The keynote speakers this year are Robert W. McChesney and Emily Bell, formerly of the Guardian and now Director of the Tow Centre for Digital Journalism at the Columbia School of Journalism.

The research to be presented at the conference ranges from studies on Twitter to Wikileaks, from foreign news to the business of news.

The abstracts for the papers are online, but the papers themselves are only available to attendees.

I am fortunate to be presenting two papers.

“Tweets and Truth: Journalism as a Discipline of Collaborative Verification” looks at how Twitter is affecting the journalistic practice of verification.

The second, “Your Friend as Editor: The Shift to the Personalized Social News Stream”, presents a study into how social networks are becoming a significant source of news for Canadians.

I’ll be posting the presentation slides later in the week and plan to blog from the conference.

During the last federal vote in May, Elections Canada warned people against tweeting or sharing on Facebook the results from polls in the east of the country, before voting had ended in the west.

A 70-year-old law prohibits the premature transmission of election results.  The idea was to prevent radio broadcasts of results in Eastern Canada from influencing voters on the other side of the country.

At the time of the last vote, Elections Canada said the law applies to social media as much as it does to print, broadcast and online.

However, in its official report (PDF) on the May 2 election, Elections Canada has acknowledged that a 1930s law is ill-suited to an age of always-on, networked digital communications.

The expansion of Web-based communications technology – particularly social media such as YouTube, Facebook and Twitter – is transforming communications both outside and during elections. In this rapidly evolving context, the relevance of the existing legal framework must be reconsidered.

In the report, Elections Canada says it has no information to suggest that there was widespread disregard for the ban on the premature public transmission of results.

However, at the time there were messages on circulating making oblique references to the results, in some cases using a fruit analogy for the different parties.

Elections Canada concludes:

The growing use of social media puts in question not only the practical enforceability of the rule, but also its very intelligibility and usefulness in a world where the distinction between private communication and public transmission is quickly eroding.The time has come for Parliament to consider revoking the current rule.

A few weeks ahead of the federal vote, CBC and CTV tried to mount a legal challenge to the results ban.

Elections Canada noted that the broadcasters argued that “the culture of communications in Canada has been significantly transformed as a result of recent technological and cultural changes,”  and that “accordingly, the public now expects to receive news immediately and to participate in its dissemination”.

Ontario’s Superior Court of Justice ruled that the case was too complex to rush through the system.

In good news for the broadcasters, the case is due to be heard in March 2012.

Given the legal challenge and the official comments by Elections Canada, the 1938 law might not be around by the time Canadians vote for a new government.

Our study, Social Networks Transforming How Canadians Get the News (PDF), found that 71 per cent of Canadians who use social networks - more than 10 million people - value them as a way of keeping up with the news.

But we also found that only 25 per cent of all Canadians online regard social networks as a reliable news source.

The discrepancy is explained by the sample size.  We asked all participants what they thought about the reliability of social media as a source for news, so this included people who use social media and those who don’t.

In our sample, we found that just under 60 per cent use social media on a regular basis.

That leaves 40 per cent of Canadians who don’t use social media. It is understandable that these people may be more sceptical about turning to social networks for news, as they are not part of that media ecosystem.

Our figures suggest that those engaged with social media value the idea of social recommendation to help them keep up with the news.

Our study found that 43 per cent of social media users some of their news every day via media and links shared by friends and family on sites like Facebook. This amounts to 6.5m Canadians who use social media on a daily basis to get the news.

Almost two-thirds of these people say their social networks mean they are exposed to more news and information than if they solely relied on the choices made by professional journalists.

Clearly there is much to unpack in the study. Overall, it highlights how many people are turning to their circle of friends, family and acquaintances online to alert them to news of interest.

The Canadian Media Research Consortium report is based on an online survey of a representative national sample of 1,682 adults conducted by Angus Reid Public Opinion. The margin of error—which measures sampling variability—is +/- 2.5%, 19 times out of 20. The results were statistically weighted according to the most current Statistics Canada data on age, gender, region, and education to ensure a representative sample.

