Essay

Courtney Love
S2676870
New Communication Technologies
Tute: Thursday 9-11 am Chris. M.

Age Verification within Virtual Worlds and Online Predators

Second Life is the online community that has revolutionized the concept of ‘virtual worlds’. The following essay will explore the growing phenomenon of Second Life and the associated risks that accompany this new online territory. As with any new form of media, issues unique to these technological products arise that society may not have encountered before; such as the instance of Second Life. Online communities face a variety of problems similar to those of real life, however the added component of the internet can make these issues hard to address. In particular these issues include ‘in world’ or online age verification and child protection from internet predators. These themes will be explored through the example of the ‘Wonderland Scandal’ that broke in 2007.

Since the launch of Second Life in 2003, the websites number of users has grown from a modest 1000 to a reported 2 million members (2007). The virtual world allows users to participate in a vast range of experiences mimicking real life in the form of a customised avatar. Users are able to interact with each other via typed instant messages and are also capable of stimulating sexual activities with each other and even creating business ventures capable of producing genuine revenue. In this forum, everyday people can take on any form they please whether it is to escape the reality of day to day life or simply indulge in a unique past time. Whatever the case may be, it is clear that this online community has opened the doors to a new form of what we consider ‘society’ to be. Users of the program will attend to the fact that the behaviours and practices within Second Life do differ to those in the real world and this is largely due to the issue of anonymity. As users have no responsibility to divulge their true identity or agenda within Second Life, the issue of masking identities requires attention to ensure the online world remains a safe environment for its users.

Recently, the issue of masking identities within the online world was brought to the attention of the public after Sky News reported the story of a community within Second Life, called Wonderland (2006), where potential pedophiles were engaging in inappropriate behavior. The story was dubbed ‘The Wonderland Scandal’ and quickly spread throughout various media outlets. It was reported that within this sub-world, users were embodying child-like avatars and stimulating sexual acts with adult avatars. Situations such as this are a good example of the unique issues that online mediums encounter. It can easily be argued that as Second Life is a virtual world where everything is stimulated, people engaging in ‘sex’ with other users in the form of child avatars is not a punishable offence, especially as the laws applicable to online scenarios are not defined as clearly as those applying to real life situations.

Although these activities are not illegal, professionals are concerned that potential predators could use this type of stimulant to act out particular fantasies. In response to the Wonderland scandal, Jim Gamble, the head of the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre (CEOP) commented on the issue, “My concern is when that person steps out of the fantasy world; they actually bring that fantasy with them into the real world and will ultimately seek to act that out" (2007).

Second Life also attempts to address the issue of age verification by requiring all users to be over the age of 18 to protect those below this age from the adult content heavily featured ‘within world’. While Linden Lab, the creators behind Second life, have also created a similar world named Teen Second Life that is aimed towards those aged between 13-17 (Carr & Pond, 2007, p.97) who are still interested in a Second Life experience, it is not unreasonable to expect curious youths from attempting to join the adult world. Although Second Life clearly depicts that users be of a certain age, it is only enforced by a date of birth field in the initial sigh up which can be easily fabricated by curious children. As a result of the scandal being made public, efforts have been made on Second Life’s behalf to increase security in regards to age verification within the world. In an attempt to protect children, ‘in world’ users now have the ability to flag any explicit material on a voluntary basis by using a program specifically developed to verify user identity. These kinds of advancements strongly show the effects moral panic within the media has and the following results that often occur.

Second Life and other similar online communities need to be considered as new forms of society opposed to being thought of as simply video games with no effect or consequence on reality. Due to this, laws applicable to online situations and occurrences in particular, need to be developed and enforced as the medium evolves. Currently legislation over the creation of indecent images does not apply to online or virtual environments as computer generated images are not included specifically within The Sexual Offences Act. A spokeswoman for The Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre refers to these kinds of images as a ‘grey area’ within legislation (2007).

