Government pulls data from Google

Posted on January 23, 2013 by | 5 Comments

Slash Gear released an article today about Government data requests to Google. This is an interesting piece especially on the discussion of privacy.  You sign a privacy agreement with online companies such as Google, but apparently it takes one government order to disregard those details.

The news starts by explaining that the data requests made by government entities has increased since last year.  The governing authorities are able to collect information by the ironically named Electronic Communications Privacy Act (EPCA).  The article shows charts of how it has increased over the years.  One other interesting piece is that Google did not make reporting data on compliance prior to 7/1/11.  I feel that it is unfortunate that any data the government requests they are able to receive, but when we want to request data from the government, it’s can be a very difficult inquiry.

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Posted by in Media, information, and communication, Technology and information policy, Uncategorized.

Facebook’s Graph Search: You Are Its Product

Posted on January 16, 2013 by | 8 Comments

This article highlights an announcement made by Facebook concerning a new type of search to be appended onto the current search function of Facebook: graph search. According to the article, “Graph Search promises to let us search through our friends’ likes, photos, locations, and any other info they’ve prior elected to share with us and/or the world.”

For most people who are in the least slightly familiar with the workings of mass-advertising on the internet (anyone’s whose ever searched for a book and *poof* an Amazon ad pops up with the ‘lowest’ price on that item), it’s no secret that companies have been tracking our web-browsing for quite some time. And it would seem – even if it’s only passively – that this practice has been generally accepted by everyone who uses the internet. It’s a tradeoff – the cost for having a million items at our fingertips has to be paid by someone – and if it going to be the advertising companies, it would only follow a natural technological trend for them to start actually utilizing the platform that they advertise on.

The article ends by asking, “Will we ever tire of being product-ized?” suggesting that human’s lives are now becoming viable form of information currency because of these new technologies. However, the question I would like to pose concerns the morality of the continuous advancement of this technology: as a society, are we slowly being shepherded by these continuous advancements into accepting our fate of being product-ized? Although it’s our choice to use these Facebook, is it morally right for Facebook to slowly morph this product we depend on and are familiar with into something that supersedes the purpose of the site that proposed to the user?

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Posted by in Uncategorized.

3-d printed high-capacity magazines

Posted on January 15, 2013 by | 10 Comments

In class Monday we talked for a moment about whether and how news stories about new technology could be ethically significant. I said that if technology changes the ways we live and interact with each other, then a new piece of technology might be very ethically significant.

Here is a great example. Forbes has an interesting write-up about Defense Distributed, a group using 3-d printers to create high-capacity ammunition magazines. (See also this article at The Verge.) People are using 3-d printers to print high-capacity magazines to hold bullets for assault rifles. Magazines holding more than ten rounds used to be banned. Since the Newtown shooting, there is growing support for banning them again. Well, how effective would a ban be if people could just download the design and print one from home?

Of course this issue goes well-beyond just gun magazines or even firearms in general. 3-d printing promises to allow DIYers to manufacture things that, up to now, have had to come from large factories. In many ways, this should be great. But what about people who want to manufacture something illegal or dangerous?

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Posted by in Classroom discussion continuation, New technology, Uncategorized.

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Aaron Swartz suicide

Posted on January 13, 2013 by | 5 Comments

Ars Technica has the best short summary of the controversial life and death of Aaron Swartz that I’ve seen. It is definitely worth reading, if you have not been following this story.

The article points out what all commentators have been saying — that Swartz was a brilliant programmer, hacker, and technological innovator (and that he was only 26 at the time of his death). The Ars article is especially good because it presents a fairly clear (but maybe over-simplified) picture of how the events of the last couple years may have led to Swartz’s unfortunate death.

Swartz was an outspoken activist for free and open access to information — especially government documents and scientific publications. In 2010, Swartz (allegedly) used the MIT computer network to download millions of academic articles from JSTOR. I am not sure what his exact motives were. The Ars article suggests that it was a kind of activism or protest. What seems clear is that Swartz did not do it for personal profit. Also, as far as I can tell, he never distributed the documents to anyone. Anyway, JSTOR did not press charges but the US federal government went after him pretty hard. Apparently, he was potentially facing more than 50 years in prison.

At this point, it does not look like people are sure about Swartz’s motive for suicide. People have been speculating, though, that it was because of despair over a long prison sentence.

Swartz’s life was complex, but a simple summary still seems accurate. He had strong moral views. He worked for those views, and, in the process, ran afoul of the law. Legal issues threatened to ruin his life. So he took his own life.

Who is at fault here? Is it the fault of Swartz himself — for going too far in pursuit of his ideals? Is it the fault of the government, for prosecuting Swartz too hard (as Lawrence Lessig contends it did)? Is it the fault of society somehow? A combination? No one’s fault, just a said turn of events?

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Posted by in Technology and information policy, Technology and society.

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Kickstarter-funded projects at CES

Posted on January 12, 2013 by | 10 Comments

The Verge has a long write-up about the Kickstarter-funded projects exhibited at CES. The new prevalence of Kickstarter-funded tech ventures might show us a model of how the path of technological progress — especially for consumer products — might become more democratic.

If you don’t know about Kickstarter, here is the basic idea: Someone has a project in mind but not enough money to do it. For example, maybe the project would cost $50,000. The person starts a Kickstarter project and asks for support. People pledge monetary support, but they only have to pay if enough other people pledge so that the project reaches its threshold, in this case $50,000. A benefit of this system is that it is safer for donors. They are less likely to end up spedning money on a project that never even gets rolling.

In the article, some of the projects in question were high tech “smart” watches, mobile phone accessories, Bluetooth-enabled stickers (for locating easily lost items), and an electric skateboard.

It seems that these new Kickstarter-funded projects will result in a wider array of available products. This means there will be more possible paths along which technology can evolve. Furthermore, the paths will be more often chosen according to the actual needs of consumers, instead of just whatever the large tech companies think they can sell. A consequence of this will likely be happier consumers. This makes Kickstarter a positive development from a utilitarian perspective.

Also, Kickstarter gives innovative people an opportunity to make money by working creatively on their own projects. That means they are less dependent for their personal income on large companies, organizations, or governments that decide what projects developers and engineers are to work on. This seems positive from the perspective of Kantian ethics. Kickstarter allows gives people autonomy and allows them to have work where they are not treated as mere means to someone else’s ends.

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Posted by in New technology, Technology and society.

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