New Comm Tech

Unfortunately, I’m still in the preliminary stages of my research, so I haven’t quite yet developed an argument.  However, my research thus far seems to indicate that the Web 2.0 services are far dodgier (EN: nice academic language there) in their terms of service than sites which have been around for quite a while.  There seem to be several reasons for this including changing social attitudes towards the internet and the recent resurgence in business and marketing interest in internet ventures since the dot com bubble burst in the 1990’s.

Psychology seems to be an important factor too: people’s behaviour changes when they’re online, especially if they’re appearing as “anonymous”.  Since social networking extends far beyond the corporate grip of Facebook, examining online communities who exploit people’s ignorance and violate their privacy seems note-worthy.  Especially the recent case of Jessie Slaughter, a 12 year old girl whose home address and phone number were posted online after she posted videos of herself on Youtube, is worthy of further research.

As there aren’t many textbooks written about these subjects as of yet, most of my information is coming from academic journal articles and news items.  They have been written from many perspectives: sociology, psychology, IT and business.