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Blaming technology when society goes wrong is lazy

Helen Young

by Helen Young

18 Oct 05:50am

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Filed under: Bullying, Facebook, Social Media, Society, Technology

25 comments

Facebook is an easy target. With its size and history of privacy gaffes, criticising it is like taking aim at the proverbial barn door.

We let our guard down online the way we never would in the physical world.

The same could be said for the online world in general. When we are faced with a social problem, from cyber-bullying to privacy breaches, it’s much easier to blame technology or the company that provides us with it than to take responsibility ourselves.

We can truthfully say that the internet has changed us, but once we start talking about how and why we need to factor ourselves in as well.

Whether we are talking about teen suicide after cyber-bullying, online stalking, loosing our privacy to targeted advertising, the formation of online hate groups, or the true value of Facebook friends then new technology and how it has changed us is not the only issue.

We also need to not just take responsibility for the things we put online ourselves – the photos we post and the like – but for choices about eh sites we use and what we are prepared to accept from the companies that own them.

The internet only influences us and our society because we use it. Sites like Facebook, MySpace, Google, iTunes and all the rest are commercial propositions and expecting them to not use the information we allow them to collect - and voluntarily provide – to their full ability is unrealistic.

Most of don’t read the Terms and Conditions of every website we use, and it’s hardly surprising given how long and complicated they can be. But if we are not prepared to read and potentially reject them then what right do we have to complain?

Doing so also denies us one of the things that makes the internet so attractive: active participation. It’s a cliché of the digital age that anyone can say anything online. If this isn’t entirely true – only about one quarter of the world has access at this point – the freedom to put ours ideas, opinions, and information on public view should come with some responsibility.

We may not always have complete control over exactly what is said about us online, but as individuals and a society we need to take some of the liability if we are going to enjoy the benefits.

Many of us are very willing to take advantage of online opportunities that suit us – the pervasiveness of illegal downloads of music, films and television shows this. If we’re willing to take advantage, why should we expect not to be taken advantage of?

We should not be relying on corporations to always tell us exactly what they are doing with our information, especially if we are not willing to ask, or even read their Terms and Conditions.

Nor should or can we rely on government regulations to take complete care of us. It is very difficult, if not impossible, for legislation to keep up with technology, particularly given how little national borders have to do with the online world.

Corporations and governments have some responsibility, but users need to be part of the equation as well.

We need to take advantage of the tools that we have to manage what we do. Last week Facebook announced three new ‘features’ which they touted as offering more control and more privacy: further control over which friends see different aspects of what we post, the ability to download our profile, and a dashboard which details which applications have recently accessed our personal information.

Their rhetoric should be taken with a grain of salt – it’s not immediately clear to me how being able to download my profile gives me more control over it – but we should also take the opportunities they offer.

After all, if we don’t what right do we then have to complain? If we’re not interested in what’s going on have can we be upset that no-one is telling us?

Controlling how online interactions of any kind affect us as individuals or a society is not always easy. For most people the online world is part of life, from paying bills to searching for a phone number, booking holidays, working, entertainment and organising their social lives.

Choosing to control our information and what is done with it is not simply a matter of not participating if we want to be a functioning part of society.

But that doesn’t mean we can simply avoid responsibility for what we do online.

As users we should at the very least be thinking about how we interact, who with, and what for. The internet is changing our society. Whether this is for good or bad is a matter for us to decide.

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25 comments

Show oldest | newest first

    • T.Chong says:

      06:44am | 18/10/10

      We live in a society, that currently seems to have the group dynamic where many of us seek to absolve ourselves of responsibility.
      Get pissed, do something you regret ( with hindsight) , then, thats not your fault.
      Put up a stupid story ,or pix of yourself on the ‘net is your responsibility, even if the consequences are unintended.
      I cant understand why some people are so willing to bare all, methaphorically , and often literally , on line via Facebok etc .
      One point though:
      If The Punch Facebook friends on the right of the page is fair dinkum, than there would seem to be a very wide range of people visiting this site, many from different parts of the world .
      Providing they arent there thru some type of branch stacking, it seems that The Punch is successful multi-culturalism writ large.
      Who says multi culturalism is a failure? ( Ms Merkel excepted)

      Reply

    • acotrel says:

      09:39am | 18/10/10

      I believe Facebook is dangerous. There is potential for it to be combined with ‘data mining’.  I stay away from it.

