Group items tagged

I'm taking this week's idea of "domains" a bit literally. Here's a quick blog post from Amit Agarwal (tech columnist for Wall Street Journal India). It links to several visualizations of internet activity. Some are physical: electricity; some are political (i.e. explicitly - all these maps are political!): censorship by country; some are social: use of SNS by country, the first edition of the xckd map of internet communities.* He offers these maps without much commentary. I'm interested in how these visual representations could help us think about the "where" of digital ethnography. My offline/physical context may be a coffee shop in Eugene, OR, am I also placed on these maps? What kinds of maps help you think about the "where" of the internet? * The second edition is worth looking at to think about the way time and technological development shapes our understanding of space.

Here's a link to the second version of the xckd map of internet communities. https://xkcd.com/802/ While not a "real" map, I often use it in presentations to explain the idea that online communities are particular and exist in relation to each other. I often pair it with the concept of "fractalized communities" found in Patrica Lange's work in youtube video bloggers. Both get at the specificity of online research; there isn't one internet that I can study - I can only tell you about my time in this particular community.

The Pew Internet and American Life Project provides a great deal of nationally representative data on Internet and new media usage in the United States. It may be a valuable site for those seeking survey data to analyze and incorporate into their research

I too have found this website to be very helpful. Here are a few more links from Pew providing evidence of the growing use of the internet and for the fading of the "digital divide." http://www.pewresearch.org/millennials/ http://www.pewinternet.org/2009/09/01/the-internet-and-civic-engagement/

Found this via Brant's link to the EASA...on their "Documents" page, under "Working Papers". Link should start downloading the PDF.

Good short read (4p) because it presents arguments for and against Hine's belief in online-only research. Probably better than reading Hine's Virtual Ethnography itself; but the review of that work and the author's response in Resource Center for Cyberculture Studies also might be a good exchange to read because we'd get different perspectives but hear Hine speak for herself. Can there be a social space that's solely constituted on and through the internet? And is online-only research the only legitimate research approach to such spaces?

An edited collection that looks at issues in conducting qualitative internet research. The first two sections - on defining the boundaries of online projects and on collecting data - seem relevant for discussions about digital ethnography.

Here is one of the articles I mentioned in class today. It was written by Keith Hampton and Berry Wellman is called "Neighboring in Netville: How the Internet Supports Community and Social Capital in a Wired Suburb.

Thanks!

Digest of larger post of big study by International Telecommunication Union about mobile broadband use...

This is report does provide a sense of how mobile broadband is spreading globally. However, I wonder if this is necessarily a "good" thing. Sure, we could argue that eventually the spread of these technologies will happen, but is the source censored or monitored in any way? Is it available to "all" without loss of content or as a democratic platform for those in marginal communities?

An admittedly vague response: http://roundtable.kein.org/files/roundtable/Foster.pdf see page 305, "...a kind of ethnographer-envy consumes artists..."

This is also kind of interesting: http://www.lindalai-floatingsite.com/content/video/data/unpublished/Excitable-Speech_Cinderella/index.html ; the person putting together this site has a number of 'ethnographic' videos, which she accompanies with a section entitled "Concept/artist statement", suggesting the ethnographer as an artist...

About People Research Publications Teaching Events Interactive Newsroom Get Involved Research The Berkman Center enjoys a global reputation for cutting-edge work centered on the relationships between the Internet, law, and society. Our mode - entrepreneurial nonprofit - embraces our pursuit of scholarly research in the manner and spirit of an academic think tank, anchored by the diverse collaborative and individual work of our faculty and fellows.

Was Andrew "Weev" Auernheimer actions malicious or do you feel he was only trying to get AT&T's attention for their own mistake? Should he be prosecuted for his actions?

That's an odd one, and really highlights the different notions of public and private spaces online. He went to some effort to get that information, so my kneejerk reaction is to say that what he did was wrong and that he should be prosecuted for it. It would certainly be unethical for an ethnographer to gather data that way, but should it be illegal? EFF calls those pages public, but I think "public" web pages are more like "public" spaces in a private building. He was clearly on their corporate premises, trying to sneak into hidden areas-he had to bombard the site with fake device IDs to get to them, and built a tool to do so. It may not be akin to breaking and entering, but what constitutes trespassing in a digital realm? If a physical office kept records in unlocked closets, would it be illegal to check all the doors in the waiting room, and take pictures when one opened? Or would we be up in arms about that office's recordkeeping practices? Ultimately, the main outcome I'd have hoped for would be requirements for corporations like AT&T to revise their security practices. What Auernheimer did was wildly unethical and without even the veneer of true white hat hacking, but I have no idea what to do with him.

Berry Wellman has ben doing research on communities, social networks, and the internet for a long time. His work may be of interest to some of you all who are interested in how online resources affect the composition of off-line networks and communities. You can find his CV and a link to his personal website here if you like. 

The Center for Media Justice presents some great material, particularly as an entry point to undergrads on concepts of media justice and examining the ways oppression operates in a digital sphere, troubling open internet and "closing digital divides" Great stuff!

ABSTRACT: Research on the digital and online environment poses several ethical questions that are new or, at least, newly pressing, especially in relation to youth. Established ethical practices require that research have integrity, quality, transparency, and impartiality. They also stipulate that risks to the researcher, institution, data, and participants should be anticipated and addressed. But difficulties arise when applying these to an environment in which the online and offline intersect in shifting ways. This paper discusses some real-life "digital dilemmas" to identify the emerging consensus among researchers. We note the 2012 guidelines by the Association of Internet Researchers, which advocates for ethical pluralism, for minimizing harm, and for the responsibility of the researcher where codes are insufficient. As a point of contrast, we evaluate Markham's (2012) radical argument for data fabrication as an ethical practice. In reflecting on how researchers of the digital media practices of youth resolve their dilemmas in practice, we take up Markham's challenge of identifying evolving practice, including researchers' workarounds, but we eschew her solution of fabrication. Instead, we support the emerging consensus that while rich data are increasingly available for collection, they should not always be fully used or even retained in order to protect human subjects in a digital world in which future possible uses of data exceed the control of the researcher who collected them.

Thanks for posting this, John. Considering the ethical concerns we all have expressed in class, I am sure this article will be helpful. I will be sure to put it on my reading list.

The Wayback Machine! This is a great tool for retrieving old copies of web sites or completely defunct/ missing websites. It has been helpful for me to delve into everyday digital content (calendars, announcements, etc.) that wasn't archived clearly. It also gave me access to abandoned sites years after the community had moved on.

And, depending on the site, can be a sort of auto-ethnographic document or snapshot...great for comparing design changes and/or significant shifts that might occur when a community changes (rather than moves on). Sort of an archaeology, I suppose.

This is a great site that keeps a record of videos removed from YouTube for copyright violations. You can't watch them, but there's something great about having a record that they were there at all. I'm fascinated by the "when" of online culture and the tendency for some material to disappear. This is one of the places I've found that lets me see what the internet used to be.

This is a great resource. I really like the concept of there being a resting place for tombstoned IP-offensive user generated content, much of what could be perceived as works of art depending on your perspecitve (IP vs remix culture). Also, a good example of creative censorship and the REAL governing authority -- RIAA, MPAA, etc.

AoIR's ethics guide from 2002.