they had not envisaged or intended.


Here is a great, simple FACT SHEET on creative commons in Australia published by the Australian copyright council:

www.copyright.org.au/pdf/acc/infosheets_pdf/g094.pdf

Works using CREATIVE COMMONS



Elephants Dream is a film made entirely from open / shared graphics and images by The Orange Open Movie Project studio in Amsterdam.

The website comes complete with loads of production images and music all free to share under creative commons licence.

Its really interesting to see that this entire movie was made from shared files, heres a link to the website:

http://orange.blender.org/

I also found a music video by "Changing Clocks" made entirely from open flickr images:



The band RADIOHEAD even created a music video using creative commons licensed data, heres a link to the article and video:

http://boingboing.net/2008/07/14/radioheads-new-3dviz.html


PORTABLE APPS!

I had heard this term used before an never actually twigged what it meant. The term portable applications basically refers to computer programs which can run straight from a USB without having to be installed on a computer.

Once I understood the term I do remember students relying heavily on portable apps to be able to play their bloody, gorey war games at school. They used the portable apps to dodge the department of education & trainings firewalls and blocks on their PC's and student access logons.

I decided to try some apps from portableapps.com. I was surprised to find loads of useful apps, not just games. You can get all sorts of programs from music players, word processor to image manipulation software.

I downloaded AssaultCube Portable, http://portableapps.com/apps/games/assaultcube_portable these apps downloaded in a couple of minutes and open instantly by opening the .exe file on your USB. Assauly cube was like an old school 'DUKE NUKEM' game, it may offer a place to take out some frustration during essay writing! hahaha


References:

http://www29.griffith.edu.au/imersd/draper/publications/research/draper_whos_really_doing_the_stealing.pdf

http://creativecommons.org.au/learn-more/licences

http://creativecommons.org.au/

http://www.flickr.com/creativecommons/

www.copyright.org.au/pdf/acc/infosheets_pdf/g094.pdf

http://portableapps.com/

Thoughts on the essay.... week 9 s*park :)

For the essay I have chosen...

How do social media change our understanding of individual identity, with regard to the kinds of people we have in our social networks?

When I read through the essay topics, this question really jumped off the page at me. Mostly because I have a keen interest in sociology and I engaged with many of the themes I will need to engage with in this essay in a course I completed last semester called 'Youth in society'.

I intend on getting in touch with a lecturer from last semester 'Brady Robards' who completed a PhD on how young people on the Gold Coast use social network sites (like MySpace and Facebook). Perfect!!! Im sure he will be a wealth of information for my essay..and he will definitely be able to steer me in the direction of some authors on the subject.

Ive started my research online also by reading a few journal articles.. I find it easier to find literature on this topic online rather than in books because the whole social media realm is such a new concept. I have chosen to focus my essay on how in particular 'Youth' are affected by social media as I feel this is where it has it's greatest impact and consquence on individual identity.

Ive found one awesome article already called 'Whose Space? Differences Among Users and Non-Users of Social Network Sites' by Esther Hargittai which analyses how people's demographics, background and the social surroundings relate to the social networking site they choose and how it impacts on them.

References:
Journal Articles

Boyd, D. M. and Ellison, N. B. (2008), Social Network Sites: Definition, History, and Scholarship. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 13: 210–230. doi: 10.1111/j.1083-6101.2007.00393.x

Sexing the Internet:
Reflections on the Role of Identification in Online Communities
http://www.danah.org/papers/SexingTheInternet.conference.pdf

Social networking sites and teens
http://www.pewinternet.org/~/media//Files/Reports/2007/PIP_SNS_Data_Memo_Jan_2007.pdf.pdf

Week 8 - CYBERPUNK - Response

Understanding the concept... Cyberpunk

At first I found the concept of 'Cyberpunk' really hard to get my head around! This is, because the term can not be defined as a certain thing, rather it is better to talk about it as common styles, themes and ideas such as: corporate control, mutation, negative human behaviour, technology.

