Last week in class our topic was Ethics in New Media. We looked at it in two areas: web marketing to children online, and the impact of data mining and electronic direct marketing on consumer privacy. The consumer privacy piece was one of those 'train wreck' topics, where the more you read about it, the more uneasy you became, yet you couldn't stop reading about it. The case study was on DoubleClick's ill-advised attempt in 2002 at selling its clickstream data to cross-reference with personal identification data, and the privacy uproar that followed.
I found myself reflecting on what steps to take as an IMC practitioner to ensure any project I run is ethical, but also on how this affects me as an individual. For example, say a couple was expecting a baby, but did not want to publicize it immediately. However, if you knew some of their online purchasing patterns for baby books, prenatal vitamins,etc, what damage could that do potentially? What if the wife was in the middle of a job search, and an employer didn't want to hire someone who would be on maternity leave within the year? If you let your mind run, you'll become a conspiracy theorist, but seriously it is worth some reflection. In all things, I take into account not the short term effect, but what precident it may set in the future.
Okay at this point hopefully I haven't freaked you out too much. I'll leave you with one of my reference articles on new media buying from Fortune magazine, entitled "Walk Softly and Carry a Big Checkbook".
--K
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Ethics and New Media: To Cookie or Not to Cookie, That is the Question
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