An obvious, but often overlooked aspect of virtual realities lies within the members of these unique societies,

‘There are real human beings behind each avatar in Second Life. You and they have real emotions’ (White, Brian A. 2007, p.94).

This important statement exemplifies why ‘in-world’ protection in regards to age verification and child protection is necessary. Despite being a ‘virtual’ world based within the realms of the internet, these communities are structured around real people and this directly impacts real world societies.

As with any new medium such as video games or virtual worlds, continual research and theories result as the discourse within the medium evolves. New Communication Medias continue to grow at a rapid rate not only in popularity but in expanding their own set of connotations and cultural values. These kinds of virtual societies need to be considered more than a computer game or pastime as they deal with real emotions and life issues. The worlds are created and generated by users with the desire to fulfill missing aspects of their lives in reality by creating a society designed to side step real life’s issues. Virtual worlds like Second Life exemplify these beliefs through their content and evolving social practices, including the downfalls of society such as online predators.


References:

1. Carr, Paul & Pond, Graham (2007) The unofficial Tourists Guide to Second Life, Boxtree London.

2. White, Brian A (2007) Second Life: A guide to your Virtual Worlds, Que Publishing, USA.

3. Leyden, John (2007) Policy Aim to Stamp Out child abuse, http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/11/01/sickos_in_sadville/ (accessed: 1/5/2008)

4. CTV.ca News Staff (2007) Virtual pedophilia in Second Life causes concern, http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20071104/second_life_071104/20071104/ (accessed 14/05/2008).

5. Pedophile playground discovered in ‘Second life’ virtual world (2007) http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,306937,00.html (accessed 14/05/2008).

6. Reuters, Eric (2007) UK to investigate pedophilia in virtual worlds, http://secondlife.reuters.com/stories/2007/10/30/uk-to-investigate-pedophilia-in-virtual-worlds/ (accessed 28/04/2008)

7. Boleto, Ricky (2008) Return to the dark side of Second Life, http://news.five.tv/news.php?news=176 (accessed 28/04/2008).

8. Harvard Law Review, vol.112, No.7 (1999) Developments in the Law: The Law of Cyberspace, The Harvard Law Review Association, USA.

9. Lynch, Mona (2002) Pedophiles and Cyber-Predators as Contaminating Forces: The Language of Disgust, Pollution, and Boundary Invasions in Federal Debates on Sex Offender Legislation, Blackwell Publishing New York.

Blog 6

Hello!

OK ill get straight into it, Tutorial Task this week was to play around with Microsoft Word and Excel.

The exercises for word were pretty basic; I have done Computers all through high school so am pretty well versed in the ways of Word. The exercises for Excel has me a little confused, i have always struggled with Excel as I’ve never needed to use it regularly so it was a great refresher and was fun to play around with. I think that these kinds of exercises are great because it is always helpful to know the programs well.

Onto the lecture.....

This week Adam ran the lecture and it was all about Video Games.
Video Studies:
-Arcade games
-Consoles
-Computer Games
-MUDs
-MMOGs
My knowledge of video games is pretty basic because I have never been majorly into them but the lecture opened up a lot about them, especially in terms of different academic and theoretical considerations.

Some of the Theoretical ideas we covered included:

-Media Effects
-The Persistence of Effect
-Games and Utopia
-Thinking of video games as a new form of cultural practice, in the same way we know think about old media such as newspapers, radio, TV and films.
-Are there questions surrounding video game culture that don’t apply to any other form?

We also covered the perspectives of Ludology and Narratology, two terms that I had never heard until this class.

Narratology> ‘story’ based.
Is the study of video games from the perspectives of them being stories or literary works. Think that games can be studied in the same way as ‘texts’ >> similar to the study of books, films, art and music.

Ludology> ‘Fun and play’.
Not concerned with the story elements but rather with Game Play elements. People who have written work that is considered as Ludology tend to follow the idea that the story element of video games is only for decoration.

Basically what I took away from the lecture was the Video Games have evolved as more than just entertainment in the same way that films and other media did and now has developed a set of cultural discourses unique to it that will continue to expand and be studied.

