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A passionate advocate for LGBTQ youth and outspoken opponent of bullying, cyber or otherwise, she's written extensively about Tyler Clementi and Dharun Ravi, and the role played by serious misuse of digital technology to malign an individual. She also goes into how "media-driven narrative" has shaped public perception of this case: http://www.zephoria.org/thoughts/archives/2012/02/24/stop-the-cycle-of-bullying.html

Thanks for sharing this...I saw danah boyd give a keynote at a conference here in Maryland called Theorizing the Web and she was definitely a big deal. Actually, come to think of it, the notes from that conference might have some information to share here as well.

An excerpt from boyd's notes on her speech about "the power of fear in networked cultures" "The tools that we build are getting repurposed around the globe by people with all sorts of different agendas. They're being used by activists to challenge the status quo, but they're also being used by the status quo to assert new kinds of authority. People are building the new networks of power on the technological networks that we've generated and they're reinforcing existing power structures. "Through social media, we're ramping up the attention economy. We are setting in motion new networks. We like to think of ourselves as disrupting power systems and, indeed, that's what we were doing for a long time. But now, those in power are leveraging our tools to exert new forms of power. Fear is one of the tools that's being used. People are finding ways to put fear into our systems. "Social media is no longer the great disrupter. It is now part of the status quo. Are we prepared for what that means? Are we prepared for the ecosystem that we've created? Do we even understand how our systems are being employed by those hellbent on maintaining power in a networked age? "I don't have good answers to these socio-technical conundrums. But I think that these are important issues and I need your help in figuring out where to go from here."

good find! you will encounter more of her work later on

I second on the good find comment! Her post about Ravi's conviction was interesting, not only because it hits home because it happened at RU, but it brings up some extremely important topics when it comes to online bullying, the use of technology/media in the private/personal sphere, privacy etc. And she closes with saying she would hope this case would change others' actions and outlook on the harmful uses of technology and invasion of privacy, but unfortunately it most likely won't and we will continue to see these types of things happening.

Thank for that! I'm really enjoying this, and it is helping me think about the culture of unease we seem to be living in. http://talks.webstock.org.nz/speakers/danah-boyd/culture-fear-attention-economy/ where

Good article! What I found interesting was the correlation between user demographics being the same online as it is offline, i.e. more males checking political communication online AND offline. I think it shows the transition from offline media use, or more traditional modes to online and often an accumulation of both. A bit off topic but it makes me think about how we're becoming masters of mult-tasking, allowing us to be in tune to several different media - whether it be traditional TV, radio etc, and switching gears to reading news online, watching videos online, listening online. As I type this, I'm researching papers and watching TV and feel like I'm in tune to both. Researching how people are now becoming the ultimate multi-taskers would be interesting. However, because we are becoming such great multi-taskers, are we almost giving ourselves a sort of "ADD" in which, in the future, we'll have a hard time concentrating on ONE thing for a certain amount of time. I find it hard to concentrate often on a project or paper with multiple messages going on, emails coming in, texts, Facebook notifications, etc. and frequently break to do all things at once = a ton of white noise!

I think we can all relate to this wall of digital "white noise" as university students within the information management sector. It seems as though there is a fine line between multi-tasking and organized distraction. I often find myself dividing my time between school work, personal correspondence, and managing my Ebay account, but this doesn't necessarily mean I'm being more efficient. Earl Miller, a neuroscientist at MIT, has actually proven that the human brain "can't focus on more than one thing at a time" (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=95256794).

Great article @ ABC. I was doing some research for my group project for the unit about e-books, brain, order, etc. and have become extremely interested in the impact of technology on our brain. As much as we may like to think we are great multi-taskers, it seems that our ability to toggle between multiple tasks on computers has hindered our ability to focus on long-winded tasks.

This is an interesting blog as long as you can get around the book promotions :-) I thought the Social Media section on the site particularly interesting. One of the articles I liked was the one on Smartmobbing by Howard Rheingold (http://rebooting.personaldemocracy.com/node/5484). This is an interesting idea because a lot of politically charged organizations are utilizing social media to basically create online mobs. Social media is now used to organize petitions, spread the word about marches, and basically spread information. People who were once sort of out of mainstream politics can now get involved and keep track of what is going on in the world. Social media has definitely influenced politics, changing the way parties endorse their candidates and more.

@ Maranda (aside... I didn't see a way to "comment on a comment" so I am posting this directly under the main post) -- I think the the social mobbing you mention is a really interesting trend. In my town, we recently started an online petition through change.org to keep our town pool. It took only a few days to get twice the signatures we needed and no gas was used or feet blisters created. I am trying to think critically of a downside to this manner of using social tools, but I cannot think of one! @Jorge -- Very nice blog. I found a great article (http://www.technologyreview.com/view/428043/there-is-no-digital-divide/) debating the other side of the digital divide argument posed by the NYT's piece from last week. I also like Rheingold's "infotention" invention. I could use a little "infotention" intervention -- every time I get involved with a tech or social tool, a new one is created that seems better and more suited to whatever task I was trying to accomplish. Sometimes I feel as if we are living in a time when nothing remains permanent.

This guys seems very clever and witty! I enjoyed reading his blog about Twitter (http://blog.sfgate.com/rheingold/2009/05/11/twitter-literacy-i-refuse-to-make-up-a-twittery-name-for-it/) talking about how this powerful social media can be so influential and useful if the user knows how to utilize it for the right reasons. Being a non-Twitter user, I found it interesting how he explained numerous advantages of being an active member. Now that I've read this, I might reconsider of joining it...

This was a very informative blog! Thanks Jorge. Like Pam, I really liked the "infotention" idea. diigo is a perfect example. I really just started looking at it today and was really confused (if you couldn't tell with my questions) on how it worked, where to comment, etc. The more I've looked at it today, the easier it has become to use. But something new will probably come along in the net couple months and then I'll have to learn how something works all over again.

This is a really interesting blog! I particularly enjoyed the "where good ideas come from" video from Oct. 19. Also, I liked the tags, which allowed me to look quickly for posts about a topic that interests me, "Internet Anonymity".