Activity 8, Legal contexts and digital identities. 23/02/2016.

http://garethmcghie.weebly.com/blog
Identify an ethical dilemma in your own practice linked to digital or online access
or activity.
Below is the student code of conduct taken from the Weltec business policy
manual.
3.6 Information and Communication Technology
Students are responsible for ensuring that all activities on their individual network account
meet the standards of conduct appropriate to an educational institute. This includes but is
not limited to all WelTec students not using their account or any WelTec system or hardware,
nor allowing anyone else to use any account or system or hardware, to:
Copy, modify or install software without authority
Infringe copyright regulations or any intellectual property
Access, obtain, alter, add or erase data without proper authority
Use the WelTec ICT resources to incur cost to WelTec or anyone else, except where prior
express authority is obtained
Use social media (including but not limited to twitter, facebook and other internet functions
or sites) in a manner which brings or is likely to bring WelTec into disrepute.
Access, store, view, publish or distribute material which is objectionable, or offensive or
otherwise inappropriate in an educational institute.
The issue I would like to discuss here revolves around item 5 on this list
As I have noted previously issues arising around the use or misuse of social
media in our school are fairly uncommon. Ours is a tertiary institution and
therefore our student body is mostly made up of 18-24 year old adults. These
students for the most part have been immersed within the world of social media
for years so are more than aware of what acceptable behaviour is and what is
not. Most have come through high schools that have done an admirable job of
educating them in the ethical use of social media.
A couple of years ago however we did have one incident that pertains to item 5
on the list above. We had a second year visual arts student who was completing
some pop art inspired work. She chose to use photographic images of friends as
part of her artwork (without talking to her friends about her plan for the photos
first). The photos were of friends in social situations, some of them a little the
worse for wear with alcohol. These images were on existing Facebook pages. The
student had then digitally manipulated the photos into a pop art format in
homage to artist Andy Warhol. After completing the work she went ahead and
loaded these pop art images onto her own Facebook page. Parents of one of her
friends whose image she had used in one of her artworks were outraged and
approached Weltec threatening legal action when the student refused to take the
images down from her Facebook page.
In reality there were many things about the project and how the student chose to
execute it that were problematic. Legally speaking the student was within her
rights to use images that were already a part of the open digital domain, and had
furthermore digitally manipulated them to such a degree as to satisfy the criteria
for alteration of original material. the student certainly did not however comply
to many of the ethical injunctions that surround this kind of work, such as gaining
express permission of subjects prior to work for a start!

Eventually after wading through the ethical quagmire Weltec insisted the student
take down the images from her Facebook page after pointing to item 5 on the
student code of conduct listed above. The whole situation had eventually drawn
Weltec into disrepute.
The student complied and eventually the situation blew over with no further
action needing to be taken. For our school these sorts of situations are rare
thankfully but can become a bit messy when the lines between legal and ethical
obligations blur. Reverting to our business policy manual and its stance on such
things is our first port of call and usually highlights for us all the boundaries
within which we should operate.
Nga mihi nui
Gareth