What's The Goal Of Anti-Cyberbullying Moves?

from the treating-the-symptoms dept

The WSJ has a column talking about some changes sites like YouTube and MySpace are making to make it easier to flag abusive content. The sites are reacting to the growing storm about cyberbullying, and are perhaps attempting to head off legislation that could inflict onerous regulations on them. The column focuses on the speed with which sites -- often hampered by sheer volume, as well as the number of unfounded reports -- can react to the flags and take down offending content. But should removing content that depicts or constitutes bullying or harassment be the ultimate goal? Like other reporting systems, it's a little hard to tell if these will actually do anything to get to the root of the problem: the bullying itself. Treating cyberbullying as separate and distinct from bullying or other abusive behavior that happens offline just masks the underlying issue. Without addressing that, the real problems for the victims will continue, regardless of whether their tormentors' activities get displayed online or not.

Filed Under: bullying, cyberbullying

Politicians Still Trying To Outlaw Being A Jerk

from the it's-not-going-to-work dept

Reader eoinmonty writes in to let us know that Irish politicians are pressuring mobile phone companies to stop mobile phone bullying, and saying that if the companies can't do so, they'll be forced to put in place laws that require them to stop bullying. The whole thing is rather ridiculous, and, as one phone company rep accurately pointed out: "It is unrealistic and unfair to expect mobile phone operators to solve what is a broader societal problem." Indeed. It seems as if politicians think that somehow the mobile operators can just snap their fingers and stop undesired activity. They can't. And, to let them in on a little secret: even passing a law won't do much to help. People are going to be bullies -- and passing a law or asking the mobile phone companies to hold back the tide won't do much to stop them.

Filed Under: bullying, cyberbullying, ireland, liability, responsibility

The RIAA's Playbook: No New Business Models Without RIAA Ownership

from the it's-that-simple dept

Mathew Ingram covers the details of Muxtape's run-in with the RIAA. As you may recall, last month the rather useful site that let people create online "mix tapes" that could be streamed to others was shut down thanks to the RIAA. The site's founder has now admitted that he tried negotiating with the RIAA, but that it was nearly impossible. The RIAA's representatives started the "negotiation" by saying they were about to shut the site down, and then complained to Amazon (whose S3 service hosted the files) to get access to the files blocked. Now, that concerns me for a few reasons. I had created a Muxtape when it first launched, but it had no RIAA label music on it. So, why would Amazon block access to it?

However, the real point of the post is just to highlight how the RIAA views these things. As has been discussed, the RIAA wants to shut down these types of sites. By now, we've seen the pattern over and over again. The RIAA has always been unable to actually innovate with its own online offerings -- in large part because the record labels still think about how to control the music and how to limit what consumers can do with it. So, instead of learning what's innovative, the RIAA has simply decided on a two pronged strategy: (1) get every new and innovative site shut down and (2) offer them one way to return: if they hand over a big chunk of equity.

Very few people seem to be talking about this, but most of the "agreements" that the big labels have reached with various new and innovative sites have involved handing over equity. Basically, the record labels are using a protection racket system: give us some equity, or we'll shut you down. Of course, all this is really doing is slowing down much needed innovation in the music marketplace. Instead, we get bells and whistles like MySpace Music (owned, in part, by the major record labels), rather than something truly useful and innovative.

Filed Under: bullying, business models, music, negotiations, riaa, startup
Companies: muxtape, riaa

Now Canadian Teachers Want Cyberbullying To Be A Criminal Offense

from the overreact-much? dept

At some point, people need to realize that there are some people out there who just do jerkry things. In fact, at some point or another, probably most everyone is a jerk to someone else. It's no fun to be on the receiving end of someone being a jerk -- but it happens. However, in the last few years, there's been this silly focus on trying to turn online jerks into criminals. We've already highlighted such an effort underway in the US, but now a bunch of teachers in Canada are pushing to make cyberbullying a criminal offense. Yes, it's important to deal with cyberbullies, but charging them with a crime clearly goes too far.

Filed Under: bullying, canada, cyberbullying, jerks, laws, teachers

Should It Be Against The Law To Be A Jerk Online?

from the well,-it-may-become-law-soon dept

In large part due to the sad story of Megan Meier, we're suddenly seeing a rush for politicians to rush through "anti-cyberbullying" that make cyberbullying illegal. It's hard to see how such legislation will pass constitutional muster, but it seems to be more along the lines of previous legislation attempts to "protect the children" that will do little to actually protect children. Certainly, kids getting bullied is a problem -- and cyberbullying can make it that much more difficult for kids who feel that they "can't escape" as the bullying can follow them outside of school. But that doesn't mean that tossing kids in jail for taunting other kids is the answer. At some point, people need to realize that there are people out there who are going to act like jerks -- and throwing people in jail isn't going to change that, though it likely will lead to frivolous lawsuits whenever some folks get upset about something someone else said to them.

Filed Under: bullying, cyberbullying, jerks, laws