Conducting research in the digital age:
ethics, copyright and the digital
economy act.
(cb, February 2011)
man, bytes, dog…
(and whether it’s a criminal Act…)
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Telecoms/Publishing Convergence
Medium
Content production, Dissemination, Storage
Disciplinary Shifts crossovers
Regulatory
Legal
Regimes
“Information wants to be free because it has
become so cheap to distribute, copy, and
recombine - too cheap to meter. It wants to be
expensive because it can be immeasurably
valuable to the recipient. That tension will not
go away.”… (Stuart Brand, Inventing the Future
at MIT)
• "the imposition of new restrictions on library networks runs counter to the
library’s vital mission of providing freedom of access to information to its
users. Not only does the legislation potentially lead to or encourage the
adoption of blocking technologies that are valuable for learning and
information sharing in an educational context, it also raises fundamental
freedom of expression and privacy issues as public bodies inevitably
monitor the activities of their users.
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• The chilling effect of the monitoring of Internet use should not be
underestimated, and the electronic recording of library users’ information
seeking activities is not consistent with a democratic approach to access
to knowledge. Library users should be free to seek information without
barriers, and without fear of surveillance."
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• (IFLA: Stuart Hamilton, senior policy advisor at the IFLA )
• ‘The Digital Economy Act…impinges on the
whole spectrum of digital rights issues; from
privacy, to universal access for essential
internet services, and censorship of content
on the grounds of copyright.
• Shifts role [of universities] from facilitating
learning to policing…
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Kate Worlock, Nature Forum: “the pros and
cons of open access’
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Ethics in Online Research; Evaluating the ESRC Framework for Research Ethics Categorisation of Risk, by Kate Orton-Johnson,
University of Edinburgh, Sociological Research Online, 15 (4) 13 <http://www.socresonline.org.uk/15/4/13.html>
10.5153/sro.2261
Ess, C., & AoIR-Ethics-Working-Committee. (2002). Ethical decision-making and Internet research. Recommendations from
the aoir ethics working committee. Retrieved April 17, 2008 from: http://www.aoir.org/reports/ethics.pdf.
Bassett, E. H., & O’Riordan, K. (2002). Ethics of Internet research: Contesting the human subjects research model. Ethics and
Information Technology, 4(3), 233-247.
Hall, Gary,Pirate Philosophy, Culure Machine, 2010.
Kate Worlock, Nature Forum: the pros and cons of open access.(
http://www.nature.com/nature/focus/accessdebate/34.html)
Stuart Brand “The Media Lab: Inventing the Future at MIT”. 1987
Researching the public web, 2010, by Mike Thelwall, Statistical Cybermetrics Research Group, University of
Wolverhampton, UK.
Justine, Pila, who owns the Intellectual Property rights in academic work,
* Buchanan, E. and Hvizdak, E. (2009). Online Survey Tools: Ethical and Methodological Concerns of Human Research Ethics
Committees. Journal of Empirical Research on Human Research Ethics (JERHRE) 4(2), 37-48
Ofcom Review: Feb 1, 2011 5:42pm GMT (Reuters) - Reporting by Kate Holton)
By Mark Hosenball/BERLIN | Tue Feb 1, 2011 9:55am GMT
(Reuters) - All across Europe, from Brussels to the Balkans, a new generation of WikiLeaks-style websites is sprouting.
(http://uk.reuters.com/article/2011/02/01/uk-wikileaks-idUKLNE71002420110201)
Periodical Publishers Association: Government calls on Ofcom to review Digital Economy Act
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• Researching the public web
• by MICHAEL THELWALL on 12 JULY 2010
• by Mike Thelwall, Statistical Cybermetrics Research
Group, University of Wolverhampton, UK.
• A simple but strong argument for researching published
information on the public web without consent is that the
object investigated is the publication and not the person.
Therefore human subject standards do not apply (Bassett &
O’Riordan, 2002; Enyon, Schroeder, & Fry, 2009; Ess &
AoIR-Ethics-Working-Committee, 2002; Hookway, 2008;
White, 2002).
• ‘In summary, the three points above make the
case that researching the public web should
not be subjected to ethical scrutiny for privacy
concerns. Whilst this is probably
uncontroversial in science and perhaps also
the humanities, it seems to be an important
statement to make in some social sciences. ‘
• (thelwell… )
Rights and Expectations…
• Ess, C., & AoIR-Ethics-Working-Committee.
(2002). Ethical decision-making and Internet
research. Recommendations from the aoir
ethics working committee. Retrieved April 17,
2008 from:
http://www.aoir.org/reports/ethics.pdf.
Ethical pluralism…
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In philosophical ethics, these
frameworks are commonly classified in terms of deontology, consequentialism,
virtue ethics,
feminist ethics, and several others.5
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At the same time, recognizing the possibility of a range of defensible ethical
responses to a given dilemma does not commit us to ethical relativism (“anything
goes”).
In the United States, for example, there may be a greater reliance on
utilitarian approaches to deciding such conflicts – specifically in the
form of “risk/benefit”
European approaches tend to emphasize more
deontological approaches – i.e., approaches that take basic human rights
(self-determination, privacy, informed consent, etc.) as so foundational
that virtually no set of possible benefits that might be gained from
violating these ethically justifies that violation