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@firefly,

It seemed like the appropriate place to put it because most of the people who are interested in privacy issues are already here and the other topic had pretty much run its course.

Also, the school survey and the XBox thing deal with a similar demographic. As I posted above, I can see how the XBox technology could creep into the education system.

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@IRFRANK,

Quote:

I already notice that advertising on the web is already specifically directed at my interests based upon what web sites I've visited. What about the ads at the bottom of this site? Seems interesting which ones come up based upon what the thread is about.

That stuff drives me crazy. No matter what Web sites I visit, I then wind up constantly seeing, and being hounded by, ads for similar items, or topics, or issues. Everything we do, particularly related to Google searches, and visited Web pages, seems to be already tracked.

But, as I said in my last post, I think discussion of these sorts of electronic privacy issues belongs in a separate thread.

1 Reply

@boomerang,

boomerang wrote:

It seemed like the appropriate place to put it because most of the people who are interested in privacy issues are already here and the other topic had pretty much run its course.

Also, the school survey and the XBox thing deal with a similar demographic. As I posted above, I can see how the XBox technology could creep into the education system.

I consider it background information that informs on why this school did not seem to consider privacy important and why there has been so little outrage to their actions. it also however makes me wonder if kids today think this sort of thing is so normal that they might answer the questions honestly if a much loved teacher did not warn them off, which is a scary thought.

1 Reply

@hawkeye10,

The budding police state using the frog in the hot water trick to condition its subjects is what I think that I am looking at.

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@boomerang,

Quote:

It seemed like the appropriate place to put it because most of the people who are interested in privacy issues are already here...

I don't know that most of the people at A2K who are interested in privacy issues are already here. When you start getting into actual government spying, and corporate and government surveillance, in the way that exploded in the news yesterday about Verizon and PRISM, which affects young people as well, you also get into political issues, and privacy vs national security etc. in a very different way.

It's not that it's wrong to put the X-Box matter here, I just think you've raised another good, but separate issue, about the whole topic of electronic surveillance, and privacy invasion, that deserves its own thread, where it might attract an even more expanded audience.

1 Reply

@hawkeye10,

For the most part the population is complicit in it though.

We spend a lot of time talking about privacy issues at our house. I make Mo read every article I come across about some kid who was arrested for something he posted on Facebook or Twitter or instant messaged to a friend. I make him read every article about a kid getting suspended/expelled/arrested at school for some offhand comment (like the kindergartener who was suspended for making terrorist threats when she told her friend about her Hello Kitty bubble gun and the kids who were suspended for discussing the Sandy Hook shootings while they were on the school bus). I made him watch the TED talk where the speaker explained such communications as an "electronic tattoo" that you can never get rid of. His school has an emphasis on social justice and they talk about these things every day too.

Despite our near daily conversions about it I think he still fails to understand why I'm "overprotective" of his online/social media life.

I know most of his friends and many of their parents never talk about it. They want the latest, greatest gizmo and they don't mind trading their privacy for it.

The frog in the hot water is a good analogy for what I see happening.

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@firefly,

I was just getting ready to start a thread about DNA and privacy issues and I don't think I want to juggle three threads but if you'd like to start one I'm sure I'll be reading!

1 Reply

@boomerang,

I find it very alarming that modern parents will constantly drill on the threat of individual abusers who want to do them harm but are completely silent on the threat of authority doing them wrong. I suspect that their hold on parental authority is so weak that they dont want to go there, but in the end what you get is systemic and massive mis education of our youth.

my kids are old enough now to come back and tell me that almost no one they know their ages have been taught a lot of this stuff that matters most. they consider them selves to be lucky to have some awareness.

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@boomerang,

Quote:

I was just getting ready to start a thread about DNA and privacy issues and I don't think I want to juggle three threads but if you'd like to start one I'm sure I'll be reading!

There is already one current thread about DNA/privacy, relating to the recent Supreme Court ruling.
http://able2know.org/topic/215619-1

But, there are certainly many other issues, relating to DNA, that could be explored in additional threads.

If I have the time to devote to a thread dealing with privacy rights, and corporate and government surveillance and spying, I will certainly start such a thread. Since I like to do a lot of reading when I get involved in topic threads like that, because I'm interested in learning more, it does require time on my part. If I can start such a thread, I will. If someone else does it, and I have the time, I'll follow it with interest.

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@boomerang,

boomerang wrote:

Then what if researchers decided

Academic researchers have a very high bar when it comes to performing research on human subjects. Not just anyone has the training to be able to design and execute a study that will produce valid results. Once the study is designed, it has to pass a board review.

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@firefly,

Good lord. Are you the thread police, now?