His wide-ranging presentation explores how online social networks tend to flatten real-life social ones.  

In real-life we have different groups of friends, from those from college to work to family. Most of the time, these groups are kept distinct from each other, and tend to mix at fixed social occasions, such as weddings.

In the words of Adams, “we all have very different relationships with the people in our life and designing for them is very different.”

But online social networks tend to lump everyone into one basket. This is usually when the tensions arise, such as a boss seeing an inappropriate message or that party photo intended just for your college mates.

Social networking sites collapse our backstage and frontstage identities.

In journalism, it means that reporters may gain access to information, photos or video that were not intended to be available to the public, but are publicly available.

The BBC acknowledged this ethical dilemma for journalists in its recently updated guidelines on the use of social media, urging staff to consider whether, for example, someone intended a photo to be available to a wider public.

Adams argues that we need to design social networks that acknowledge the multiple facets of our identity and the different nature of the relationships we have.

But since we talked about Twitter in journalism class this week, it seemed a apt time to share.

Enjoy “The Twit Network”.

In an op-ed for The Globe and Mail, I explore what privacy means in an age of Facebook and Twitter.

It was prompted by Monday’s Quit Facebook Day.

While I understand the reasons why users are upset with Facebook’s attitude to privacy, I argue that deleting your Facebook profile is merely a symbolic act.

By embracing the social web, and everything it has to offer, we have let go of our privacy.

In the op-ed, I argue that we should not simply blame Facebook for invading our privacy:

Facebook did not do this to us. We did it to ourselves. We have been redefining notions of privacy since we first posted vacation photos on Flickr, birthday videos on YouTube and lunch details on Twitter. We willingly surrendered our privacy.

Don’t get me wrong. I am a social media enthusiast. But we need to understand that we are entering into a bargain here. By sharing our lives online, we are giving up some of our privacy.

The Canadian Internet Project report, Canada Online! The Internet, Media and Emerging Technologies: Uses, Attitudes, Trends and International Comparisons (PDF), looked at Internet habits based on a 2007 survey of more than 3,100 Canadians.

It found that new media is not displacing traditional media, saying that online newspapers do not seem to be replacing printed versions.

As Charles Zamaria, the project’s principal investigator and a professor at Ryerson University explained:

Conventional wisdom would suggest that Internet use has increased at the expense of traditional media. But the amount of time spent attending to conventional media by Internet users and non-users is virtually identical. In general, we found that Internet users are not finding time to be online by taking away from their traditional media diet. In many ways, media activity just begets more media activity.

One of the reasons for this multi-tasking. The study found that 75% of Canadians are doing something else while online. It is particularly prevalent among the young, with 91% of 18-29 year-olds multitasking. Talking on the phone is the most popular activity while surfing the we, followed by listening to music or the ratio.

In the words of Fred Fletcher, co-investigator and professor emeritus at York University:

The Internet does not demand our attention in the same way television or other media do. Canadians seem to use the Internet casually or share time online with someone
physically beside them. So it is becoming more difficult to isolate and measure specific media use for individuals as Canadians. More and more, Canadians are using many media simultaneously.

The Internet is firmly entrenched in Canadian life, with 78 percent of the country connected, spending an average of 17 hours per week online. Moreover, Canadian net users are typically very experienced, having been online for an average of nine years.

The CIP study found that news continues, along with communication, to be among the most predominant uses of the net. It sheds some light on how Canadians get their news online:

• More than half use a search engine every day
• The three most popular home pages are Google, MSN and Yahoo
• 79% regularly go online to look for local, national or international news
• 78% feel offline printed newspapers are still a trusted source of news
• The youth spend less time than do older users reading traditional printed newspapers, but more frequently visit news sites online

CBC.ca emerged as the most popular Canadian news site, followed by CTV.ca and GlobeandMail.com. And surprisingly, the news sites favoured by young people were not significantly different from those preferred by adults.