These ideas are combined in science-fiction to raise awareness of certain issues or get you thinking. The first movie that sprang to mind for me.. although it did not involve robotics or mutation was one that Will Smith starred in called "Enemeny of the State". The main ideas of the movie focused on the American Governments control of society through technology, although I wouldn't call it sci-fi for me I would put it's themes into the cyberpunk category. What do you think?



The cyberpunk nerds on cyberpunkreview.com (the most comprehensive resource site I found) failed to name Enemy of The State as a cyberpunk movie.. perhaps they missed it. However well known movies that they do name include: The Terminator, Alien, 12 monkeys, Robocop, Irobot, The Matrix, Total Recall & most recently AVATAR.

I really like the cyberpunk genre as I feel it even though in most cases it is just weird and wonderful fiction, it highlights the way technology, government and commercialisation are rapidly taking over our lives. If we are already creating robotic animals where does it stop?!


"Classic cyberpunk characters were marginalized, alienated loners who lived on the edge of society in generally dystopic futures where daily life was impacted by rapid technological change, an ubiquitous datasphere of computerized information, and invasive modification of the human body." – Lawrence Person

Who is WILLIAM GIBSON?!



William Gibson is one of the most well known and respected science fiction writers. He is often labelled the king of the cyberpunk genre of science fiction and is credited with predicting the rise of reality television.

Gibson began writing sci-fi novels in the 1970's. The cyberpunk movement emerged in the 80's "with Gibson at its helm, as an apparent manifestation of countercultural art (Vogler, 2010). Gibson's success was due to his first hit book "Neuromancer" which hit cult status and created the genre of cyberpunk.

IDEAS WE DEFINED IN THE LECTURE AS CYBERPUNK:
- Fusion of man and machine - Robots, cyborgs
(The Terminator, Robo cop, Hancock

- Corporate control over society - Large corporation, government (conspriacy theories), removal of civil liberties.

- Story focuses on the underground - Unground society, anti-hero, uprising
(Avatar)

- Ubiquitous Access to information - Hackers, internet, viruses, blurring of internet & reality

CYBERPUNK STYLE: charcters are dirty, hyper-realistic, neon colour schemes, slick tyle
(12 monkeys, the chick with the orange hair)

Source: http://www.cyberpunkreview.com/what-is-cyberpunk/

No dicussion of CYBERPUNK is complete unless we mention Boston Dynamics Robotic Dog:



or what about Toyota's violin playing robot... call me crazy but WHAT THE??!!!!

'

It creeps me out! and to think with all the millions of dollars this robot took to develop, you think they would have made him do something a little.. I dunno.. USEFUL!

CYBERPUNK NEWS STORY

ROBOT SOLDIERS TAKING OVER WAR!



http://www.metro.co.uk/tech/811174-stephen-sackur-how-robot-soldiers-are-taking-over-war

ALTERED NEWS STORY!

ROBOTS TAKING OVER WORLD WAR III

June 15th, 2035

The nanobots are now the U.S military's strongest force in the war. In the air, robotics is pretty well advanced. Drone planes being used in Afghanistan are using technology which has been around since the mid-1990s. They were initially designed for surveillance but are now armed with potent missile and bomb systems to annihilate al-Qaeda.

They don’t get tired, they don’t get bored and thousands of significant terrorist leaders have been killed by them. The nanobots were originally developed as a bomb disposal robot for IEDs (roadside bombs). But the US subsidiary of the company has now weaponised it, either with an M16 or a grenade launcher, to make the first real ground-based robot soldier.

This generation of robots have much more autonomy. Once you introduce real autonomy the machine itself, with highly sophisticated computers is, in a very real sense, making its own decisions. These robots are so sophisticated they can identify the enemy before opening fire, they can also analyze a persons biological age from 200m away. There are designed not to fire upon anyone under the age of sixteen.

The US plans to have 80 % of its military aircraft unmanned. It has trained almost all incoming pilots to never leave the ground. This war has become a war fought by electronic counter-warfare and hacking into satellite links and communications.

