Where Should We Draw the Line?

    In an era of knowledge updating and information exploration, people have exerted a tremendous fascination on various social media platform. However, a rise of social media also aroused heated discussion on ethic problem in this area, which is a complex and controversial issue.

    From the week’s reading materials as well as class discussion, I saw a dilemma in today’s social media. On one hand, protecting integrity and the public trust are fundamental to social media platform. On the other hand, lack of systematic rules and network security laws made social media always be blamed for unethical in numerous situations. Where should we draw the line is an issue worth thinking about for all social media participants.

    According to a survey conducted by The Ethics Resource Center, “active social networkers show a higher tolerance for activities that could be considered unethical,” from which we can see that although social media are challenged by a lot of ethical problems, sometimes people can “benefit” from or participated in those unethical behaviors unconsciously, that’s why active social networkers show a higher tolerance for social media. I myself have been a victim of unethical social network as well as a participant in some unethical behavior unconsciously.

    One of the core ethical values proposed by PRSA is loyalty, or protect confidential and private information. Nowadays, when we join a specific social network site, register for a E-mail or open an account for online shopping, we are asked to complete personal information online, such as our job, contact number and other details, and those information are promised to be confidential by those websites and online services. But when I received some annoying messages, callings and spam, I know that my personal information has been leaked. Some social-networking sites had "deceived" users by sharing personal data with advertisers that it had promised to keep private. That’s how I victimized from unethical social media.
    What’s more, when surfing online, we are likely to neglected the copyright issues and take it for granted that we could download something form the Internet for free. I was also keen on websites that offering downloading free mp3s, e-books and software without being aware of the intellectual property protection issue. I found in western world, people pay more attention on intellectual property issue than that in China, that’s also where we should continue to improve and move forwards. That’s how I also participated in unethical social media behaviors.
    To understand where to draw the line we should first understand the potential connection between ethics and social networks. Ethics is not a force that hinders the development of social network. On the contrary, it helps social media to develop in a healthy and orderly way. Ensuring both ethics compliance and social media success should be the eternal principle.