P2 Vodcast: Privacy and Hypersurveillance

Team name: The A-Team
Team members: Clarianne Asuncion, James Purdy, Mark Shannon, Victoria Wighton

P2 Context

Safeguarding Privacy in a New World of Hyper Surveillance


According to wikipedia.org, which is constructed by the voice of the people, the definition of Net Neutrality is defined as “a broadband network free of restrictions on the kinds of equipment that may be attached on the modes of communication, where communication is not unreasonably degraded by other communication streams.”

Breaking down and analyzing this context of this quote is the fundamental basis of our video research podcast. Many large companies are data mining information about consumers and selling it off to other companies for mass profits. Such information consists of personal addresses, contact addresses, consumer purchases, and much more. All this data created and sold for what? Companies want market data to analyze and predict consumer trends.

Are companies safeguarding the data they are collecting or are they exploiting them to other firms globally? What about the thought of companies knowing more about you than you know about yourself?

It is easy for companies to data mine behind our backs since they hold all the keys. In exchange for offering ‘free’ services (We say ‘free’ because there is an opportunity cost), we must forgo personal information. Some individuals are unaware of what the consequences are. May we refresh your memory of telemarketers. Using a contest form as an example; Before the internet, one would have to fill out a sheet in which you place your name, address, and phone number. After the contest is done, this information is sold off to telemarketing companies, which in turn call your house or send ads in your mail. Similarly today, filling out online contests forms or downloading software that requires some sort of registration is collected, organized, and marketed off to other companies-Which coincidentally, your new e-mail inbox is later cluttered by advertisements and viruses. This example is minimal compared to the power these companies have with this information.

The real question we, as users, are faced with is, how much is too much is too much before our identities are completely lost in translation over the internet by money hungry fascist corporations? Our time to act is now.


Works Cited
Amazon. 1 Apr. 2008 .

Blogger User Terms. Blogger. 1 Apr. 2008 .

Dollar Sign. 1 Apr. 2008 .

Ebay Logo. 1 Apr. 2008 .

Facebook User Terms. Facebook. 1 Apr. 2008 .

Free Money. 1 Apr. 2008 .

Google Logo. 1 Apr. 2008 /zyVEqQrX7Ac/s1600-R/google_logo.jpg>.

Hmmm. 1 Apr. 2008 .

Lithgrow, Michael. "Net Neutrality in Canada Under Siege: Bell Implements “Traffic
Shaping” Service to Throttle Internet Access." 31 Mar. 2008. 1 Apr. 2008
.

Mel's Video Blog #1: Flight of the Conchords (HBO). 1 Apr. 2008 .

"Net Neutrality in Canada." The It Nerd. 1 Apr. 2008 .

"Net Neutrality." Wikipedia. 1 Apr. 2008 .
Pak, Tony. "http://www.yorku.ca/dapina/lw2970/ip/?p=185." Osgoode Law School (York).
1 Apr. 2008 .

Piere Intro. 1 Apr. 2008 .

Privacy Google Agreement. 1 Apr. 2008 .

Rogers Logo. .

Sorensen, Chris. "TheStar.Com | Business | Rogers Website Messages Irk Google." The
Toronto Star 29 Mar. 2008. 1 Apr. 2008 .

Tim Berners Lee. 1 Apr. 2008 .

Yahoo User Agreement. 1 Apr. 2008 .

CCT205 FUN EDITTING

"The Most Random Video of Life"
feat. members of Anchorman

Week 6: Project 2 Proposal

Introduction
The concept of the video will be the notion of hyper-surveillance, with a specific focus on the issue of privacy. Other areas of discussion will include references to Legislation, the Bill of Rights, and the current-day similarities to George Orwell's 1984.

Concept
The video podcast will focus on how privacy is infringed upon in many areas of one's daily life and activities. Throughout the course of our research for this podcast, as well as in the presentation of the podcast itself, we intend to answer the following question regarding surveillance and breaches of privacy: How far is too far? Our intention is to convey the concerns and precautions that one must take when it comes to their personal privacy, not only online, but with any technologically related medium. An important issue is that in today's surveillance society, one is constantly being watched, but if we are doing nothing wrong, then should there be a reason to worry? Nearly all of the technologies in today’s society consequently also have methods of surveillance. Cellular phone conversations can be overheard, instant messaging conversations are routinely archived, and built in webcams on personal laptop computers can be controlled remotely. The methods by which our actions can be recorded are endless, and it is our goal through the video podcast to bring attention to these methods.