That’s it! I’m done!

Blog 5

Evaluating Wikipedia

So the task is to pick two subjects that I’m an expert on and verify their accuracy and to consider the following:
Is this an accurate article? * Does it cover all the basic facts that you'd need to understand this topic?* Does this article follow the Wikipedia guidelines for useful articles?* Is this article fair and balanced, or is it biased towards a particular side or argument?*What changes would you make to this article to improve it and make it useful for the wider Wikipedia community?

Any way I chose just Jeans and Splendour in the Grass.

Just Jeans/Just group:
The page actually way smaller than I thought it would be, it did cover the basics of the company and it was accurate but there probably could have been way more info in there because it’s a pretty interesting company in terms of expansion.
The article wasn’t at all biased; pretty much achieved that by mentioning criticism of the company.
I would have put in more because there is a lot of history with the company and it is pretty impressive for an Australian company that now dominates the market users would find it useful if they needed it.

Splendour in the grass:
This page is way better than the Just Jeans one. It has decent amount of information on there about the history of the festival, where it is and the vibe of the festival. It also has a detailed section on ticket scalping and how the organisers changed the system and were the driving force behind new legislation laws. Also on there is a detailed list of each year’s line up with nearly all the bands names being hyperlinked to their page which is helpful. From what I know all the information was pretty accurate and the article was well written. I wouldn’t say there was a lot more that could have been added as it covered a lot.

Birth of the computer
So, in our 6 week lecture we looked at the history and evolution of the computer and subsequently the internet. This is an extremely short and recapped account of the history that’s missing a lot of info but you get the idea.

Originally the first form of a computer was created in 1936 by Allen Turing and it was used to crack Nazi cribs, which the code changed for daily. The idea was that they would eliminate the wrong answers and be left with the correct.

Commercial commuters didn’t surface until the 1950’s when IBM created them for military and government work. These remained expensive, large and generally unattainable for the average person until the invention of the PC in 1975.

Apple:

Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak were the founders of the computer company Apple, focusing on evolving the PC they created and released the Apple I, it was basic with no keyboards or features we use today but it was a start. After deciding their best option was to create a PC that was user friendly for consumers who were interested in the software aspect rather than the hardware side of things.

This led to the release of the Apple II and eventually the purchase of VisiCalc, which led to the business world sitting up and taking notice as a PC was now an asset not just a toy.

IBM:

While all this was going on IMB realise they were missing on the PC action and made plans to enter the market. The used the concept of ‘open architecture’ where they would acquire the products needed from other companies and assemble them themselves. Leaving only the software to be worked out. Enter Microsoft owner Bill Gates. Together they acquired the software to get them up and running but eventually Windows was created and together IMB and Microsoft were dominating the market.

We also looked at the Internet and the Web, two very different things. The Internet is a network made up of other networks that are linked via phone lines, or more recently via broadband cable.

The web is a use of the Internet that evolved allowing users to communicate via email ECT and use search engines that were emerging such as geocities in a HTML format. I.e. the word processing style people were familiar with.

That’s about it really, cya!

Blog 4

Hello hello! Welcome again to blog 4!
As usual I’ll be discussing the lecture, which this week was titled ‘Why I hate Wikipedia’, as well as the tutorial and the tutorial task.
Wikipedia is an online user generated information website that gives users access to an endless amount of information articles. The information provided on Wikipedia can be uploaded and edited by anybody who chooses to do so, resulting in information that can be truthful and well sourced or fictitious.

The site has been designed to allow anybody with knowledge on the topic to create or edit a page and add to the information, regardless of fact. This information could have been written and edited by someone that might be considered a credited source but Wikipedia makes no promises that it was. Because of that it has been repeatedly hammered into my brain by all of my teachers: Wikipedia is not to be used as a reference.

