I recently attended a lecture by Prof Andrew Clement through IPSI addressing how our current legal/policy frameworks handling personal information are no longer adequate. Using the example of the no fly list used by the US and Canada, Clement presented a number of case studies in which public, not private information, now readily available, searchable and aggregated online, was used to restrict citizens’ entry into the US because of the “security threats” they posed. Notable academic examples include a professor who criticized the Bush admin and another for dropping LSD in the 60s (he published a paper about his findings that came up on Google).

Instead of clinging to an older paradigm of privacy, Clement argues that citizens need to be protected with better models that can address current challenges in managing personal data brought about by new technology. Instead of focusing on privacy, he proposes the idea of identity integrity, which is characterized by a focus on the rights of citizens and a presumption of anonymous entitlement and of innocence. It also calls for policy to be more transparent, or at least for a proper appeals process to be in place e.g. addressing the difficult process of appealing one’s inclusion on a no fly list.

In addition to identity integrity, there is the notion of identity management which people already instinctively do, with varying levels of competency. Identity management is definitely something I’d like to see included in the educational curriculum. It’s also something I believe corporations and online vendors need to become more responsible for instead of constantly placing the onus on users to track their personal data. Especially young users.

Too often I have heard the argument that a free online service should be compensated by a user’s content that has been voluntarily uploaded. Personally, I find it fairly ridiculous to expect - let’s pick on Facebook for example - your average 13 year old to actually read through the FB TOS, which is written in an inaccessible legal language and is excessively long for an online text. And, if youth users want to continue to understand how their personal data is shared, they are also expected to read the TOS of each 3rd party application they add? And are their parents supposed to read them too?

Users don’t want privacy so much as they want control over their online personal data. Would it be so difficult for online apps to be more transparent about how they are using it? More importantly, shouldn’t they?

I learned how to do cataloging today using the OCLC (Online Computer Library Center). It reminded me of this film clip that I came across on The Polyglot Spot.

Maybe it’s naive, but I don’t see why both systems of organization can’t coexist for library catalogs. Imagine if users could tag materials in their university catalogs. In addition to searching for items in a standardized, hierarchal manner, you could also search laterally, rhizomatically. Imagine doing research on your topic where the material would have tags to help you trace its place in numerous discourses (e.g. tags like contra-Bazin, early third wave feminism, postwar Japan, May 68, queer, libertarian), local university courses (e.g. Prof X recommends, good for PSY100), student opinion (e.g. boring, concise, weak methodology, outdated, heavy) etc. Currently, articles on HeinOnline allow users to make digital comments on articles; this would be similar, but with the additional power of organization and navigation.

It reminds me a little of wordpress’ post about the difference between categories and tags. Lorelle weighs in with a more detailed explanation and related links.

This post is meant to be a follow up to Michael Wesch’s video The Machine is Us/ing Us. I titled it “part 1″ because there’s probably more I’ll have to say about this in the future.

There is no such thing as pure content. The information highway is for billboards. I was trained in cinema studies and I was taught to never separate (film) form and content. While technically, as Wesch demonstrates, web content is more separated from form than in the past, the internet is still a medium, and digital information can’t escape the formal limitations still impinged upon it.

I’m reminded of a quote from Robert Bringhurst’s The Elements of Typographic Style:

We read the screen the way we read the sky: in quick sweeps… This makes it an attractive place for advertizing and dogmatizing, but not so good a place for thoughtful text… Intricate, long sentences full of unfamiliar words stand little chance… When reading takes this form, both sentences and letterforms retreat to blunt simplicity. (version 2.4, pages 193-194)

Admit it: when you see a long block of text online, you start to skim or skip over it. Every web designer knows this. Even this post is far too long for comfort. Why is it so hard to read online? Because digital information is not designed to be read, but scanned. (For more on usability and “billboard design”, I’d suggest Steve Krug’s Don’t Make Me Think.)

Web 2.0 is not just a communal effort at information management, it is the organization of digital information which tends, as Bringhurst points out, to pass over literate texts that are rhythmic, langourous, baroque, subtle and sensual. Instead, we shift our forms of information towards mixed media texts whose words are blunt, streamlined, simplified and snarky. And hopefully there will be pictures. I mean, isn’t a blog post that much better with pictures?

On a side note: texts that combined words and images, like comics, were once deemed less literate, for children. Are trends in digital information helping us get over this bias? Another side note: I think image macros and sites like ytmnd - intarweb spaces most users regard as the bane of the net - are also prime examples of “billboard design” and a trend towards fusing text and image. Now back to our regularly programmed post!

There’s a lot of pressure online to get your soundbite or pullquote in before your user clicks somewhere else. Certain things get sacrificed in the way. Including the full quotation from Bringhurst which I will put under the “cut” below:

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The library field has definitely seen a shift in the past couple of years from conservatism (or even outright fear and antagonism) regarding the internet and web 2.0 towards a new kind of excitement. Or at least, excitement along with the conservatism. Personal case in point - recently, I’ve been helping the chief librarian at the Japan Foundation Toronto Library learn about web 2.0 applications and now she’s thinking about generating rss feeds to promote the organization’s events and library acquisitions. While she was never afraid of the internet, I believe it never seemed relevant enough to warrant attention until 2.0 became such a catch phrase. It’s a really fascinating time to be in library studies…

This post is also something of an excuse to promote the JFTL because it is such a great resource and it’s open to the public free of charge, unlike other special libraries downtown. I really love the zen-like space and am constantly borrowing material while I’m working! In addition, the JFT also runs a free art gallery, and regularly hosts events, lectures and film screenings. There’s also a ton of resources for Japanese language students and teachers.