Also, corporations such as Facebook, Google, and Microsoft often take great lengths to obtain our personal information, but what guarantees do we have that this information is dealt with accordingly? It may be possible that Facebook sells our information (such as who we talk to, our relationship status, etc) to advertising companies. Google always crawls the web to capture any information it can, but just how powerful are their web crawlers? Microsoft requires personal information for most installations, and with the introduction of ActiveX, are there any more barriers to that information? These topics as well will be covered by our video podcast.

Research Approach
The basis of our research will involve a combination of field research and a variety of conventional research to further support our arguments. We will include live interviews with random subjects and incorporate supporting evidence from scholarly journals and other personal blogs or video podcasts to show opposing views about the issue. Some of the video podcast we will be using will be taken from www.current.com. One of the main articles that we will focus on is “public surveillance functions of private security” by Alison Wakefield. We would also be looking at different articles on the infringement of privacy involving internet. Lastly, we would also assess different major corporations and their methods of gathering data.

Treatment
The podcast will incorporate a hit television show ‘24’ type theme, where multiple segments of events are happening at once during a specific duration. The camera will play a neutral roll, capturing our interaction with each other. Many shots will be filmed from the shoulder to not only capture dramatics, but also carry good audio quality. The type of atmosphere we are trying to generate would be action pact and adventurous to draw the attention of the audience as well as keeping it formal to come off as factual.

Our footage would contain research that will be placed in dialogue, which is backed up by visual aids. Interviews of individuals as well as other extended metaphors will be placed to further emphasis our story. Much effort will be placed on ‘what makes a good blog’ by including comic relief and emotion.

Week 5: My Team

Team name: The A-Team
Team members: Clarianne Asuncion, James Purdy, Mark Shannon, Victoria Wighton

The initial concept for our video podcast is regarding Google and its relation to privacy in the online world. Features such as Google Analytics and Googlebots pry into the darkest corners of a website, and quite possibly, password protected information such as bank accounts and secure web sites.

Also, we will speak about privacy in regard to other applications which have yet to be determined, but may include cell phone conversations and ATMs.

Week 4: Videopodcast Review - "Plasticky Goodness"

"PLASTICKY GOODNESS"

"Plasticky Goodness" is truly the epitome of geniusness. Plastic guitars can go a long way! The members of "The Guitar Zeros" have shown that when you find what you're passionate about and really put your mind into it, nothing is impossible. It opens up options for those who wants to learn music in a different way. This videopodcast was able to portray this message well.

"Guitar Hero" can be described as the new finger-tapping, whammy bar-pressing, guitar-tossing, video game that allows regular individuals to feel like rock stars in their own living rooms. The concept of this video game has been adopted by a band called "The Guitar Zeros" who creatively transformed these plastic guitars into actual music playing ones. They were able to achieve this by writing software that allows them to create thousands of sounds with the Guitar Hero instruments. They have been rocking out with these souped up plastic guitars by playing songs from the actual video game. Their creativity, resourcefulness has truly captured and inspired many indivuals, such as myself. Essentially, many people, including myself believe that "Guitar Hero" would ultimately discourage people from learning actual instruments. However, this videopodcast has changed my perspective.

The videopodcast began with an interview of a girl who introduces the band, Guitar Zeros. After the introduction, a brief but detailed presentation of how the plastic guitars were transformed was shown. Here, it was suggested that these new guitars could potentially be "an alternative way" to play the guitar. The guitar has 32 possible combinations and can be plugged into other devices such as an amplifier etc. This segment promotes and alternative way of learning the guitar. The next segment are various clips of the creators commenting on what, how and why they created the guitar. One of the comments made was "we're just really harnessing the raw energy of rock, the best we can". This comment showed a lot of passion and dedication put into both playing and creating music. Towards the end, were clips of the band performing and fans acknowledging their talents. In this segment, fans were going up on stage and congratulating the members of Guitar Zero. This is moving because it shows that these avid musicians were able to reach out and help others appreciate music in a completely different level.

Overall, the organization of this videopodcast was excellent. The images, sounds and the interviews were all neccesary and relevant in getting the message across. The information provided was sufficient. The sound quality was clear however the image quality was mediocre and could be improved. Despite these minor areas that require improvement, the content and the story was depicted well and the message was effectively conveyed.

Week 3: Web 2.0 and Podcasting where is this heading?