So then how do we know the truth? Well there are 4 theories that can be used; The Correspondence, The Coherence, The Performative and The Source Theory.
We also had a look at a couple of other websites that are considered reliable sources, Factiva and Informit.
The tute task this week was a few questions so I’ll tackle them first then get to my essay topic?

-How do the ideas from Walter Benjamin's "Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction" apply to contemporary digital media?
Walter Benjamin says that mass production lets everyone view digital media and not just ones selected. Quality is applied to digital media rather than just quantity.

-There was a time when "Art" was made by artists who were skilled professionals. Now that anyone with a computer can create things digitally (music, images, videos, etc), what does that mean for "art"?
I think it is good thing for art. Art is continually evolving and exposing itself in new ways and with the evolvement of digital art there are more facets to ‘art’ then ever. To say that ‘anyone with a computer’ can create things implies that all those who never had a computer were particularly skilled or gifted and if you look at it that defiantly isn’t the case. There are those that will disagree with me, but, art is about many things and being skilled isn’t a necessity.

-Is a photoshopped image "authentic"?
I think it is tempting to say that no a photoshopped image isn’t authentic but it really depends on what is done to the image. Altering an image by say airbrushing it probably wouldn’t be considered as authentic but at the same time if you use Photoshop to combine or alter an image than you create an original and therefore authentic image or piece of art. Others might disagree but I’m a big fan of Photoshop and that’s how I see it.

-Do digital "things" have an "aura" (in Benjamin's terms)?
The “aura” refers to people’s sense of awe they have to these productions. These digital Medias provoke feelings and opinions, and so are considered to have an aura.

Now since this has gotten a bit long I’ll just brush over my essay topic. I’ve changed it from semiotics (way to broad) and now I’m looking at Second Life. I did some research and found that there had been an incident referred to as the ‘Wonderland Scandal’ where users were creating avatars that looked like children and engaging them in ‘sex’ with adult avatars. The media caught wind of this and Second Life again got some bad publicity but I found it really interesting. So, I’ll be looking at policing within world> whether this behaviour is illegal or just immoral> whether there is any real protection for children on the site> if this is even an issue because it’s all fake.

The exact angle hasn’t been decided but with some brainstorming I’ll get there, cya!

Week 4 is well underway as I’m sure you all no by now and there’s plenty to do so I will just jump right in.

I’ll begin with Wednesdays lecture because there was quite a lot covered in it that I didn’t really know anything about so I’ll use this as a chance to hammer it into my brain. The topic was Old Communications Technologies so naturally we began at the oldest form of communications: rock art. Or you can call them cave drawings or whatever term you want use, these are the first ways that we began to communicate via images, letterings and symbols. As this developed through time, dance, music and more elaborate symbols were used in tribes. Keep in mind that they weren’t communicating to remind that ‘we need milk’, these practises were deeply rooted in faith and religion and represented mythological beliefs. From here we went on to look at the development of the alphabet through hieroglyphics and the Ugarit culture.

Fast forward to the 15th centaury where the development of the printing press is introduced via the first form of newspaper, the Gutenberg Press, which first printed passages from the bible. Through time communications developed to more familiar forms such and the telegraph, radio, telephone and television.

