New material for lecture or discussion

Use contents links below to connect to specific material for lecture. Boxed teaching modules are organized by posting date. Note: Whenever possible, the most stable links have been chosen for postings below. As Interpersonal Divide explains, links vanish over time on the Internet, a dynamic but unstable medium.

                        Academic Year 2004-05 Postings

Athletic Digital Fraud Ads in Video Games Anti-Phishing Group Are Bloggers Journalists? Case of Stolen Fetus Cyberbullies Victimize Digital TV for Your Cell Phone Does E-Science Work? Instant Stalking Obsession Internet Comes to the Farm iPod at Duke questioned IQ hurt by emails

Harvard Rejects Hackers JFK Assassination Game Locator Phones: Spies, Helpers? Make Room for New Rooms Schools Cancel Cellphone Ban Superbowl Goes High-Tech Tech: Little Impact on Teaching The Digital Street  Utah Cell Phone Study Violent Video Games Study Why E-Learning Goes Bust "Wrist Video" Army Technology

Title: "Locator Phones: Spies or Helpers?" Author: David Hayes Citation: Kansas City Star, March 16, 2005 URL:  http://www.kansascity.com/mld/kansascity/business/11656483.htm Description: Sprint is preparing to launch cell phones with a new service: pinpoint tracking, so that employers can ascertain which workers are closest to a desired destination point. However, the new phones, which will use the Global Positioning System technology, also will help emergency crews locate cell phone users in trouble. Other uses include managing fleets of vehicles and automating orders while personnel are on the road. These uses sound legitimate; however, David Hayes, senior technology writer for the Kansas City Star, also notes: "Eventually, the wireless industry believes location-based wireless services could be used for everything from tracking employees, to learning if our children stray from the neighborhood, to sending electronic coupons to the phones of consumers when they are near a fast-food restaurant." Teaching Tip: Focus discussion on how Sprint is touting logical uses of GPS tracking technology, and then follow how the phones actually will be used by consumers. In particular, analyze the prospect of text messages and pop-ups on cell phones when a consumer is near a Burger King or McDonald's. Will fees be charged to shut off these intrusions? Weigh in on the privacy issues associated with such a gadget? Columnist David Hayes covers this, too, noting that suspicious parents, jealous partners, and vengeful employers and authorities can misuse or misinterpret the location data. Finally, the service at this point only locates the whereabouts of the cell phone, not the cell phone user, opening up prospects for all manner of inventive alibis or misinterpretations. What examples can you foresee, from falsely accused suspects in the wrong place at the wrong time ... to teen accomplices carrying cell phones of friends gone AWOL?

Title: "Athletics Fraud in the Digital Age" Author: Doug Lederman Citation: Inside Higher Ed, 11 May 2005 URL: http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2005/05/11/nicholls Description: This article documents a new problem associated with distance learning and athletic fraud with coaches encouraging students ineligible to compete to take online courses, with those coaches proctoring exams and, among other things, helping student athletics cheat so that they get better grades. Some 28 athletes and a recruit were involved at Nicholls State University. A report by the National Collegiate Athletic Association’s Division I Committee on Infractions noted that these infractions took place between 2003-04 and involved distance learning courses offered by Brigham Young University. To the credit of Nicholls state (no pun intended), its registrar noted that BYU online transfer credit seemed to come with higher grades than residential courses. The NCAA concluded: "This case illustrates the ease with which individuals can manipulate and then breach security protocols for online correspondence courses. In turn, this case underscores the need for supervision and monitoring of these courses, including registration for and selection of courses, identification and conduct of proctors, and exclusion of coaches from involvement." Teaching Tip: Discuss the computing nature of online courses and the invisibility of the process without proper proctoring--requiring a physical rather than digital presence--to ensure that responses and assignments are being transmitted by the enrolled student. What other scenarios besides athletics, involving cheating, can distance learning facilitate? What responsibility, if any, did BYU have in this matter to ensure proper proctoring? Does BYU allow students at its residential campus to take exams without a professor in the room? Is there a double standard, with lesser standards associated with distance learning, and if so, are money and marketing the primary concerns associated culturally with Internet and e-learning, especially since e-learning has not lived up to its hyped promises (see "Why e-learning goes bust")?

