Simulation Suspension of disbelief

1
Social Changes, Part 2

• PART 1
• Simulation Suspension of disbelief
• Social Saturation Self (selves?)
• PART 2 E-Communication in the social realm
• Some studies
• Net addiction disorder
• Anonymity on-line behavior
• Tidbits of interest

2

• Recent studies/surveys
• .about net use and effects on individuals/communi
  ty
• RH-26 27

• Carnegie Mellon study (Sept 1998)
• Came under much fire
• AUTHORS Rebuttals Commun of the ACM (just fyi)
• Follow-up study, released Sept. 2001 found
  what?
• Stanford University study (Feb 2000) SIQSS
• Prof. Norman Nie (Political Science, Stanford)
• Nov 2002 Press Release announcing journal
  studies
• Web-based Journal IT Society (launched Aug
  2002)

3

• Center for Media Education (Jan 2002)
• Teen Study
• UCLA Internet Project
• 10-year study
• Year 3 Report A few findings

• Of interest fact that its being examined.
• Related to these studies possibility of new
  addictions

4

• Internet Addiction Disorder

• Still controversial among mental health profls
• Is it a separate addiction, or a disorder of
  impulse control? Some other terms used?
• What is it?
• Most therapists agree that you have a real
  problem if a couple things are true.
• Separate category Abusers (Negative impact,
  but no major life changes)
• APA criteria
• Why might it be so addicting?

5

• OTHER RESEARCHERS and their findings

• Dr. Nathan Shapira (U of Cinn Coll of Medicine)
• Disorder of Impulse Control Netomania
• Some findings (1998)
• Dr. David Greenfield
• Founder, Center for Internet Studies
• www.virtual-addiction.com/
• Book, Virtual Addiction Help for Netheads,
  Cyberfreaks and Those That Love Them, 1999
• Digression

6

• Dr. Kimberly Young (U of Pittsburgh)
• Worlds first cyberpsychologist
• Some findings
• Identified 5 general subtypes
• Presented to APA in 1999
• Book Caught in the Net, 1998
• Center for Online Addiction
• ACE model Accessibility Control Excitement
• Cybersex and infidelity online articles

7
Back to a recent discussion
Famous New Yorker comic

• What do you think the artist was trying to convey
  here?

• Agree or Disagree? Why? Discuss.

7
8

• Anonymity

• How is on-line anonymity different from off-line?
• Is it a double-edged sword?
• Beneficial uses (aside from great equalizer
  idea)
• What are some risks?
• Why easier to misbehave/be dishonest on-line? t
• Online Disinhibition Effect
• Anonymity
• Invisibility
• Asynchronicity
• Solipsistic Introjection
• Dissociation
• Neutralizing of Status
• Interaction effects

9

• What is Pseudonymity?
• Who knows who you are? (more shortly..)
• Right to anonymous speech in the U.S.
• First Amendment
• Supreme Court rulings
• Various state laws - no Federal laws yet
• Discovering identities of anonymous posters
• A companys reputation
• The flip side
• What are companies doing about all this?
• The OVERALL clash/controversy
• Right to ANONYMOUS SPEECH vs. Right to REDRESS

10

• ILLEGAL ANONYMOUS SPEECH
• Many court cases briefly.

• INTERESTING issue/clash for our purposes
• Unmasking identities re speech that may be
  protected!
• No good mechanism in place to distinguish between
  someone who uses anonymity to commit a crime and
  someone with a legitimate, lawful, and ETHICAL
  desire to communicate anonymously.
• Many court cases
• Four-part test

11

• State court rulings
• Hasnt stopped companies from filing similar
  suits
• LOTS of URLs a few
• Anonymous Internet Foundation johndoes.org/
• Chilling Effects www.chillingeffects.org/johndoe
  /
• CyberSLAPP www.cyberslapp.org
• Anti-SLAPP Resource Center www.thefirstamendment
  .org/antislappresourcecenter.html

12

• EFFECT of divulging ID of anonymous authors?
• Most famous case Julius Helsingiuss
  pseudo-anonymous remailer service (Finland)
• AAAS Report, 1999 Anonymous Communication
  Policies for the Internet
• Secure anonymous remailers other on-line
  privacy tools, just fyi
• www.epic.org/privacy/tools.html
• www.gilc.org/speech/anonymous/remailer.html
  (visit)
• www.anonymizer.com/ (anonymous Web browsing)
• Degrees of pseudonymity

13

• Just for culture Nym Servers (pseudonymous)
• Excerpts from www.geocities.com
• Communication with a nym server generally takes
  place through the anonymous remailer network.
• The nym server sends receives messages on
  behalf of a user, but it has no information as to
  who that user is. .It knows only that the user
  sending mail from an account is the user that
  created the account (although not where).
  Messages are encrypted.
• A pseudonym maintained via an anonymous remailer
  chain and a nym server is considered the "gold
  standard" of pseudonymity on the Internet.
  Directly piercing the pseudonym would require
  either breaking several layers of strong
  encryption or subverting a number of independent
  anonymous remailers located in several countries
  and on several continents.
• More about Nym Servers
• Anonymous Remailer User FAQ

Case Study 2 Bungle
14

• Flip side of anonymity

• From Time Digital magazine
• I just got a Web cam for my birthday, and I
  thought it would be a lot of fun to showcase my
  personality on the Web. But Im worried that
  Ill be sitting there doing all this outrageous
  stuff and no one will be watching. I dont want
  to waste my A material on empty seats. How do
  I guarantee there will be an audience before I go
  live?

• Webcams
• The bizarre boring educational
• www.camcentral.com
• Why do they/(we?) do it?
• Why do we watch?
• What is blogging?
• Code of ethics
• First Blog Reporter

15

• Some interesting URLs
• Cyber-Affairs
• Infidelity Check
• OnLine Affairs Support Center
• Cybersex and infidelity online
• And
• The Journal of Online Behavior dedicated to the
  empirical study of human behavior online

16

• The medium cannot help us to develop moral values
  if we dont already have them in place.
• HOWEVER can it hinder?
• Is technology really neutral?
• Complexity of behavior choice rises with
  psychological distancing --often made easier
  in cyberspace.

WATCH for INTERESTING WEB FORUM POSTINGS! Going
on NOW.