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July 22, 2004
A Social Networking Bill of Rights
Posted by Clay Shirky
Over at the Planetowrk Journal, Duncan Work has proposed
a social networking bill of rights, elaborating on these 5 principles:
1. The right to know who is collecting what and for what purposes;
2. The right to not participate;
3. The right to clear and, in some cases, irrevocable privacy policies;
4. The right to control access to personal information and attention;
5. The right to participate in a global social networking system without restrictive barriers.
It’s wrapped up in something that’s a bit too much of an ad for LinkedIn for my taste, but it’s an interesting start. #3, especially, will be interesting to see in practice, since the courts have usually allowed a wide degree of freedom for companies to unilaterally change their bargain with users, especially for businesses in bankruptcy, which triggers freedom from all manner of contractual obligations. Would be fun to write the contract that is designed to survive that sort of change of control for the data.
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1. Bill on July 23, 2004 1:07 PM writes...
I have a question. Social Security numbers now have the status of universal identifier. For some public and commercial services, such as the use of electric utilities, divulging your SS# is mandatory, although that was not the intent of the law that created social security.
My question is: isn't it likely that a peoplesDNS or other identity scheme will also become de facto mandatory and if you choose to "opt-out" you won't have access to certain life-supporting services?
Permalink to Comment2. Ken Jordan on July 23, 2004 2:28 PM writes...
Re: Bill's comment, there's another article on Planetwork Journal that addresses this question: "The Social Web: Creating An Open Social Network with XDI" - the author's propose an open standard for persistent identity that also allows for anonymity and personal control of private information. The protocols, called XDI and XRI, are now going through OASIS, in fact. For more, go to: http://journal.planetwork.net/article.php?lab=reed0704
Permalink to Comment3. Stephen Downes on July 23, 2004 4:41 PM writes...
A good initiative. I would like to add that I offered a similar document five years ago, and feel that it captures the same spirit.
The Cyberspace Charter of Rights
http://www.downes.ca/cgi-bin/website/view.cgi?dbs=Article&key=964803517
also at
http://www.newstrolls.com/news/dev/downes/column072299.htm
There are some specific differences between the two documents that we could discuss; in the meantime I am recommending the Charter of Rights as the document that should be adopted for this purpose.
Permalink to Comment4. bill on July 23, 2004 4:56 PM writes...
Rather than protecting the privacy of data in the system, I meant what if you aren't in the system and don;t want to be.
For instance, I have never had a credit card because my income is too low. Because I've never had a credit card, I don't have a credit history either and am not database's like TRW.
So, when a bank or a prospective landlord runs a credit check on me, they get nothing - and they send me packing.
Could there be a similar effect with universal ID schemes? That people not "in the system" who have accredited no form of "reputation" are excluded from essential services that will someday be linked up with this ID scheme?
Permalink to Comment5. bill on July 23, 2004 5:09 PM writes...
Also, what about third parties who want to map social networks via FOAF or some other distributed ID scheme, for instance:
1. An anti-semitic group that wants to map social networks of Jews by crawling user profiles; or
Permalink to Comment2. Groups that compile data on third parties, such as convicted felons, and make that data available through the network.
6. Duncan Work on July 28, 2004 11:44 PM writes...
Clay, thanks for commenting on the article.
Regarding my bias for LinkedIn. True. But I can say that I carefully chose LinkedIn, in advance of approaching them, as the best company to join forces with, and I still think I made the right choice. In the future, though, I’ll tone it down some.
About the irrevocability of social networking user (and non-user) rights, as you say it requires a legal contract, and thus more than a lofty ideal.
I hope to see social networking systems evolving into recognized ‘trust exchanges’. In a bank, or financial exchange, a customer deposits money and the bank has clear obligations to the customer. In social networking systems, customers deposit their social capital, in exchange for guarantees on how the system will operate.
Bank customers would never deposit funds into a bank whose terms read “We reserve the right to change these terms at our own discretion at any time.” Perhaps at present few users of social networking systems regard their ‘deposits’ near so seriously. And yet, if social networking systems become as important as I think they can be, their customers will wise up. As I pointed out in the paper, exchanging social capital has powerful benefits and applications, and at the same time it also raises the stakes re need for trust in the system.
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