Wednesday 28 April 2010

Social Media, technology, education, and law News

This week there are so many interesting news articles on the topics of social media, technology, law, and education- and the intersections of all of the above. Here's a sampling.

ABA Journal: An Ohio judge who refused to step down from a serial murder case after a newspaper reported she may have posted anonymous Internet comments about the defendant and his lawyer was removed from the case by Acting Ohio Chief Justice Paul E. Pfeifer.

Chronicle of Higher Ed: Northern Arizona University is spending $75,000 to install an electronic system that tracks student class attendance by detecting student ID cards with an electronic sensor.

Chronicle of Higher Ed: The new internet trend Chatroulette, popular with college students, works on a simple principle: a screen with 3 boxes. One is your image, the second is a random other online person’s image (the randomness is what makes it Roulette), and the third is a box for typing messages and chatting. If either gets bored chatting they can click on a “Next” button to chat with a new random person and be 99-percent sure of never seeing each other again.

CNet: A woman in England appears in Google Streetview 43 times while she is out walking her dog.

ABA Journal: In a recent Florida felony gun case, the jurors admittedly were texting and making cell calls during deliberations and after the deliberations were over a prosecutor in the case posted a ditty about the trial on Facebook that can be sung to the tune of the theme song from Gilligan's Island.

Legal Blogwatch: Craigslist crimewave: Rapes, Fake 'Orgy Requested' Ads and robberies using Craigslist. For example, a Connecticut man, as part of a feud with a "soccer-mom" neighbor, targeted her with an explicit online posting (supposedly from her) that invited the Craigslist world to join her for an orgy.

MIT Technology Review: South Korea targets 2 million Internet addicts; the Culture Ministry announced a joint project with major South Korean gaming companies earlier this month to implement a "late-night shutdown" on Internet games popular among young users. Stories of internet addiction include a couple who let their 3-month-old starve while they raised a virtual child in an online game, spending most of their days at an Internet cafe instead of caring for their newborn and a 22-year-old who bludgeoned his mother to death for nagging him about playing Internet games and then played games online for hours, paying with his mother's credit card.

MIT Technology Review: Pope warns of Internet risks; says the Internet and the ongoing process of media convergence carry a risk of conformity of thought and control.

O'Reilly Radar: How the US military is using social media; Letters from the front have been replaced with Facebook updates.

ABA Journal: Juror in a reckless homicide case faces contempt of court charge for watching a YouTube video about the case before deliberations.

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