[iDC] The Bronx Blog Project

[me at ankurkalra.com]

tobias,

You do raise some interesting points that I have been thinking about 
myself for a while recently. However, I question if the lack of privacy 
you mention is intrinsic to the *medium* of blogging, as opposed to the 
specific implementations we see today.

I'll have to admit -- I have not yet had a chance to listen to the talk 
you mention, so I'm not familiar with the specific points raised there, 
but the challenges of privacy online in the world of Flickr, Facebook and 
blogs have been discussed widely in the past and in other forums as well.

Personally, I feel that current implementations are relatively naive in 
the access controls they provide, but that these are criticisms of the 
implementations only and not the medium itself. I'm not yet convinced that 
the privacy implications of today's implementations neccessarily limit the 
possibility of better, socially-aware implementations for this medium in 
the future.

Already we have seen some evolution in access-control mechanisms -- 
Facebook, for instance, is a lot more sensitive to these issues than 
Friendster originally was. Viegas' Collections work illustrates that 
socially-aware control mechanisms *are* possible, and is motivated by 
examples like these. Personally, my own thesis work
(<self-plug> http://ankurkalra.com/spice.pdf </self-plug>) is an attempt 
at exploring these kinds of access-control mechanisms for blogs, amongst 
other things.

Admittedly, the mechanisms involved are still quite simplistic, but I do 
feel that there are people thinking about these problems and making 
some progress in these areas. We don't yet have all the answers, but we do 
recognize the problem.

(Josh -- interesting project, I'll be trying to get in touch with you out 
of band about some of the details)

Thanks,

Ankur


On Wed, 13 Dec 2006, tobias c. van Veen wrote:

> Date: Wed, 13 Dec 2006 15:45:29 -0500
> From: tobias c. van Veen <tobias at techno.ca>
> To: iDC <idc at bbs.thing.net>
> Subject: Re: [iDC] The Bronx Blog Project
> 
>
> Hi Josh,
>
> It sounds like a great project & I think the politics are great. However
> I've been thinking about the downside to social networking ever since
> listening to the "Privacy is Dead" talk by Steve Ramban:
>
>    http://www.hopenumbersix.net/speakers.html#pid2
>
> Not that I'm against social networking. I use it myself, have a blog, etc.
> But I have since thought long & hard about what I put up on the Net; and
> taken steps since towards private browsing, a more controlled data trail,
> etc.
>
> I'm curious, was there a discussion concerning privacy and security concerns
> related to the newbie blogger's desire to put your whole life up online..?
>
> I was struck by the phrase that blogging pictures of one's girlfriend and
> children was a positive step in the blogsphere in the sense of "getting into
> it." But who is getting into whom?
>
> I.e. was there a discussion concerning crowdsourcing by corporations & how
> much of social networking's raison-d-etre is data harvesting?
>
> And how data harvesting is constructing a very different Net -- now that
> Google & MySpace collectively "are" the Net.
>
> I.e., did any student have the option of *not* blogging due to these
> concerns? And was the choice presented as such or was blogging -- or one's
> virtual self -- the default participation of the class and an assumed good
> to begin with?
>
> Curious ..
>
> best,
>
>    tobias
>
>
>
>
>
> tobias c. van Veen -----------++++
> http://www.quadrantcrossing.org --
> McGill Communication & Philosophy
>
>
>
>
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