Communication ethics and the internet: intercultural and localising influencers

In the information-technology powered twenty first century a general demand for more effective communication is driving people to question the present, examine the past and to prognosticate the future. The ‘unique global media-information system’ - the Internet- is the central fact of a vast new complexity of communication that is driving social-economic-political-religious- technological change at a rate never experienced before. The premise of this paper is that the Internet can be better understood as the first complex global media with both democratic and authoritarian possibilities, the full extent of which are still emergent. In respect of the symposium question, this paper suggests that Internet embedded communication theory can be used progressively as part of a widening and deepening approach to intercultural conversation, dialogue and debate. In theory, the localising nature of the Internet can be read as part of a greater movement towards communitarian and community centred self-governance, local democracy and social self-sufficiency. There is considerable scope for a new theory of society founded in localised ‘in-community communication’ practice supported by international human rights and effectively responsive to the asymmetric global information environment and congruent with newly democratised local structures of self-governance

Ethics and the Internet in West Africa : toward an ethical model of integration

French version available in IDRC Digital Library: Enjeux éthiques d'Internet en Afrique de l'Ouest : vers un modèle éthique d'intégratio

An Article We Wrote to Ourselves in the Future: Early 21st Century Views on Ethics and the Internet.

Written from the viewpoint of the year 2050, this Article discusses the clash between legal ethics and the technological revolution of the early twenty-first century. As a result of ethics rules being applied to new technologies in ways never contemplated under traditional circumstances, lawyers had to be overly cautious when they used the Internet to correspond with or seek out clients, or otherwise promote their legal services. The lesson learned is that the legal community should reflect on the harm caused by over zealous regulation and take a more reasoned approach to the use of technology for the benefit of lawyers, judges, and clients

Explaining the Connection Between Ethics and the Internet by the Students of the Zagreb School of Economics and Management

Etika u vezi s informacijskim i komunikacijskim tehnologijama (Information and Communiacation Technologies – ICT) postavlja se kao temelj modernog poslovanja. Brzi razvoj tih tehnologija dovodi do brzog razvoja u svim segmentima društva, znanosti i obrazovanja. Tako danas poluživot znanja u većini oblasti iznosi svega pet do šest godina. Razvoj tehnologije donosi i informatički sve pismenije generacije, kao i problem etike, koja kao disciplina treba biti sastavni dio poslovanja te informacijske i komunikacijske tehnologije. Njihova veza predstavlja preduvjet za poslovni uspjeh. U svrhu pisanja ovog članka provjerili smo stavove mlađih generacija, njihova promišljanja vezana uz etiku i internet kao jedan od dijelova informacijskih i komunikacijskih tehnologija.Ethics and its connection with information and communication technologies (ICT) is used in this article as a basis for contemporary business management. The fast-paced development of these technologies leads to swift development in all segments of society, science and education. Thus, today the half-life of knowledge in most fields of science has a duration of five to six years. Technology development brings with it generations that are increasingly informationally literate, but also the problem of ethics, a discipline which should be an integral part of business management and information and communication technology. The connectedness of these is a precondition for business success. For the purposes of this article the author has examined the attitudes of the younger generation, their thoughts on ethics and the internet as an integral part of the information and communication technologies

Libraries, Electronic Resources, and Privacy: The Case for Positive Intellectual Freedom

Public and research libraries have long provided resources in electronic formats, and the tension between providing electronic resources and patron privacy is widely recognized. But assessing trade-offs between privacy and access to electronic resources remains difficult. One reason is a conceptual problem regarding intellectual freedom. Traditionally, the LIS literature has plausibly understood privacy as a facet of intellectual freedom. However, while certain types of electronic resource use may diminish patron privacy, thereby diminishing intellectual freedom, the opportunities created by such resources also appear liberty-enhancing. Adjudicating between privacy loss and enhanced opportunities on intellectual freedom grounds must therefore provide an account of intellectual freedom capable of addressing both privacy and opportunity. I will argue that intellectual freedom is a form of positive freedom, where a person’s freedom is a function of the quality of her agency. Using this view as the lodestar, I articulate several principles for assessing adoption of electronic resources and privacy protections

Four Facets of Privacy and Intellectual Freedom in Licensing Contracts for Electronic Journals

This is a study of the treatment of library patron privacy in licenses for electronic journals in academic libraries. We begin by distinguishing four facets of privacy and intellectual freedom based on the LIS and philosophical literature. Next, we perform a content analysis of 42 license agreements for electronic journals, focusing on terms for enforcing authorized use and collection and sharing of user data. We compare our findings to model licenses, to recommendations proposed in a recent treatise on licenses, and to our account of the four facets of intellectual freedom. We find important conflicts with each

Benchmarking of corporate social responsibility: Methodological problems and robustness

This paper investigates the possibilities and problems of benchmarking Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). After a methodological analysis of the advantages and problems of benchmarking, we develop a benchmark method that includes economic, social and environmental aspects as well as national and international aspects of CSR. The overall benchmark is based on a weighted average of these aspects. The weights are based on the opinions of companies and NGO’s. Using different methods of weighting, we find that the outcome of the benchmark is rather robust for a sample of more than 50 large Dutch companies.Benchmarking; corporate social responsibility; sensitivity analysis; stakeholder perspective; transparency; triple P bottom line