victoria mcauley
Book Review: Shareveillance
Shareveillance: The Dangers of Openly Sharing and Covertly Collecting Data Clare Birchall (2017) Digital Tattoo Rating: 2/5 Summary What does it mean to share in the Digital Age? In her book Shareveillance: The Dangers of Openly Sharing and Covertly Collecting Data, Clare Birchall investigates the intricacies of digital sharing on personal and state levels, and […]
Guest Blog Post: Cluster What?
Cluster What? Written By: Henry St. Clair Information systems literacy comes front and center in a new work of theatre that was unveiled at Toronto’s 2018 Fringe Festival. The play, written by the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Information’s own Professor David Philips, is affectionately titled “Cluster F****d”. Philp’s piece attempts to lead the […]
Guest Blog Post: The Up-Vote, Down-Vote Conundrum
The Up-Vote, Down-Vote Conundrum Written by: Richi Tam “I only got 10 likes in the last 5 minutes. Do you think I should take it down?” Does this sound like someone you know? Your friend? Your colleague? Maybe even you…? Well if you must know, I was just quoting the Chainsmokers. However, I […]
Guest Blog Post: Connection
Connection Written By: Henry St. Clair There are strong parallels between the historic experience of television and the modern digital information environment. People have been staring at advertising saturated screens of one form or another for a rather long time. Yet while the TV of old might have courted a great deal of our […]
Article Review: The Tyranny of Convenience
The Tyranny of Convenience Tim Wu (2018) ________ Digital Tattoo Rating: 3/5 Summary The name Tim Wu might sound familiar: Wu coined the term “net neutrality”, which we reported on in February. He is a professor of law at Columbia University, ran for the Democratic nomination for lieutenant governorship of New York, and […]
Book Review: Managing the Digital You
Managing the Digital You Melody Condron (2017) ________ Digital Tattoo Rating: 4/5 Summary I don’t know about you, but the number of files on my computer has gotten out of control. Every time I have to switch devices, or find a paper from last semester, I realize how poorly I’ve managed the data […]
The End of the Neutral Net
What is Net Neutrality? The concept is relatively simply: net neutrality refers to the current state of the internet, where “broadband providers should treat all Internet traffic the same”[1]. Essentially, net neutrality regulations ensure that internet service providers (ISP), like Verison, Comcast, or Bell, allow unrestricted access to the content on the web. This form […]
Citizen Lab: Leaks, Hacking, and Fake News
The terms leaks, hacking and fake news have been tossed around frequently by reporters, government officials, and activists. What do these terms mean, and how do they impact our digital identities? This May, the University of Toronto’s Citizen Lab released a report that sheds some light on these terms, and answers some questions that we often think, but […]
When Seeing Isn’t Believing
Textual literacy skills in the North American public have been on the rise since the dawn of the 20th century. More people than ever before are able to understand, and critically interpret written statements; however, fewer people are taught visual literacy skills. It is easy to believe the things that we see. The human mind […]
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