CHRISTIAN FUCHS - ICT&S - UniversitÃ¤t Salzburg

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Christian Fuchs: Social Networking Sites and the Surveillance Society6. Integrated Social Networking Sites (ISNS): Research MethodSpecific research that has been conducted on ISNS include: appearance andattractiveness on Facebook (Tom Tong et al. 2008, Walther et al. 2008), business andpolicy implications of SNS and other “participatory Web and user-generated content“(OECD 2007), effects of MySpace and YouTube on election campaigns (Gueorguieva2008), factors that influence privacy settings (Lewis/Kaufman/Christiakis 2008),friendship (boyd 2006a), gender (Magnuson/Dundes 2008, Cohen/Shade 2008),implications for libraries (Charnigo/Barnett-Ellis 2007, Harris/Lessick 2007), languageuse (Carroll 2008, Herring et al. 2007), media theory (Beer 2006), medical education(Ferdig et al. 2008, McGee/Begg 2008, Thompson et al. 2008), music culture (Baym2007, Beer 2008a), pharmacy education (Cain 2008), place and identity(Goodings/Locke/Brown 2007), psychological distress (Baker/Moore 2008), researchethics (Moreno/Fost/Christakis 2008), self-esteem and sociability (Zywica/Danowski2008), SNS as virtual learning environments (Mitchell/Watstein 2007) and their role ineducation (Mazer/Murphy/Simonds 2007), studies of specific users such as AfricanAmericans (Byrne 2007) or the Korean site Cyworld (Kim and Yun 2007, Haddon andKim 2007), taste performance (Liu 2007), teenage life (boyd 2008b), the blurring ofpublicness and privatness (Lange 2007), the rise of marketing relationships on ISNS aschallenge for public relations (Meadows-Klues 2008), or work skills (Bernardo 2007).Corporate and state surveillance has thus far not been an issue in ISNS research. Mostspecific studies operate on the micro level of analysis and do not focus on the critiqueof coercive and repressive totalities, i.e. macro contexts. Therefore our study is differentfrom most other studies that have thus far been carried out because it focuses on howeconomic and political macro contexts shape ISNS and it critically analyzes andquestions these influences.We conducted an empirical case study on the relationship of surveillance society andISNS usage by students in Salzburg. The research was carried out from October toDecember 2008. The questionnaire was available for 50 days to the students. The basicresearch questions were:(1) What do students consider as the greatest opportunities of ISNS?(2) What do students consider as the greatest risks of ISNS?(3) How knowledgeable are students of the rise of a surveillance society?(4) How critical are students of the rise of a surveillance society?(5) How does the degree of knowledge about surveillance and the degree of criticalconsciousness on surveillance influence the usage of social networking sites?We constructed a questionnaire that consisted of 35 (single and multiple) choicequestions, 3 open-ended questions, and 5 interval-scaled questions. The questionnairewas implemented as an electronic survey with the help of the online tool SurveyMonkey. Our potential respondents were students in Salzburg. In order to reach them,we sent out invitations to participate with the help of the University of Salzburg’seLearning platform Blackboard, we asked local online platforms that are frequentlyused by students in Salzburg to post invitations to their platforms and to send outnewsletters (http://www.unihelp.cc, http://www.salzburg24.at, http://www.where2be.at,http://www.salzblog.at). We also posted invitations to all discussion groups on studiVZ,45
Christian Fuchs: Social Networking Sites and the Surveillance SocietyFacebook, and MySpace that have to do with students’ life in Salzburg. These were intotal 53 groups. We distributed flyers and hanged up posters at Salzburg’s threeuniversities: Paris Lodron University of Salzburg (Faculty of Humanities and SocialSciences, Faculty of Natural Sciences, Faculty of Law, Faculty of Theology), MozarteumSalzburg: The University of Music, Theatre and Visual Arts, Paracelsus MedicalUniversity. An invitation to participate in the survey was sent as part of a newsletter toall students at the University of Salzburg on November 18, 2008. As an incentive forparticipation, we gave away three Amazon vouchers (60€, 25€, 25€) among those whocompleted the survey.In order to answer the first two research questions, we asked the students what theyconsidered as the greatest advantages and risks of ISNS and if they have furthercomments on such platforms. This allows us to conduct a quantifying qualitativeanalysis of the answers given.The socio-demographic variables included: gender, age, status at university(undergraduate student, graduate student, doctoral student, etc), number of completedsemesters, faculty, income, urban/rural-origin, educational status of parents, classorigin, usage frequency of ISNS.Knowledge of surveillance society and policies was measured with the help of an index(surveillance knowledge index) that was calculated based on the answers given to threequestions that tested such knowledge. For each correct answer, one point was given sothat zero points indicated a low knowledge, one point a modest knowledge, two pointsa medium knowledge, and three points a good knowledge of surveillance.(17)Web platforms in Austria have to pass on personal data (name, email-address, etc) tothe police:O Yes, always if the police demands so (X)O No, neverO Only if the policy has a juridical order that was passed by a court and is handed overto the provider.(18)Platforms such as studiVZ, Facebook, or MySpace store data about me only as long as Ido not delete my account.O Yes, this is correct.O No, this is incorrect (X).(19)I can describe in one sentence exactly what the Data Retention Directive is:O YesO NoX…correct answerThe first question tests students’ knowledge of the Austrian Security Policy Act. Thesecond question tests knowledge about data storage. The third question assessesstudents’ knowledge of the European Data Retention Directive.How critical students are of surveillance, i.e. if they consider surveillance as an actual46
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CHRISTIAN FUCHS - ICT&S - UniversitÃ¤t Salzburg

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