rivka

It's time for me to take my annual "refresher course" in rights and protections for human research subjects. This is more or less something I can do in my sleep. Nothing changes about the Belmont Report or the informed consent requirement or the special federal protections afforded to prisoners from year to year.

But this year there was something new in the section on Internet research (emphasis mine):

One of the most controversial issues regarding Internet research involves the observation of online communications. There is currently no consensus in the research community about whether online communications in open forums constitute private or public behavior. Conclusions about whether they are public or private behavior will affect if and how the regulations are applied. If the behavior is public, then this research could be considered exempt. If, however, there is a "reasonable expectation of privacy" on the part of the subjects, then IRB review may be required.

Another issue in observing online communications is whether the individuals engaged in this communication are identifiable. Although the subjects' actual identities are not "readily accessible", for many individuals, their online identities are as important to them as their real identities. Again, whether the subjects are identifiable affects how the regulations are applied.

Researchers should consult their IRB for guidance on how these issues are applied at their institution.

I'm so glad they noticed both of these things.

I know the conventional wisdom is that you're an idiot if you think the things you say on the Internet are private. Yes, on the one hand, the public Internet is public. On the other hand, I think it is legitimate to say that in some Internet contexts, people are speaking to a particular assumed audience and may reasonably feel that their privacy is violated if the assumed audience is bent too far. No, I don't think that you have the right to rant about someone on your public blog or LJ and then complain if that person comes along and responds. But on the other hand, I think that, for example, people posting to a bereavement-focused message board expect that they are speaking to other bereaved people and would have reason to feel violated if a new poster later turned out to just be there collecting research data. It's complicated. Research guidelines acknowledging that it's complicated are an improvement.

And of course people's online identities are important. Given the number of public discussions of online activity that equate "accountability" with "using your legal name," it's good to see an acknowledgment that online identities are often stable, personally valuable, and backed up by history and reputation such that it would be damaging to discard them.

A guy in Norway is collecting giraffes. He's trying to get people to send him a million giraffe images by Jan 1, 2011. Which sounds ridiculous, right, except that he's been at it for about a year and has already collected 850,000. He might actually make it.

It's really neat to see the diversity of images people have sent in. A stunning and subtle watercolor painting is a few clicks away from a crude giraffe sculpture constructed from office supplies. I am particularly struck by this one, which may be the most artistic thing ever constructed from an old banana peel. I love this adorable knitted one too. But there are quilted giraffes and giraffes made from guitars and giraffes made from sports equipment and mosaic giraffes and scultped giraffes and edible giraffes and drawing after drawing, from people all over the world. I love the internet.

The statistics page is also kind of fun to look at. Why so many giraffes from Lithuania? What on earth happened the day he got 30,000 giraffes?

Alex and I made contributions yesterday. (Hers, mine.) I encourage you to consider helping him out as well. The only rule is that the giraffes must be hand-created, not computer generated, mass produced, or living and photographed.

If you've been online for more than five years? You've really got to check out today's XKCD.

Via AckB, a little something to lift your spirits this morning.


Where the Hell is Matt? (2008) from Matthew Harding on Vimeo.

I tried to log in to my account this evening because I'm in the middle of an auction. I went to www.ebay.com, which had the typical "Hello rivkawald!" message on it. I clicked "sign in." My username was prepopulated in the right field. I entered my password. And was directed to what seems to be a phishing page.

"We have noticed an increasing fraudulent activity recently. In order to provide your security and protect you from fraudsters we have introduced a new system of identification that will help us to avoid any kind of fraud or unauthorised access.

Please enter as more information as possible to provide your complete identification and to activate all the features of the new system."

The page then proceeded to ask for my full name, date of birth, mother's maiden name, social security number, credit card number & security code, ATM PIN, bank account number, and routing number.

No, really. And there wasn't any way to get past it.

(Screencaps are here and here.)

I went back to www.ebay.com and tried to log in again. Same thing again. I tried their "live help" chat and got routed to "account security live help," where I waited and waited and WAITED to no avail. "Thank you for your patience. Please hold for the next available Live Help Agent." And hold. And hold.

Finally I got through to a live agent. She had me clear my cache and cookies. I cleared everything out and then was able to get a regular login page when I went to ebay.com. I immediately changed my password, obviously.

But what the hell? I typed in the address to the eBay main page myself. I didn't follow a link in an e-mail. How could this happen? I am running AdAware and a full virus scan, but... yikes. This scares the hell out of me. I thought only stupidcredulous people were victims of phishing scams.

