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1. Digital Literacy

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Useful content relating to week 1

Why big data has made your privacy a thing of the past | Tech. Watching the legal system deal with the internet is like watching somebody trying to drive a car by looking only in the rear-view mirror. The results are amusing and predictable but not really interesting. On the other hand, watching the efforts of regulators – whether national ones such as Ofcom, or multinational, such as the European Commission – is more instructive. At the moment, the commission is wrestling with the problem of how to protect the data of European citizens in a world dominated by Google, Facebook and co. The windscreen of the metaphorical car that the commission is trying to drive has been cracked so extensively that it's difficult to see anything clearly through it. So in her desperation, the driver (Viviane Reding, the commission's vice-president) oscillates between consulting the rear-view mirror and asking passers-by (who may or may not be impartial) for tips about what lies ahead.

But while all this is going on, the ground is shifting beneath the disputants. BBC Radio 4 - Digital Human, Series 5, Whispers. Online research. Critical thinking. Juan Enriquez: Your online life, permanent as a tattoo. Webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20140702233839/ To tackle the spread of misinformation online we must first understand it | Farida Vis. Last summer the World Economic Forum (WEF) invited its 1,500 council members to identify the main issues the world faces, and what should be done about them. The WEF consists of 80 councils covering a wide range of issues including social media. Members come from academia, industry, government, international organisations and wider civil society. The top three issues highlighted for 2014 concerned rising societal tensions in the Middle East and north Africa; widening income disparities; and persistent structural unemployment. Perhaps surprisingly, in tenth place was a concern over the rapid spread of misinformation online, and specifically social media's role in this.

With a value of 3.35 on a scale of 1-5 this was seen as "somewhat to very significant". False information and the news Within a number of professions – journalism being an obvious one – the spread and potential for reporting misinformation is a genuine concern. Are internet users concerned? How does information spread? Amazing mind reader reveals his 'gift'. Guidelines on prosecuting cases involving communications sent via social media. Social media told to simplify terms and conditions.

27 November 2014Last updated at 19:04 ET By Rory Cellan-Jones Technology correspondent Most people use social media without every properly studying the services' rules Social networking firms including Facebook and Twitter are being told to make it clearer to members how they collect and use their data. A report by the Commons Science and Technology Select Committee says the firms' terms and conditions are far too long and complex.

The MPs say users may not be aware of how their details can be used by websites and apps. Any reasonable person would struggle with long privacy policies, they add. The committee says reading such documents has been likened to "engaging with Shakespeare". And it says that the rules have been designed for use in US courtrooms and to protect organisations in the event of legal action rather than to convey information. T&Cs updates Facebook recently unveiled updated terms and conditions policies that it claims are simpler and easier to read. Relationship of trust. 12 surprising ways personal technology betrays your privacy | InfoWorld. Digital literacy. Webmaker. Www.jisc.ac.uk/media/documents/projects/llidaexecsumjune2009.pdf.

Digital literacy can boost employability and improve student experience | Higher Education Network | The Guardian. The nature of knowledge is changing and, in this digital age, our definition of basic literacy urgently needs expanding. With an estimated 90% of UK jobs requiring some level of IT competency, the notion of digital literacy – those capabilities that equip an individual for living, learning and working in a digital society – is one that needs to be taken seriously by colleges and universities. We live in an online world with the digital divide closing up both through government initiatives (Martha Lane Fox, the government's digital champion, recently took up the challenge of getting 10 million people in the UK online, saying that otherwise "they will be even more isolated and disadvantaged as government and industry expand ever faster into digital-only services") and technological advances – more than half the UK population now own a smartphone with internet capability.

But it's not just about employability – increasingly digital literacy is vital for learning itself. An Ultimate Guide to Online Reputation Monitoring. Www2.futurelab.org.uk/resources/documents/handbooks/digital_literacy.pdf. Dimensions of digital media literacy and the relationship to social exclusion | Sora Park. As existing in many different types and varying on the basis of social contexts. Not only is it the skills to interpret social artifacts but it also involves the social context. A wider range of competencies is involved in using digital media compared with traditional mass media. While literacy skills of mass media focus on how people can critically understand mediated messages, digital media literacy skills expand beyond interpretation of content into the realm of controlling, filtering and appropriating content through various digital media channels (Livingstone, Couvering and Thumim, 2005).

