Week 10

This weeks lecture focused on identifying trends in social computing and media and ethics.

We began the class by getting into groups and answering the quesyions;

1. Is monitoring employees via technology ethical?

2. Under what circumstamces is it ethical for customers data to be shared?

3. Is it ethical for Facebook to display newsfeed stories that increase your mood?

Majority of the class agreed in their answers where such as, monitoring is ok if it is non-invasive, but this then posed the question where do you draw the line? Highlighting if there were any previous disclosure agreements or contracts who is the rightful owner of the data? For example, Facebook use their control over newsfeed stories as a marketing strategy, do you accept these terms signing up for it? It is something that we see as casual and do not put enough thought into. I found this topic extremely interesting as it is a growing concern.

We were then explained some theory of ethics; Meta-Ethics - where do our ethical principles come from? Normative Ethics - study of the actions, regulate right and wrong conduct. 

Deontological theories - Duty theory= character traits, virtues. Rights theory= rights all people have and others are obliged to acknowledge.

Consequentialist theories- actions are morally right if the consequences of that action are more favourable than unfavourable.

Breaches of privacy; Spamming, Selling date, poor security measures, unconsented monitoring, unsolicited correspondance- there should be an opt in option not an opt out, why are we automatically signed up? We were given example of debateable copyright infringement such as Facebook nightclub photos or the KPMG girl video. 

Our group met and began putting the information we had each gathered into a presentation.