Online Ethics: Some Thoughts
What considerations should be examined when looking at business ethics on social media?
Is it OK to promote yourself through multiple accounts? Why not just create thousands of accounts and follow yourself?
Is it OK to compile other people's articles just to get views?
Is it OK to pretend to be someone else or create bots that pretend to be something else?
Is it OK to friend everyone on Facebook and then spam them with ads or emails? LinkedIn?
In an age where attention is currency what behavior/s should be shunned or prohibited from being exhibited?
Nudity? Violence? Or should it all be allowed in the name of transparency, freedom, and entertainment?
Is it all ok if it's on the internet? Is it even real?
Or is it a reflection of the culture at large? The internet acts as a metric for human activity and thought. It also facilitates human activity and thought. It is a feedback look that can internally track and analyze its own variables as long as someone programs it to do so. If the internet is merely information we can treat its content as we do any piece of information:
1. Attempt to understand it.
2. Asses its importance.
3. Asses its validity.
4. Accept, deny or remain agnostic.
Roughly speaking we should be skeptical of anything online including the motivations, authenticity, and context of any content produced. This is why reputation and trust are so important to establish online. If you want people to trust you-you need to have integrity online just as in real life (Probably because the internet is real and the activities existing on it are real). Since your online reputation is an extension of your offline reputation you should take it seriously.
But with the internet, it is easy enough to hide behind an online persona so you may be able to shield your offline persona from any damage you desire to cause. I can't imagine it is likely that any good can come from the purely anonymous online threat, lie or shaming that comes from those protecting themselves with fake accounts. But just because I think it is repugnant what is the line at which force must be taken?
What do you think?