References:
William (Ford) Gibson Biography

http://biography.jrank.org/pages/4355/Gibson-William-Ford.html

http://project.cyberpunk.ru/idb/williamgibson.html

http://www.williamgibsonbooks.com/

Robert K. J. Killheffer, an Interview with William Gibson in Publishers
Weekly, Vol. 240, No. 36, September 6, 1993, pp. 70 1. online: http://www.library.spscc.ctc.edu/electronicreserve/swanson/InterviewwithWilliamGibsonFall2002.pdf

http://www.cyberpunkreview.com/what-is-cyberpunk/

Week 6 - SOCIAL NETWORKING! Response & spark

Almost all of us are victims to the EVIL social networking realms these days... In my opinion if you are going to put your pictures, videos and text on the internet you have to take into consideration that it can be viewed by anyone! and is ultimately property of the social networking site itself. The social networking sites do have laws restricting

I had a scary experience myself when I was working as a teachers aide, where students googled my name and found photographs of me which I had posted onto myspace when I was a teenager. This proved how social networking sites can come back and haunt you, so ever since I have been extremely careful with what I put on my social networking sites, especially because I intend on being a teacher one day.

There is a way to protect yourself, most reputable sites e.g facebook do have extensive privacy settings to ensure that only certain users can access your information. My advice to others would be things like only add people to friends that you are sure you know and trust, always keep your images set to private, do not divulge your mobile number or address.

I thought another dimension of social networking I must mention here is CYBERBULLYING! I think parents in this day and age parents need to be extremely vigilant, especially in the impressionable teenage years from 14-17. When researching I find a very tragic landmark case about a 17 year old boy named Allem Halkic who chose to take his own life after being bullied on MYSPACE by another teen.

Here is a link to a story on the court case ran in the Age:

http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/man-avoids-jail-in-first-cyber-bullying-case-20100408-rv3v.html

This tragic case highlights the darker side of social networking sites.

I found a disturbing article on cnet.com
http://news.cnet.com/8301-13577_3-20018783-36.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20on how Facebook has been awarded further intellectual property rights with its new geolocation space. This is where you can "check-in" to a certain destination.. Its all a tad scary and invasive if you ask me, it's far too easy for someone to set up a fake profile and pose as a friend for my liking. I certainly won't be "CHECKING IN" anytime soon.

Further references:

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/cyber-bully-convicted/story-e6frg6nf-1225851590486

http://www.smh.com.au/national/tragic-allem-puts-spotlight-on-bullying-problem-20090407-9xnx.html

http://www.readwriteweb.com/archives/number_of_virtual_world_users_breaks_the_1_billion.php?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+readwriteweb+%28ReadWriteWeb%29

Week 7 - Tute*spark - Free software trial

Free Software Trials..

For my software trial I decided to try LIMEWIRE. I have never been into downloading anything of the internet so I thought Id give the old music downloading a go! I went to www.download.com and downloaded the free version of Limewire 5.5. I was surprised at just how easy it was to download music. I really like the program but it did slow my whole computer down whilst it was downloading. The other negative is the volume and quality of the tracks I chose, there does not seem to be any uniformity. I was also frustrated at times when I thought I was downloading a full track and it was a stupid intro or parody.

I conducted some further research into the program and many sites warned against using Limewire because of the risk of it downloading viruses and trojans.. when I looked at various reviews this seemed to be a fairly common complaint. Another common complaint was the reduction in computer speed, which I also experienced when I downloaded the program.

I guess for me, you can't beat anything but the real thing... Ive tried Gimp and theres no comparison in quality.. like anything.. YOU GET WHAT YOU PAY FOR :)

References

http://www.download3000.com/limewire-user-reviews-18957.html

http://www.kokeytechnology.com/free-softwares/file-sharing-programs/beware-of-limewire-viruses-and-trojans-sample-limewire-virus-video/