83

My score seemed impressive to me until they presented me with a list of the 187 countries I "forgot," which in many cases (e.g., Navassa Island, French Southern and Antarctic Lands) I had never even heard of.

Phrases I never imagined myself typing:

Check out this totally cool Periodic Table of the Elements.

Edited to add: And then check out this totally cool Periodic Table. Which is an actual, you know, table. The elements lift up so that samples can be stored underneath. For example: #92, uranium.

At playgroup this morning, Suzanne asked how Michael and I had met. I told her, and mentioned that it was ten years ago this month. So this evening, as I was casually surfing around, I decided that I should really try to figure out exactly when, ten years ago, we met.

Whoa! It was ten years ago TODAY.

Ten years ago today, I walked into a Nashville hotel room full of total strangers and met the man I would one day marry. Although we'd known each other in passing online, at that point we had no idea that we were, you know, destined for each other. As I recall, the first words he said directly to me were: "Bait? Y'all are going to eat bait?!"

It was the first ever alt.callahans Callahanicon. I'd only even been reading the newsgroup for about six months, and had never been to a convention of any kind. I don't even know what made me decide to hop on a plane from Iowa City to Nashville - it seems completely out-of-character for the person I was at the time. But I did it. And my life changed forever. Not just because I met Michael - I also met saoba that weekend, who became one of my dearest friends, performed our wedding, and helped ease Alex into the world. I met pixel, who, as I recall, jumped into my lap about five minutes after we met, and then fell off the bed. I talked to wcg for the first time, when he called in by phone. In a lot of ways, for the first time that weekend I felt like I had found my people. Geeky congoers who conducted their social life, and deep parts of their emotional life, over the Internet. It was the beginning of a whole lot of changes, for me.

Most of all, Michael. It really was almost as cliche as "our eyes met across a crowded room." For reasons that I couldn't articulate, I just felt incredibly drawn to him. We kept making casual excuses to sit near each other and talk to each other. By the time that this picture was taken on Saturday night, we were both already falling hard. A couple of hours after dinner, we kissed for the first time.

That's probably a good place to fade tastefully to black, huh?

Michael, I love you. Almost from the first day we met, I've felt such peace with you - such a sure and certain knowledge that, no matter what happened, we were always going to be on the same side. You are my rock and my refuge. Happy anniversary.

---

Oddly enough, even before we knew that tomorrow was our ten-year anniversary (if one dates from the first kiss), we had arranged to hire a babysitter so we could go on a date. Funny how these things work out. Not the most romantic of dates in the world - we're going to go shopping and see Ratatouille - but still, anything with a babysitter involved is kind of a big deal. Yay.

New Year's Eve has never been a big holiday for us; we spent this one sedately at home. We fed Alex early, and then had a special dinner for the two of us: beef tenderloin, steamed asparagus with lemon butter, asiago cheese bread, wine. Unfortunately, both Michael and I are feeling ill. He's coming down with some sort of cold, and I'm suffering from major fatigue and dizziness - I guess from the ear infection.

I do have New Year's resolutions this year, for the first time in a very great while.

1. Stop neglecting my health. Concretely: go to the dentist, get an annual GYN exam, and start paying more attention to getting vitamins into my diet. It would be an added bonus if I could possibly not walk around with a sinus infection for three weeks instead of getting medical attention promptly.

2. Don't sit down at the computer without either a planned list of things to do, or a time that I intend to get off. Because my surfing is getting out of hand - and it's not even good-quality social interaction, as those of you who have complained about my lack of LJ commenting can attest. It's just mindless compulsive reading that I often don't even enjoy.

3. Deal with one piece of household clutter every day.

therealjae happened upon the website of a pastor who is so right-wing-fundamentalist-wacko that he apparently spends most of his time railing against other right-wing-fundamentalist wackos for not being rigid enough. Nothing unusual there, unfortunately...

...except that the guy's name? His real name? Is Darwin Fish.

Seriously.

("Yes, Darwin Fish is my real name. It is the name my parents gave me when I was born in 1961. At the time, to my knowledge, there was no "DarwinFish" symbol made up at that time. My father's last name is "Fish," and my mother liked the name Darwin. So, this is my name. Some have suggested that I should change it, but I don't believe that would be honoring my father and mother (Exodus 20:12).

I have not openly cursed the day I was born as Jeremiah did (Jeremiah 20:14-18), but perhaps I have in my heart...")

therealjae was just delighted by the absurdity, of course, and of course so am I. Which led to the following IM conversation: ( Read more... )