Perhaps the most surprising finding was how social networks such as Facebook and Hi5 are transforming the online experience. 40% of Canadians have used a community or social networking site and almost a quarter do so at least weekly.

This is changing what people use the net for, particularly among young for whom going online is as much about exploring, socializing and experiencing new forms of interaction as it is about seeking or sending information.

As Professor Zamaria explains:

Our study demonstrates is that the Internet is becoming a destination or a place in itself, where many visit not only for information or to be entertained, but just to be there, and to be connected and share with others. Our finding hat almost three quarters of all Internet users surf online without a specific reason or destination,and more than half do so on a regular basis, supports our contention that the Internet, for many, as as much an experience, as it is a valuable source of information and entertainment.

This marks a significant evolution in online behaviour, with the Internet becoming part of our social and cultural fabric. The emergence of tools that allow us to connect and socialise are turning the Internet into a third place in cyberspace.

(Via Newslab.ca)

(Via Richard Brennan’s Newjiffy)

Lessons from Facebook: The Effect of Social Network Sites on College Students’ Social Capital (PDF), by Sebastian Valenzuela, Namsu Park, and Kerk F. Kee, graduate students at UT Austin, found that social media were good for connecting people and sharing information.

They found that Facebook was great for collective action but less useful as a forum for discussion and deliberation.

A survey of more than 2,600 college students in Texas showed that more than 80% were regular users of Facebook, but taking part in groups was not part of what they did on the site. The research found that people would join a group but only a handful ever engaged in the discussions.

Rather, Facebook offered a way of organising online and connecting for students.

Presenting the study, Sebastian Valenzuela said the research should help counter some of the negative media coverage of social networks.

He concluded that Facebook users were more connected, happy and engaged than they get credit for in the mainstream.

But, he added, online networks are not a panacea for democracy due to low activity in groups.

Her court-appointed attorney, Kelley Drye’s Don D. Buchwald, has attacked the media for invading his client’s privacy.

The press release (PDF) from the attorney says the alleged call girl was “thrust into the public glare at age 22 without her consent”.

He goes on to accuse some outlets of violating journalistic norms by using suggestive photos of Ashley for commercial gain. The release suggests that “certain of those photos were obtained in violation of Ms. Dupre’s privacy rights and federal copyright law”, adding that the use of these “may well constitute violations of federal copyright laws”.

The photos are everywhere, with some sites like Gawker boasting of “Kristen: The Definitive Gallery“.

According to some reports, the impetus for the press release was the photo spread in the New York Post, which had a half dozen images of Dupre in its print edition and 20 online. The pictures are credited in the paper to Wesley Mann at Contact Press Images.

Many of the images published by other news outlets came from MySpace. The AP distributed three of those images, including the one of her in a bikini, with a disclaimer authorising the use of the photos only with reports or commentary on the Spitzer scandal. Reuters also ran the photos, crediting MySpace.

Aside from the issue of whether it is ethical to take material from social networking sites, there is the question of copyright. According to MySpace terms and conditions, “this limited license does not grant MySpace the right to sell or otherwise distribute your Content outside of the MySpace Services”.

The BBC is introducing new rules that would restrict BBC journalists from using pictures from social media site without the permission of the copyright owner. In this case, is the AP the copyright holder, or is there a public interest argument for their publication?

Even though the photos are everywhere online, her attorney has warned that “as counsel for Ms Dupre we will take all steps that we deem necessary or appropriate to protect Ms Dupre from any unwarranted exploitation of her name, picture, voice, or likeness for purposes of profit”.

This seems to be a mammoth, and on the face of it, impossible task. A quick search on Google Image Search yields more than 5,000 photos.

The lawyers can’t expect to sue every blog that has republished the photos. But they could go after big media outlets that have resources and a reputation to protect.