However, digital media literacy should not be regarded as replacing traditional media literacy; rather, it expands the literacy skills involved in reading, writing and understanding to encompass the new technologies. Internet literacy, internet or online skills, and digital media literacy concepts are used interchangeably. Guidelines on prosecuting cases involving communications sent via social media.

Digital Legacy & Employment. The Myth of Digital Literacy. Developing digital literacies for employability. This resource set is for: students and recent graduates; employers and employer bodies; staff concerned with employability issues in HE/FE institutions Digital literacy or capability is relevant to the employability of graduates in a number of ways. Employers increasingly expect graduates to have excellent digital capabilities, whatever the role they are recruiting forDigital networks are increasingly essential to job searching and to developing a professional identity, including showcasing achievements from higher educationMany graduate jobs are in the digital economy, and many graduates are managing portfolio careers using digital networks and media to do so Findings on employability from the final synthesis report Further findings and lessons from the final programme meeting Guardian HE Network article on employability and Developing Digital Literacies Resources See also: -> Developing digital literacies home page.

Enhancing student employability through technology-supported assessment and feedback. Effective use of technology across all aspects of assessment and feedback processes can help address these issues. Providing better management and analysis of course information Course information systems can help ensure appropriate linkage between work-related competences and assessment tasks. Manchester Metropolitan University has introduced an employability curriculum framework including a set of graduate outcomes which should be assessed in every programme and each unit (module) description at undergraduate level now indicates which of these outcomes is addressed in the unit. This is explained in a short video. Tying the outcomes recognisably into each assessment strengthens the concept of employability in the curriculum and improves transparency and consistency as well as offering the potential to include better information for the Higher Education Achievement Report without extra work on the part of staff.

For more on this topic read our detailed guide on managing course information. Man Tells University He's Broken In And Stolen Five MacBooks, The Autotweet Reply Is Not Really Suitable.. Autotweets can, on some occasions, be pretty useful. Not in this case though. When one man, Brian Shelf, tweeted saying he'd got into Sheffield Hallam University, the student union's president replied congratulation him, and offering her help if needed. You Might Also Like..Man Tweets Obviously Fake A-Level Results, Universities Get Excited And Offer Him PlacesA-Level Results In Nine Refreshingly Alternative PicturesJumping Boys Holding Exam Results Really DO Exist - Here's The Proof However, he hadn't really got in. Oh. Evaluating Internet Resources. How do I evaluate the quality of websites? How can I teach students to evaluate websites? Where can I find checklists for evaluation? Evaluating Internet Resources There's lots of good information on the Internet, but you will also find opinions, misconceptions, and inaccurate information.

Read Evaluating Information: An Information Literacy Challenge by MaryAnn Fitzgerald. Do you believe everything you read? Look for what Wikipedia calls the "verifiability" of information. Read Wicked or Wonderful: Revisiting Wikipedia by Annette Lamb. Misleading Websites Some websites were designed to be intentionally misleading. Read How to Spot a Fake Website by Garen Arnold (2009). Use the following websites to explore the issue of Internet content. Fake news has become a popular form of satire. The Onion The Daily Show from Comedy Central Colbert Report from Comedy Central A few websites are addressing the issue of misleading information. Criteria for Evaluation Authority. Filtering Information. To tackle the spread of misinformation online we must first understand it | Farida Vis.

BBC World News - Click, 18/05/2013 GMT, Celebrating 20 years of the world wide web. Food Standards Agency worker sacked over Facebook 'like' wins £30k | Daily Mail Online. Alan Blue was sacked after he 'liked' a post apparently encouraging violenceHe also mistakenly typed 'i wish' rather than 'u wish' in response Probe claimed the posts were a ‘breach of trust’ and ‘not professional’Employment judge agrees with Mr Blue's assertion it was 'just banter' By Laura Cotton For The Scottish Daily Mail Published: 06:07 GMT, 25 September 2014 | Updated: 11:07 GMT, 25 September 2014 A father of four who was sacked over comments he made on Facebook has been awarded more than £30,000 at an employment tribunal. Alan Blue, 51, worked for the Food Standards Agency (FSA) as a meat hygiene inspector at Wishaw Abattoir in Lanarkshire. But he lost his job on November 5 last year after he ‘liked’ a posting on the social media site that appeared to encourage violent behaviour towards the manager.

Scroll down for video Mr Blue said: ‘I was at home watching the telly and went on to Facebook on my phone. He added: ‘I regret liking the comment because I never meant to harm anyone.’