One common criticism of social media-- Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc.-- is that it compromises users' privacy. Indeed, in some school districts teachers and administrators monitor the behavior of their K-12 students on social networking sites and "cybervetting" of job applicants by potential employers is an increasingly common practice. In her book I Know Who You Are and I Saw What You Did: Social Networks and the Death of Privacy, Lori Andrews argues that we need to adopt a Social Network Constitution to protect our rights online:
It should say that social networks are private spaces and that employers, schools and other institutions are prohibited from accessing social network pages or taking adverse actions against a person based on anything they post on a social network. A similar rule is being considered in Germany, which would forbid employers from using information from social networks in the processes of hiring or judging employees.What do people think of this proposal? Do you agree with Andrews? Or does she go too far? Please try to write a couple of paragraphs on this and we'll use the online discussion as a jumping off point for an in-class discussion of these issues.