How Online Privacy Literacy Supports Self-Data Protection and Self-Determination in the Age of Information

Current debates on online privacy are rooted in liberal theory. Accordingly, privacy is often regarded as a form of freedom from social, economic, and institutional influences. Such a negative perspective on privacy, however, focuses too much on how individuals can be protected or can protect themselves, instead of challenging the necessity of protection itself. In this article, I argue that increasing online privacy literacy not only empowers individuals to achieve (a necessarily limited) form of negative privacy, but has the potential to facilitate a privacy deliberation process in which individuals become agents of social change that could lead to conditions of positive privacy and informational self-determination. To this end, I propose a four-dimensional model of online privacy literacy that encompasses factual privacy knowledge, privacy-related reflection abilities, privacy and data protection skills, and critical privacy literacy. I then outline how this combination of knowledge, abilities, and skills 1) enables to individuals to protect themselves against some horizontal and vertical privacy intrusions and 2) motivates individuals to critically challenge the social structures and power relations that necessitate the need for protection in the first place. Understanding these processes, as well as critically engaging with the normative premises and implications of the predominant negative concepts of privacy, offers a more nuanced direction for future research on online privacy literacy and privacy in general

The curve complex and covers via hyperbolic 3-manifolds

Rafi and Schleimer recently proved that the natural relation between curve complexes induced by a covering map between two surfaces is a quasi-isometric embedding. We offer another proof of this result using a distance estimate via hyperbolic 3-manifolds.Comment: 5 page

Open Letter on Ethical Norms in Intellectual Property Scholarship

As scholars who write in intellectual property (“IP”), we write this letter with aspirations of reaching the highest ethical norms possible for our field. In particular, we have noted an influx of large contributions from corporate and private actors who have an economic stake in ongoing policy debates in the field. Some dollars come with strings attached, such as the ability to see or approve academic work prior to publication or limitations on the release of data. IP scholars who are also engaged in practice or advocacy must struggle to keep their academic and advocacy roles separate.Our goal is to bring attention to the dramatic changes that are occurring in the field, highlight the potential pitfalls, and suggest a set of ethical norms to which we will strive to adhere. We conclude this letter with a set of ethical norms to which a large number of IP academics have already subscribed. We welcome additional signatories to the principles expressed in this letter

Cultural differences in social media use, privacy, and self-disclosure : research report on a multicultural study

This research report presents comparative results from five nations (United States of America, United Kingdom, Germany, the Netherlands, and China) with regard to social media use, self-disclosure, privacy perceptions and attitudes, and privacy behavior in online environments. The data stemmed from an online survey that was conducted from November, 2011, to December, 2011. Across all five nations, N = 1,800 participants completed the survey. The findings suggest that a broad differentiation between Western and Eastern cultures only partly accounted for differences in social media use and privacy behavior. Rather, the results of this report suggest that European countries (United Kingdom, Germany, and the Netherlands) share similar privacy perceptions and show similar behavioral patterns. Non-European cultures (the USA and China) on the other hand, use social media differently. Participants from European countries had generally smaller audiences on social network sites and microblogging platforms, tended to limit the visibility of their postings and profile information more, and used more privacy settings to safeguard their privacy. In particular, German social media users seemed to be guarded, protective, and rather reluctant to participate in online communication. Users from the US, on the other hand, rated privacy-related behavior as less risky and were hence less likely to imply sophisticated privacy strategies. Apart from these findings, the report also shows that there are more commonalities than differences. People from all five countries think that it is important to protect privacy. Most users consciously decides what to share and what not to share. Accordingly, social media users do not always share intimate and detailed information about their lives

Sourdough bread preparation using selected lactic acid bacterial starter cultures

The lactic fermentation of cereals is known to improve the food quality through the development of flavor, enhancement of the nutritional value and shelf life, and by removing toxic or antinutritional factors of food products. Lactic acid bacteria (LAB) strains are able to improve the shelf life of several food products. The efficiency of the LAB cultures determined in in vitro assays was confirmed in bread manufacture. The sourbread prepared using 50 per cent yeast and 50 per cent LAB starter (based on cell density) was found to be superior to the conventional bread in textural characteristics, flavor, appearance and even taste. It contained enough protein (10.15%) and the least fat value (7.68%). It scored the highest acceptability index of 81.70. These results point out the advantages of using selected LAB strains as starter cultures for sourdough fermentation

Ergodic directions for billiards in a strip with periodically located obstacles

We study the size of the set of ergodic directions for the directional billiard flows on the infinite band $\R\times [0,h]$ with periodically placed linear barriers of length $0<\lambda<h$. We prove that the set of ergodic directions is always uncountable. Moreover, if $\lambda/h\in(0,1)$ is rational the Hausdorff dimension of the set of ergodic directions is greater than 1/2. In both cases (rational and irrational) we construct explicitly some sets of ergodic directions.Comment: The article is complementary to arXiv:1109.458