Digital impact

Digital impact

The Coetail (Certificate of Educational Technology and Information Literacy) course clarifies a variety of dangers in using, submitting, and reproducing information that is freely available digitally. Students analyze acceptable use policies, copyrights, fair use, special considerations for use in education, and one’s digital footprint.

Every posting of music, voice, blog, picture, tweet, or email leaves a trail back to the one who posted it. Some of these trails are good. It is convention to give credit to the author of a copied picture when using it. Some trails to one’s computer are less than desirable. These trails and the long term consequences of the postings are included in a concept known as one’s “digital footprint”.

Seems to me the use of “footprint” stems from what one leaves behind from one’s presence at a location. If one walks on a beach, another can see the impression left in the sand. When one burns fossil fuels, an increase in atmospheric carbon is part of what ‘one leaves behind’. When one visits the internet, there is a trail, but little impact. But what one ‘leaves behind’ when one submits a post to the Internet is bigger than a footprint; it’s impression is more like stepping into and rippling the water, rather than just marking the sand, at the beach. One’s footprint is still left in the sand below the water, but it’s the ripples or wave made in the water that spread around and impact the world. It might be more appropriate to refer the ‘what one leaves behind’ as one’s digital impact.

It is this digital impact one needs to be aware of before clicking the mouse on ‘Send’ or hitting the ‘Return’ key when interacting digitally. One might want to consider the digital environment and assess the consequences of the action on the digital environment and conduct a quick digital impact assessment before clicking the button.

To ascertain if a digital submission is wise, a digital impact assessment could include the quick answering of a few questions:

1) Will this action be traced back to me at any time in the future? No matter what the digital user thinks, the answer to this should always be considered “Yes”. The security of anonymous surveys, encrypted transactions, and the information we have on our personal computers are already challenged.

2) Is this digital environment safe? Sending an email to a select group of ‘friends’, conducting a financial transaction via the internet, and even viewing internet sites from a cyber café computer are not safe. Your boss can read your emails, credit card information has been stolen from the Internet, and porn sites are traced back to their observers.

3) Would I mind my mother or the reviewer of your next job application seeing this?

4) Am I comfortable leaving this action public for the rest of my life? That’s how long it will be available for viewing by others.

5) Have I given credit to the originator of any images or ideas I am including in my submission?

6) What am I creating? Is this action the monster, lion in waiting, inconsequential blah-g, or seed of a new idea for which it is intended?

7) How could this action come back to bite me? What might be politically correct, convention, acceptable, or the fashion at this time, might be taboo soon. The action should leave a “feel right”-ness about it.

Much of the discussion of the course focuses on the restrictions of internet use. The heart of the real value of the Internet, creating new knowledge and increasing the quality of life, should be a main consideration. Criticism of another’s actions without suggesting improvements and writing one’s train-of-thought have less positive impact for our future than a creating of something new. So the intended impact can be in the answer to:

8) What value am I adding to life?

I hope that this post is a forward movement. I welcome comments and criticisms.