    • TheRealDave says:

      11:21am | 18/10/10

      I have some brand new, and near new, tin foil hats on sale this week if you are interested. Made from aluminium mined and smelted right here in Australia and manufactured by one of worlds leading alfoil manufacturers - Comalco - you know this is a quality product.  Mention The Punch and I’ll throw in a second matching one for free. Yes, two tinfoil hats for the price of one! But only if you call in the next 30 minutes.

    • Russell says:

      06:46am | 18/10/10

      Good points, Helen. Previous generations of “smart young things” once identified themselves as standing apart from capitalism and its enslaving products. Todays’ have just made Facebook’s founder a zillionaire by giving him their entire identity.

      You’ve got one of Steve Jobs’ gadgets in your pocket? Good. He’s got you in his.

      Reply

    • Macca says:

      06:56am | 18/10/10

      The biggest problem with the internet is anonimity. The internet is touted as a world-wide social tool connecting societies all over the globe. And yet it is the only social place where you are granted the right to be a shadow.

      It is the 21st Century equivalent of a Venitian masquerade party.

      Reply

    • Mr Mask says:

      08:09am | 18/10/10

      And what’s wrong with that, Macca? There are good reasons to be anonymous on the Net.

      By the way, is “Macca” your real name?

    • Joan says:

      09:12am | 18/10/10

      Like movie stars some writers choose to go by another name… a nom de plume. In the blogsphere it is useful it individualises conrtibutions. If too many Joans appeared for comments I could change my name to something like Macca Rena perhaps

    • Muttley says:

      09:28am | 18/10/10

      Spot on Macca. The anonymous nature of the internet removes any trace of responsible behaviour in some. It iks not improving the notion of being a member of a community. Exactly the opposite.

    • acotrel says:

      09:41am | 18/10/10

      If I make a public comment, I’m prepared to sign my name to it!

    • Mark says:

      09:53am | 18/10/10

      Many things that need to be said are not said for fear of retribution so the annonimity does give voive to these.

    • Muttley says:

      10:45am | 18/10/10

      fair point Mark. But the down side is that things that shouldnt be said now have a means of being published. For instance, the charming individuals that deface memorial sites. You create something to celebrate the life of someone who has passed, and sickos get in there and write deliberately inflammatory or degrading remarks. Or the lovely people that recently egged on a suicide in the UK. The young lady about to take her own life was subjected to people telling her she should do it. That is the price of creating an environment where there are no consequences.

    • Mr Mask says:

      11:08am | 18/10/10

      Muttley and acotrel, are those your real, full names?

      It’s kind of odd to see people who are using nicknames complaining about anonymity.

    • Muttley says:

      12:46pm | 18/10/10

      Not at all odd Mr Mask. You’ve simply missed the point. My issue is not with anonymity, it is with the behaviour of some while hiding in an anonymous environment. I dont make any comments that i would not be happy to repeat to someone in person. If everyone treated their posts as though they were actually speaking to someone there would be a vastly different environment on the internet. But the rank cowardice and maliciousness that spews forth because of the anonymous nature of the internet is troubling to say the least.

    • Chris L says:

      05:53pm | 18/10/10

      I agree Muttley that those circumstances of defacing memorials and encouraging a girl to suicide are tragic. The simple fact, and it is something we all knew before the inernet was invented, is that there are pricks everywhere. Just as a physical memorial might be defaced by a pointless vandal the risk online is the same. I don’t see that this is related to the technology, just the people that use it. I suspect this is the point Helen is making.