In our forever changing society, the only thing that remains constant is change. Technology is constantly changing and there is always a need for improvement and advancement. The rise of the internet has dramatically changed our society in terms of jobs, lifestyle, and most importantly, communication. A current trend that is changing with regards to the internet is the rising of second generation web based communities, also known as web 2.0 or the Semantic Web. Tim O'Reilly is the founder of Web 2.0. He proposes that it is designed to facilitate and enrich a users experience and engagement in the world wide web. These Web 2.0 applications, particularly wikis, blogs and podcasts, have been increasingly adopted by many users because of their ease of use and rapidity of deployment and they offer the opportunity for powerful information sharing and ease of collaboration. The future of Web 2.0 and podcasting seems to be one with many innovations and will be tremendously furthered and Tim O'reilly has carefully outlined some of the potential changes (O'Reilly 2005) from web 1.0 that are changing.

"Web 2.0 is participative" (Miller 2005). Web 1.0 has tended to be somewhat one-sided, with a flow of content from provider to viewer. Currently, those who use the internet had actively participated online, by blogging, sharing files, or equivalent (Lenhart et al 2004). That percentage will rise, and participation will become a part of our online lives as individuals share reviews of books, comment on the local Chinese restaurant, engage with our governments, or even given give each other diet recipes and advices! "Web 2.0 applications have been quick to spot the value of user-generated content" (Miller 2005). It heavily stresses out the importance of active user engagement. It takes importance of the output of the user and making this available for everyone else.

“Literally millions of people now participate in the sharing and exchange of these forms of media by producing their own podcasts, videos and photos” (Anderson 10). People are able to be creative and create their own content and also share the knowledge that they have with the public. With the steady rising of Web 2.0, it isn’t surprising that bloggers will eventually switch to video podcasting as replacement for blogging. With exposure to both visual and auditory stimuli, users will be more active and engaged. It is more engaging in a sense that sometimes through blogging or chatting, we don’t catch certain emotions that the blogger writes, with podcasting, we can see facial expressions, voice intonations and emotions. Web 2.0 focuses specifically on communication and facilitating community.

Further more, another advantage of Web 2.0 and podcasting is ease of access and sharing of information. Research and education facilities, news agencies and even those in the medical field have adopted podcasting as a valid form of communication. Wikis, blogs and podcasts are all relatively easy to use, which partly accounts for their proliferation.The fact that there are many free and Open Source versions of these tools may also be responsible for their explosive growth. Thus it would be relatively easy to implement. Paradoxically, some of their disadvantages also relate to their openness and ease of use. With virtually anybody able to alter, edit or otherwise contribute to the collaborative Web pages, it can be problematic to gauge the reliability and accuracy of such resources.

One advantage of web 2.0 that comes in handy for me as a student is the use of discussion forums such as blackboard, ccnet, and wikispaces. These onlide educational discussion forums have helped many students with clarifying information with professors, accesing lecture notes, and even stirring up questions about what was learned in class. It is facilitating the notion of "active engagement" as specified by web 2.0. A future example of conducting lectures could be through webcam, where students are at home, on their computers attending lectures at home through the webcam. Through this method of conducting lectures, there is still some sort of engagement involved. Students can still ask questions and participate. Parallel to this, some companies have already adopted this type of technology: www.gotomymeeting.com is an example of this. GoToMyMeeting is a way to attend meetings or conferences without being physically there. It specializes in web conferencing, online meetings, web conferencing services.

Overall, although Web 2.0 has it's shortcomings, the benefits seem to outweigh the negatives as this media is increasing quickly. Because it is still evolving, constant change will occur to improve it. The future of Web 2.0 will be one of innovative technologies, perhaps even developing a Web 3.0 or other forms of social networking on a higher level. Perhaps creating the quality of podcasting better, making even interaction even more real. There seem to be no limits to technology is that Web 2.0 interactivity can be seen and used by just about any one. The production value can be fairly low. The amount of technology, widgets, etc. can be fairly low. You can create an interactive web site just by inspiring your site visitors and interacting with them.

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Sources:

Anderson, Paul. What is Web 2.0?.
JISC Technology and Standards Watch. Feb 2007.
<http://www.jisc.ac.uk/media/documents/techwatch/tsw0701b.pdf> accessed on 29 Jan. 2008.

Lenhart, A., Horrigan, J., & Fallows, D. Content Creation Online, Pew Internet & American Life Project research report. February 2004
<http://www.pewinternet.org/pdfs/PIP_Content_Creation_Report.pdf> accessed on 29 Jan. 2008.

Miller, Paul. "Web 2.0: Building the New Library." Aradianne 45 (2005). <http://www.ariadne.ac.uk/issue45/miller/> accessed on 29 Jan. 2008.

O'Reilly, Tim. "What is Web 2.0." (2005).
<http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/oreilly/tim/news/2005/09/30/what-is-web-20.html> accessed on 29 Jan. 2008.