Short description:

The Internet has been transformed in the past years from a system primarily oriented on information provision into a medium for communication and community-building. The notion of ?Web 2.0?, social software, and social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter and MySpace have emerged in this context. With such platforms comes the massive provision and storage of personal data that are systematically evaluated, marketed, and used for targeting users with advertising. In a world of global economic competition, economic crisis, and fear of terrorism after 9/11, both corporations and state institutions have a growing interest in accessing this personal data. The contributions in this book provide a comprehensive look at issues that are redefining our entire concept of privacy and surveillance.

Long description:

The Internet has been transformed in the past years from a system primarily oriented on information provision into a medium for communication and community-building. The notion of ?Web 2.0?, social software, and social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter and MySpace have emerged in this context. With such platforms comes the massive provision and storage of personal data that are systematically evaluated, marketed, and used for targeting users with advertising. In a world of global economic competition, economic crisis, and fear of terrorism after 9/11, both corporations and state institutions have a growing interest in accessing this personal data. Here, contributors explore this changing landscape by addressing topics such as commercial data collection by advertising, consumer sites and interactive media; self-disclosure in the social web; surveillance of file-sharers; privacy in the age of the internet; civil watch-surveillance on social networking sites; and networked interactive surveillance in transnational space. This book is a result of a research action launched by the intergovernmental network COST (European Cooperation in Science and Technology).

'With its careful balance between theoretical and empirical, critical and relatively neutral perspectives on the internet and surveillance, this excellent collection helps to define the challenges we face in understanding and coming to terms with social media and the still evolving network environment. Its impressive scope, accomplished through contributions from an international community of scholars updates the familiar, while setting the ground upon which future assessments of exploitation, alienation and resistance will have to begin once again.' ? Oscar H. Gandy, Jr., Professor Emeritus, University of Pennsylvania

'The spread of digital technologies presents the opportunity of people accessing and producing information more readily than ever before, a liberating potential. However, it also means that each and every one of us leaves a digital trace whenever we use credit cards, undertake a Google search, or pass through card-operated barriers. The opportunities for harvesting information ? for using surveillance to order and organise people and places ? is unprecedented. From the compelling reflections of pioneering analyst Thomas Mathieson, through sophisticated theoretical observations from the likes of Christian Fuchs and David Lyon, to richly-detailed case studies, this is a volume to savoured.' ? Professor Frank Webster, Head of Department of Sociology, City University London and author of Theories of the Information Society, 3rd edition 2006

Table of Contents:

Preface  Thomas Mathiesen  1. Introduction: Internet and Surveillance  Christian Fuchs, Kees Boersma, Anders Albrechtslund and Marisol Sandoval  Part 1: Theoretical Foundations of Internet Surveillance Studies  2. Critique of the Political Economy of Web 2.0 Surveillance  Christian Fuchs  3. Exploitation in the Data Mine  Mark Andrejevic  4. Key Features of Social Media Surveillance  Daniel Trottier and David Lyon  5. Jean-François Lyotard and the Inhumanity of Internet Surveillance  David W. Hill  6. Critical Internet Surveillance Studies and Economic Surveillance  Thomas Allmer  Part 2: Case Studies, Applications and Empirical Perspectives of Internet Surveillance Studies  7. A Critical Empirical Case Study of Consumer Surveillance on Web 2.0  Marisol Sandoval  8. Disciplining the Consumer: File-Sharers Under the Watchful Eye of the Music Industry  David Arditi  9. Socializing the City: Location Sharing and Online Social Networking  Anders Albrechtslund  10. What Do IT Professionals Think About Surveillance?  Iván Székely  11. Fields, Territories and Bridges: Networked Communities and Mediated Surveillance in Transnational Social Space  Miyase Christensen and André Jansson  12. When Transparency Isn?t Transparent: Campaign Finance Disclosure and Internet Surveillance  Kent Wayland, Roberto Armengol and Deborah G. Johnson  13. Privacy, Surveillance and Self-Disclosure in the Social Web: Exploring the User?s Perspective via Focus Groups  Monika Taddicken  14. How Does Privacy Change in the Age of the Internet?  Rolf H. Weber  Part 3: Conclusion  15. Postface: Internet and Surveillance  Kees Boersma