    • LC says:

      09:50am | 21/03/11

      @ Macca & acotrel

      So…what are your real names?

    • Expat says:

      09:07am | 18/10/10

      It’s a learning phase. In South Korea and Japan where people have been online 24/7 for years via their phone, there hasn’t been a distinction between how people behave online as opposed to offline for a long time, because there is no offline. As the rest of the world catches up, they’ll go through the same learning curve until people realise that distinction is history, and also behave accordingly.

      Reply

    • Duff says:

      09:50am | 18/10/10

      Expat, that is a good point.  Although I don’t think it will be quite so simple as that.  People will certainly get more savvy about using it, but the biggest ‘problem’ with the internet is the very thing that makes it so seductive:  it was designed to be without borders, impossible to control and virtually unaccountable.  There is no other piece of technology that has done that before.  You konw, they say that guns don’t kill people, people do, and many American gun owners believe that it is only a matter of familiarity, training etc to make them safe.  But the statistics do not back that up.  People are not perfect.  We cannot learn to handle everything 100%.  Some technologies do indeed make the world a more dangerous place.  Consider the car.  We love them, but they kill thousands of us every year and cause a lot of damage to society.  I think the internet will ultimately be like this.  It will continue to be a very dangerous and uncontrollable risk in our lives.  It will come at an unavoidable price to society, just as it comes with benefits.

    • Expat says:

      11:28am | 18/10/10

      Thanks for your reply, Duff, although by and large, fortunately, it has been that simple. Sure, it’s impossible to legislate against stupidity, but the fundamental difference is that in Japan and South Korea, the vast majority of people don’t behave any differently on or offline. They went through the social network phase years ago, (got bored with it and went back to email), and learnt that it’s best not to do anything online that you wouldn’t offline. When people no longer make any distinction, it becomes obvious (to almost everyone). We still need to tell kids to look both ways before they cross the street, but that’s about it.

    • Markus says:

      01:39pm | 18/10/10

      Duff your gun analogy is a good one, as with guns it is not just a matter of familiarity and training, but attitude.
      Canada for example, has more firearms per capita than any other country in the world, but one of the lowest levels of firearm related deaths. Australia, pre gun laws, was similar (Port Arthur aside, which was a horrible tragedy, but an anomaly).

      Expat is right, if similar attitudes prosper as to what the internet should and should not be used for, the world will have more Canadas and less USAs on the internet as it were.

    • Expat says:

      02:21pm | 18/10/10

      Good point, Markus. The different ways in which different societies use technologies says a lot about those societies, and very little about those technologies.

      Almost daily we still read of examples where people are still learning that when push comes to shove, online “anonymity” is an illusion harboured at their own peril. When people realise that, as digital natives do, the better off they are.

    • Duff says:

      09:26am | 18/10/10

      So it’s all our fault for not reading the fine print?  And forget the fact that most of ‘us’ are actually kids and teens.  I dunno, in my world it is better to ensure the “corporations” who create and operate websites for the purpose of making a profit do so in such a way so as not to harm or jeopardise people in the process.  That’s actually how the law usually works in the “real” world.  The internet should be held to the same standards.  And it probably would be, if not for jurisdictional issues.

      Reply

    • NEFFA says:

      02:03pm | 18/10/10

      yes duff, its called responsibility

    • Tess says:

      09:28pm | 18/10/10

      Duff in exactly which jurisdiction do you propose these laws that will miraculously protect idiots from themselves?

    • dancan says:

      11:14am | 18/10/10

      Back in the 90’s before the internet became common place people were always concerned about “the man” spying on them and gathering information. 

      Today there is no need worry about “the man” people are more than willing to post almost anything about themselves on the internet for 5 minutes of fame.

      Reply

    • karl says:

      06:38pm | 18/10/10

      I have certainly noticed that more and more people have an inability to spell the word “losing.”

      Reply
 
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