If you want a separate thread, go start it yourself....

0 Replies

@firefly,

Quote:

That stuff drives me crazy. No matter what Web sites I visit, I then wind up constantly seeing, and being hounded by, ads for similar items, or topics, or issues. Everything we do, particularly related to Google searches, and visited Web pages, seems to be already tracked.

Go to a website by using a google search term sandboxie and see if your os will run it.

If your computer os will run the program all you need to do is run your browser in it sandbox and nothing from malware to tracking cookies can reached out of the sandbox not even so call super cookies.

Been using it for years and been very happy with it and best of all the free version is more then good enough.

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@DrewDad,

Quote:

Academic researchers have a very high bar when it comes to performing research on human subjects. Not just anyone has the training to be able to design and execute a study that will produce valid results. Once the study is designed, it has to pass a board review.

And, such a study, connecting SEL issues to the type of video games played by the child, could certainly be designed, and if it didn't violate any ethical guidelines for research in the department, it would be approved.

I think you're missing the point of boomer's concern about the X-Box surveillance in that regard. Or, if you're not missing it, you're not really addressing it either.

1 Reply

@firefly,

I'm saying that the researchers can't perform the study via illicit surveillance. (Such a study would be invalid on the face of it, since the conditions would not be controlled.)

Study participants would be volunteers, and would at least be notified that they're in a study (even if they aren't told the real reason for the study).

For those who don't know, undergraduates in psychology classes are often required to volunteer for one or more studies.

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@DrewDad,

Can't agreement to participate be buried in the terms of use?

1 Reply

@boomerang,

No, because they could be monitoring someone who didn't agree to the terms of use.

And like I said, the conditions would vary so much that the study probably wouldn't be valid.

Now, I'm not saying that the data and/or monitoring can't be misused. I'm saying that academic researchers are unlikely to do so.

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@DrewDad,

You could simply correlate the students' SEL survey responses, on things like the negative affect scale, with the frequency with which they played certain video games, or viewed certain documents, on school computers--you are simply correlating two sets of already existing data, you don't need "controlled conditions" as long as the data was all obtained under similar conditions. You wouldn't necessarily need to tell the students they were "in a study", because you wouldn't be doing anything to influence their behavior.

boomer's concern is that schools could begin using something like X-Box surveillance technology.

I can understand her concern. I'm a Verizon customer, and I had no idea the government was accessing Verizon customer phone records.

1 Reply

I am thinking of a public school "terms of use"'agreement that they will in the future have us sign, it will be much like the cruise line terms of use agreement that basically goes "if you go on one if our cruises we can do what ever we want, we never owe you a refund, and you cant sue us".

0 Replies

@boomerang,

Quote:

For the most part the population is complicit in it though.

We spend a lot of time talking about privacy issues at our house. I make Mo read every article I come across about some kid who was arrested for something he posted on Facebook or Twitter or instant messaged to a friend. I make him read every article about a kid getting suspended/expelled/arrested at school for some offhand comment (like the kindergartener who was suspended for making terrorist threats when she told her friend about her Hello Kitty bubble gun and the kids who were suspended for discussing the Sandy Hook shootings while they were on the school bus). I made him watch the TED talk where the speaker explained such communications as an "electronic tattoo" that you can never get rid of. His school has an emphasis on social justice and they talk about these things every day too.

Despite our near daily conversions about it I think he still fails to understand why I'm "overprotective" of his online/social media life.

I know most of his friends and many of their parents never talk about it. They want the latest, greatest gizmo and they don't mind trading their privacy for it.

And you're very right to be having those conversations with Mo. The kids are complicit in the amount of information about themselves that they expose, all kinds of information, particularly through the social media and their cell phones--and they don't think about the information that's stored on their electronic gadgets that can be retrieved by others, and shared by others, even apart from what they themselves put in plain view on the internet.

I don't know if you're following the upcoming George Zimmerman trial, but the defense in that case has already publicly released all kinds of information and photos from the victim's cell phone, despite the fact that the judge ruled this will not be admissible evidence at trial. So, even after his death, material that a teen had on his cell phone, and that he put there, and that he assumed would always be private, can be retrieved and used in attempts to damage his reputation, even after his death.
http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/05/23/18449794-zimmerman-defense-releases-texts-about-guns-fighting-from-trayvon-martins-phone?lite

Keep being "overprotective" with Mo, keep having those talks about privacy issues.

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@firefly,

liar...the judge said that defense can not bring that up in opening statements, and that the ability to bring that information up later will require the prosecution claiming that little travon martin would never hurt anyone, aka as rebuttal.

1 Reply

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