On Friday, Dharun Ravi - the Rutgers student whose roommate Tyler Clementi killed himself - was found guilty of privacy invasion, tampering with evidence, and bias intimidation (a hate crime). When John Palfrey and I wrote about this case three weeks ago, I was really hopeful that the court proceedings would give clarity and relieve …
The Power of Youth: How Invisible Children Orchestrated Kony 2012
To many people unfamiliar with Invisible Children, the Kony 2012 campaign looked like a brilliant example of "viral" media spread. The center of the campaign is a compelling 30-minute film where a father talks to his son about the evil practices of the Ugandan war lord Joseph Kony. The father makes it clear that his …
Continue reading The Power of Youth: How Invisible Children Orchestrated Kony 2012
A Message to the “First Responders” in Gay Kids’ Lives: Why We Need to Ditch the Politics of Blame, Stop Talking About “Cyberbullying,” and Move Toward Sharing Responsibility for the Loss of Tyler Clementi
2 March 2012 A Message to the “First Responders” in Gay Kids’ Lives: Why We Need to Ditch the Politics of Blame, Stop Talking About “Cyberbullying,” and Move Toward Sharing Responsibility for the Loss of Tyler Clementi By Mary L. GrayCross posted on HuffingtonPost; maryLgray.org; Cultural Digitally Senior Researcher Microsoft Research New England, Cambridge, MAAssociate Professor of …
Is blocking pro-ED content the right way to solve eating disorders?
Warning: This post deals with eating disorder and self-harm content and is potentially triggering. Following up on Tarleton's terrific post on moderating Facebook comes Tumblr's announcement that it will no longer allow pro-eating disorder (pro-ED) or pro-self-harm blogs on the site. Active Promotion of Self-Harm. Don’t post content that actively promotes or glorifies self-injury or …
Continue reading Is blocking pro-ED content the right way to solve eating disorders?
Stop the Cycle of Bullying
[John Palfrey and I originally wrote this as an op-ed for the Huffington Post. See HuffPo for more comments.] On 22 September 2010, the wallet of Tyler Clementi - a gay freshman at Rutgers University - was found on the George Washington Bridge; his body was found in the Hudson River the following week. His …
The dirty job of keeping Facebook clean
Last week, Gawker received a curious document. Turned over by an aggrieved worker from the online freelance employment site oDesk, the document iterated, over the course of several pages and in unsettling detail, exactly what kinds of content should be deleted from the social networking site that had outsourced its content moderation to oDesk's team. …
What the GPS Device on Antoine Jones’ Jeep Cherokee Means for Internet Privacy
Yesterday the Supreme Court ruled on United States vs. Jones [PDF of court opinion], a case in which the FBI/DC police placed a GPS tracking device on the Jeep Cherokee of Antoine Jones, a club owner in DC who was suspected of dealing cocaine. The cops tracked Mr. Jones for 28 days, and, based on …
Continue reading What the GPS Device on Antoine Jones’ Jeep Cherokee Means for Internet Privacy
How Parents Normalized Teen Password Sharing
In 2005, I started asking teenagers about their password habits. My original set of questions focused on teens' attitudes about giving their password to their parents, but I quickly became enamored with teens' stories of sharing passwords with friends and significant others. So I was ecstatic when Pew Internet & American Life Project decided to …
Continue reading How Parents Normalized Teen Password Sharing
Two kinds of piracy
Just a quick follow up on the discussion of SOPA; people keep asking me what kind of legislation would be more appropriate than SOPA and PIPA, and that might have a better chance of gaining the support of the technology industries, users, and Congress. I'm not in the business of writing laws, but as a …
SOPA and the strategy of forced invisibility
Since I supported the blacking out of the MSR Social Media Collective blog to which I sometimes contribute, and the blacking out of Culture Digitally, which I co-organize, in order to join the SOPA protest led by the "Stop American Censorship" effort, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Reddit, and Wikipedia, I though I should weigh in …
Continue reading SOPA and the strategy of forced invisibility
