Policy must reflect constantly changing issues
December 13, 2009 by Opinions · Leave a Comment
I love the Internet, to the point where people have questioned whether I am addicted and need a 12-step program. However, as a student journalist and someone generally interested in everything, it comes in handy for developing story ideas, researching topics and keeping informed, but with anything, the Internet has its downfalls.
YouTube, the master of user-generated content, is a great place for odd news, niche events and inside access to events. It may seem crazy, but a lot of the best sources for stories come from users who immediately post their content online for others to enjoy, unless it’s celebrity news, which ends up being bought by TMZ.
Twitter is not only extremely useful for its trending topics, but also the ease at which news can be distributed. I can follow any news organization with a Twitter account from our own Kentucky Kernel accounts for news, sports and opinions, to the Washington Post or the New York Times. Even the national debt has a Twitter account, which updates regularly just how much we are behind on our collective bills.
When people say, “Twitter is stupid,†“I hate it,†or “I don’t get it,†I go into a long monologue about how wonderful and life-altering it can be, if you think of it as more than mere status updates. Sure there are people who need to be banned from “twitversations,†but overall it’s very useful.
Facebook is easily my favorite place on the Internet, because it allows me to keep up with people with the ease of a few clicks. I friend people I haven’t seen in years, or make sure my journalism doesn’t suffer without much effort. Just this semester, I have had to use Facebook to expedite contact with writers and to provide emergency mug shots several times.
Because of this, I am one of the people that hates privacy settings on Facebook and other sources of information like the online white pages or the UK directory.
Unfortunately, not everyone uses the accessible information to reconnect with old friends, to try to manage a content for a college daily paper or to contact a potential source quickly.
Admittedly, I have to sometimes pry a little to make sure my job gets done, but at no point do I feel like I am crossing the line into someone’s privacy that won’t be understood after contact is made. And then there’s the story of then-freshman Kirsten Lovas which is the perfect example of why such privacy has to be granted and policing the Internet is a necessity.
According to Dec. 11 Kernel article, Lovas, now a nursing senior, had that line crossed in a major way as she was stalked by someone who found her information on the UK Web site’s directory.
The policy UK follows is the 1974 Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act, which is a federal law that tries to protect privacy of personal information within student education records.
FERPA states that schools can give a student’s name, address, phone number, date and place of birth, honors and awards and dates of attendance, according to the U.S. Department of Education Web site. UK is required under FERPA to tell students about records and accessibility which is in the Student Code of Conduct.
As a society, we have become more privacy-oriented and tend to keep to ourselves a lot more than we did 35 years ago, and with the ease of access the Internet provides, the problem only continues growing.
I personally don’t mind having my information accessible, but not everyone is like that, and not everyone knows how just how easy it is to obtain information.
To put things into perspective, the three Web sites I mentioned all have clearly defined policies that are constantly being updated as new issues arise. Facebook as recently as last week updated its policy. I have had warnings about the changes for weeks, and still get notifications when I log on. Meanwhile, FERPA has been in place for 35 years and is largely unknown to most students.
Yes, they have made updates and yes there are measures in place to ensure that students are protected, but is it too difficult to adopt the same measures as the social networking sites that are so popular these days?
These sites have many more issues to deal with beyond protecting the privacy of students and they seem to do a much better job at protecting their users. I’d hate to see Facebook’s policy makers outdo our government’s.
Wesley Robinson is a Spanish senior. E-mail wrobinson@kykernel.com.
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