Also touched on was the topic of semiotics, which I vaguely remember being interested in high school English and Media. As a refresher I read through the ‘semiotics for beginners’ link that was provided on the lecture notes and I think after a bit more investigation it might prove to be the topic or theme of my essay. Theres no basic definition for the term semiotics, it is known as the study of signs and had a lot to do with representation.
The reading for this week, and the last couple of weeks has been the Walter Benjamin, The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction paper. I followed the advice and read it quickly and didn’t understand the bulk of it, then went back into it with some more depth and I have to say I haven’t really wrapped my head around it. Still, the discussion we had in the lecture about Benjamin’s’ work and life did shed some light on it. While on the subject of Benjamin we discussed some other major theorists and their ideas including the Frankfurt School, Habermas, and Louis Althusser who were all from different times.
The tute task this week was to answer 10 posted questions without using Wikipedia or Google search engine. So, assuming I could still use other search engines I went to the faithful butler at Ask.com. Here are the questions and answers as well as the links I found through Ask.com.
1.Who was the creator of the infamous "lovebug" computer virus?
-Onel de Guzman, 24, a computer school student
http://archives.cnn.com/2000/TECH/computing/06/29/philippines.lovebug.02/index.html
2. Who invented the paper clip?
-William D. Middlebrook, he was not first to have the idea however he was first to patent the paper clip and created the macheine that made the paperclips.
http://www.ideafinder.com/history/inventions/paperclip.htm
3. How did the Ebola virus get its name?
- virus gets its name from a river in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where it was first recognized.
http://www.ccds.charlotte.nc.us/History/Africa/04/burton/burton.htm
4. What country had the largest recorded earthquake?
-1960 Chile
http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0763403.html
5. In computer memory/storage terms, how many kilobytes in a terabyte?
- 1 terabyte = 1 073 741 824 kilobytes
www.t1shopper.com/tools/calculate/ - 43k
6. Who is the creator of email?
Commercial Email. In 1988, Vinton Cerf arranged for the connection of MCI Mail to the NSFNET through the Corporation for the National Research Initiative (CNRI) for "experimental use", providing the first sanctioned commercial use of the Internet. Shortly thereafter, in 1989, the Compuserve mail system also connected to the NSFNET, through the Ohio State University network.
www.livinginternet.com/e/ei.htm
7. What is the storm worm, and how many computers are infected by it?
A computer visus that began attacking windows computers in jan 2007, usually with the attatchment names ‘230 dead as storm batters europe’. It effected thousands of computers.
http://www.snopes.com/computer/virus/valentine.asp
8. If you wanted to contact the prime minister of australia directly, what is the most efficient way?
To contact the Prime Minister it must be done through the Australian Government website.
http://www.australia.gov.au/
9. Which Brisbane-based punk band is Stephen Stockwell (Head of the School of Arts) a member of?
Black Assassins.
No Source, heard him say it in the lecture yesterday, but it can also be found at http://www.griffith.edu.au/school/art/staff/stockwell.htm.
10. What does the term "Web 2.0" mean in your own words?
Web 2.0 is a term used to refer to a movement concerning the next generation of the internet that created a more user-based internet.
http://www.oreillynet.com/pub/a/oreilly/tim/news/2005/09/30/what-is-web-20.html

Using Ask.com was generally pretty similar to using Google although I do find the recommended pages to often be way off, I still feel like anything on the internet from independent sources, half of those answers could be made up and I would never really know. I suppose the best way to get around that would be to double check with reliable databases such as informit.com and factiva.com.

Thanks!

Blog 2

Welcome everybody to my second blog!

This week in the lecture we watched the movie Alphaville. Haven’t heard of it? I’m not surprised; it’s not exactly in the Rom-Com section at Blockbuster. That’s not to put it down though, despite being made in 1965 and the cast speaking entirely in French, I have to say I did get into it.

I had already done a little bit of a background search before the lecture so I had some idea of what to expect, which I can imagine made it a little bit easier to follow. Like I mentioned, the film was made in 1965 and was directed by Jean-Luc Godard. It’s the tale of tough talking detective Lemmy Caution who is saving the world from the giant computer that is ruling Alphaville, ‘Alpha 60’, all while winning the girl. Godard took a unique approach when filming by using no special effects (a concept foreign to us today), rather choosing to film in locations around Paris with modernist buildings that he thought had a futuristic feel. When watching the movie, keep in mind that in 1965 the concept of a super computer ruling over people seemed ludicrous, unlike today where computers and technology encroach on nearly all aspects of our lives.

In Thursdays early morning tutorial we started to discuss Alphaville and generally it seemed everybody got the concept of the film and could identify the major difference in the way people thought of technology between now and 1965. I also used the tute time to look into French New Wave cinema, I didn’t know anything about it having only really heard the phrase a few times but I found the info on Learning at Griffith really helpful. From what I’ve read it was the movement of new filming techniques within the French arts scene which became a somewhat of a revolution around 1958 to 1964 but continued on afterwards. A lot of the techniques that were used like using natural lighting, shooting on location and jump cuts are still used regularly in filming today.

