The ethics of forgetting in an age of pervasive computing

In this paper, we examine the potential of pervasive computing to create widespread sousveillance, that will complement surveillance, through the development of lifelogs; socio-spatial archives that document every action, every event, every conversation, and every material expression of an individual’s life. Examining lifelog projects and artistic critiques of sousveillance we detail the projected mechanics of life-logging and explore their potential implications. We suggest, given that lifelogs have the potential to convert exterior generated oligopticons to an interior panopticon, that an ethics of forgetting needs to be developed and built into the development of life-logging technologies. Rather than seeing forgetting as a weakness or a fallibility we argue that it is an emancipatory process that will free pervasive computing from burdensome and pernicious disciplinary effects

Using technology to enhance back to school night

This project was intended to build communication between the school and the home. With the use of a multimedia presentation, DVD, school and classroom expectations were communicated to the parents. A survey was given to first grade parents to determine whether this DVD would be beneficial. The results of that survey showed that there was a need, and parents were wanting information in areas of school and classroom expectations, academic standards, disciplining students, and character development. Through the Assessment, Design, Development, Implementation and Evaluation process (ADDIE), a DVD presentation was designed, developed, and implemented to communicate these learning objectives

The different role of mandatory access in German regulation of railroads and telecommunications

Network services can be provided efficiently in competitive markets, if nondiscriminatory access to the complementary infrastructure capacities is guaranteed. The sector-symmetric application of the disaggregated regulatory approach to railways and telecommunications reveals the different role of mandatory access. Whereas in telecommunications only the local loop may create a remaining regulatory problem, mandatory access has to be guaranteed with respect to the railway infrastructure as a whole. In spite of the large phasing-out potentials of sector-specific regulation in telecommunications, this sector is still under the burden of overregulation. In contrast, in the railway sector mandatory access has been introduced only recently. --

Fiercely Real?:Tyra Banks and the making of new media celebrity

This paper will examine former supermodel Tyra Banks as a contemporary “celebrity entrepreneur,” focusing on Banks’ recent shift from television persona to multimedia icon within a neoliberal popular culture. I argue that our contemporary new media environment, marked by convergent media texts, self-branding, and interactivity, provides an ideal space for Banks to produce and globally circulate her postfeminist star text. Through her websites, Facebook, and Twitter confessionals, Banks is able to successfully navigate the contradictory discourses that insist female celebrities be both “authentic” selves while maintaining a disciplined, hegemonic femininity that becomes legitimized and naturalized. I conclude that while Banks’ mobilization of a hypervisibility and sense of individual agency generates an authenticity that may resonate with her fans, she remains contained by the neoliberal and postfeminist discourses that allow her to have such a prominent Internet presence. Consequently, this paper serves to raise unexplored questions about the relationship between celebrity culture, postfeminist and neoliberal subjectivities, and new media

Competition in the post-trade markets: A network economic analysis of the securities business

In order to analyse the role of competition in the post-trade markets a normative network economic analysis of the securities business is provided. The theory of monopolistic bottlenecks constitutes the theoretical reference point for this analysis in order to identify stable network specific market power. It is shown that clearing and settlement are competitive value-added telecommunications services and therefore do not justify ex ante market power regulation. Precondition for competition on the markets for clearing and settlement is nondiscriminatory access to the complementary technical regulatory function - the notary function (authenticity, registry, links between competing end custodians). --

Recent Methodological Opportunities in Online Hypermedia – a Case Study of Photojournalism in Singapore

This methodological paper reviews the recent work done by photojournalists in Singapore who have leveraged on the use of multimedia to create meaning-rich narratives of the social situations they investigate. Using an online multimedia project recently launched by journalists and photojournalists in Singapore, I will show how photographers'/photojournalists' expertise, knowledge and combination of text and photographs serve to exemplify the opportunities that hypermedia affords to sociologists, and argue that hypermedia presentations are particularly useful in extending auto/biographical narratives, encouraging collaborative research, as well as interrogating the everyday social lives of our informants.Visual Sociology, Hypermedia, Online Methods, Singapore, Photojournalism, Visual Methods, Photography

The Benefit of Adopting Comprehensive Standards of Monitoring Employee Technology Use in the Workplace

[Excerpt] This article will examine issues as they relate to the privacy of employees\u27 lives given that nearly everything can be discovered by some form of electronic monitoring. It will posit that most laws as they exist today do little to apprise either the employer or the employee as to what type of electronic monitoring of personal communications is acceptable. It will further propose that most employer policies related to scrutinizing employee electronic communications are vague and unsuitable. The article will conclude that, given the leeway employers tend to be given (often justifiably so) in monitoring employees there is little chance that we will soon see any standardization of laws regarding what can be done with electronically obtained information. Because of this, the author asserts that, given the vague state of the law, employers need to devise effective monitoring policies in order to strike a balance between their interests and the privacy interests of their employees