Once that was all out of the way we began on the tute task which was to begin this blog and master the skill of adding a ‘link list’ to our pages. This is basically a little section on your blog page where you add links to your friend’s blogs. I figured this sounded simple enough and set about it. After a frustrating 10 minutes of fiddling I took the easy way out and went to the ever helpful HELP section. From there it was a piece of cake and I passed my knowledge on to those struggling around me as though I just happened to be brilliant. I’m certain they did not buy this.

Our blog task this week was to look into the different ways we use communications technologies to keep in touch with friends and family. Generally with me, communicating with my family is pretty basic, just using mobiles for calls and text messaging. Not so much because my parents can’t use things like email but I live with them and my brothers so we see each other daily and it isn’t really necessary. With friends though I suppose there are a few more variations, I use Myspace, my mobile, MSN and email pretty much daily. This may seem like a lot, but considering nearly everyone I know uses all of these it’s pretty much normal. I actually met the man who runs all of Myspace within Australia the other day at work and would have loved to talk to him and get his opinions on how Myspace has grown and created a whole new form of communication but we were flat out and I only got to speak to him for about 5 minutes!

Good grief this has been long.

Blog 1.

Welcome everybody,

Just to take a second ill introduce myself, I'm Courtney Love (although I swear I wasn't named after her), I’m and 19 have lived on the Gold Coast for over a decade now but I hail from the small town of Wagga Wagga, NSW.
I’m new to Griffith University, this being my first year, first semester studying Communications. The following is a brief recap of week 2 in New Communications Technologies.

Lecture Notes:

Unfortunately I wasn’t able to make it to the lecture this week mostly because traffic decided to own me on Wednesday. Still after reading the lecture notes and reading the mammoth reading conveniently posted it felt like I was there.

The lecture discussed and explored the use of email and spam and its relativity today, its convenience, pro’s, con’s ect. Nearly everyone in the room admitted to being bombarded with irritating spam announcing discount Viagra and discount penis enlargements so effective the ladies will be banging on your door. These mass emails are sent out all hours of the day to the majority of email account holders in a bid to hook some poor sucker in on a scam. Although I can only assume that they do have some positive and interested responses or they wouldn’t be able to continually bug us with all this spam.

Also touched on was the question of whether bloggers should be or are considered to be journalists. Are the days of needing degrees and years of lowly interning at papers/magazines fetching coffee before you could call yourself a journalist gone and to be replaced by any Joe who has access to a computer with internet? Personally I think that there is a pretty clear line between legit journalists and bloggers, mostly because bloggers really tend to throw down any random thought, outrage or gossip and top it off with a pretty font. Just like I am now really, and I wouldn’t call myself a journalist.
Also worth a mention was the topic of ‘Second Life’ which was bought up in the first lecture last week. It’s basically a virtual world where you sign up and are given a body (called an avatar) then you interact with other users who are also roaming about. Then if you are really into it you can pay money to customise your avatar with clothes, hair, wings if you feel it necessary. It was pretty much the first I had heard of it bar a few friends mentioning it in conversation and while it was interesting to see the examples of people who had gone on to make money from it, mostly it reminded me of Myspace. Fun, but a total waste of time. Though it did bring up the issue of ‘cyber law’ to govern business transactions such as stocks and property, both which people are making real money from, also to catch those looking to scam users out of their money. When one woman who owned a dress store within the Second Life world said that she often spent more than 10 hours a day ‘in world’, I mostly just thought she was sad and needed to get a ‘first life’.

Tutorial Notes:

- Set up account for blog on Blogger.com
- Discussed what went on in lecture
- Became familiar with allotted hard drive space for each student (5gb)
- Began writing all my brilliant thoughts on this blog.\

Thats all! thanks!