Title: "iPod program did not deliver" Author: Staff editorial Citation: The Duke Chronicle, posted 8 April 2005, published 28 February 2005 URL: http://www.chronicle.duke.edu/vnews/display.v/ART/2005/02/28/ 42231ace3f796?in_archive=1 Description: This editorial in the Duke student newspaper criticizes the institution's technology policy of giving free iPods to first-year students. The program cost the institution $500,000 last year and was copied by other universities, including Drexel. The newspaper states that the program was "far from a success"--indeed, only 1.6 percent of classes integrated the device--and urged that the program be discontinued. Later in the semester the University declared the program a success, but decided to limit distribution of the iPods only to students who enroll in classes using the device, according to another article in the Duke Chronicle. Arguments by students against the iPod program noted that the device was marketed to play music rather than perform academic tasks. Teaching Tip:  This is yet another example of the new generation gap discussed in Chapter 6, "The Medium is the Moral." The older generation of academic administrators continues to see technology as information whereas the current generation sees it as entertainment. Class discussion can focus on limits of the iPod in facilitating curricula in addition to how the device was actually used--to entertain. What other technological devices or applications have been promoted for educational purposes by administrators, only to be used by students as entertainment? What role did marketing play in the decision by Duke to buy the iPods? Is this another example of the advice, articulated in Interpersonal Divide, of asking why a device was purchased ... and then determining how it is being used? If institutions don't answer that question, will marketing do it for them?

Title: "Harvard, MIT join Carnegie Mellon, Rejecting Applicants" Author: Dan Carnevale Citation: Chronicle of Higher Education, posted 15 March 2005, published 9 March 2005. URL:  http://chronicle.com/temp/reprint.php?id=3k1c845jll81ggrott9tafsfrnyiixpl Description: This news article notes that 151 applicants who hacked into the admissions databank of some of the country's best business schools will not be admitted, because of the breach of ethics. The dean of the Harvard Business School states, "This behavior is unethical at best -- a serious breach of trust that cannot be countered by rationalization. Any applicant found to have done so will not be admitted to this school." Applicants reportedly learned how to hack into the system through instructions posted on Business Week's online forum. Some claimed they were just following computer instructions and didn't realize that would be an ethical mistake. Teaching Tip: Class discussion can focus on obvious questions:  Should applicants be denied admission, is it an ethical breach if they were just following instructions in an online forum, should they be punished if they didn't realize hacking into admission databanks was an ethical mistake? All this relates to "discretion," and there are several references to that throughout Interpersonal Divide, including a journal exercise at the end of Chapter Eight. The above hacking incident also relates to "The Seven Habits of Highly Mediated People" in Chapter Three: "People who lack perception also lack discretion. Media exposure, as we have said, erodes both." Finally, the excuse that hacker-applicants "didn't realize they were doing anything wrong" is based on the concept of "plausible denability," the idea that no one can conclusively disprove that claim, however spurious, because one person cannot fully know another person's mindsett. [Note: This excuse also is used in cases of online plagiarism and is easily refuted by referencing the conscience, i.e. students should have realized that what they were doing was morally wrong.]

Title: "Now consumers of news are producing it, too" Author:  Paul Gilster Citation: Raleigh News & Observer, posted 12 March 2005, published 27 February 2005 URL:  http://www.newsobserver.com/business/technology/gilster/story/ 2163806p-8545343c.html Description: Paul Gilster, correspondent for the Raleigh News & Observer, gives his take on author and journalist Dan Gillmor who "thinks digital technology is reshaping journalism, giving it a populist flair and turning it into what he calls 'roll your own, open-source news gathering.'" Gilster analyzes Gillmor's populist ideas about journalism with a somewhat skeptical eye, which working journalists develop over time, and concludes: "Technology allows a level of consumer engagement that flies in the face of media consolidation, and that's good news for getting the facts out no matter what your politics." Gilster's column was published a few weeks before a California court decision against three Web site operators who posted information about a pending product from Apple code-named "asteroid," with the judge ruling that the operators disclosed trade secrets and could not take advantage of the state shield law, protecting journalists from revealing anonymous sources. Teaching Tip: Is a blogger a journalist ... or just a consumer who is producing news? This type of discussion allows the instructor to  touch on First Amendment freedoms vs. responsibilities of journalists who primarily work in or cover physical place vs.bloggers who primarily operate in cyberspace. It also allows discussion on whether anyone with a computer who disseminates information should enjoy shield-law protection. This is particularly on point in Chapter Seven, "Icons and Caricatures," of Interpersonal Divide, which cites the work of Theodore Roszak, author of The Cult of Information, in noting that "information" used to mean "fact" but now because of technology means opinion or simply, "data." Fact is associated with objectivity, which is a process associated with physical place.  Opinion can be targeted to a market. [Note: Objectivity is often confused with "balance," citing two sides of a story. For more information on objectivity, see The Columbia Journalism Review's July/August 2003 article by Brent Cunningham, who states:  "My favorite definition was from Michael Bugeja, who teaches journalism at Iowa State: 'Objectivity is seeing the world as it is, not how you wish it were.'"]

Title: "Wrist Video Gives Israeli Army an Edge" Author: Josef Fedderman Citation: The Associated Press, March 4, 2005 URL:  http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory?id=553024 Description: This report features a new technological device, a comic-book like wrist watch with LCD screen so military personnel can monitor drones and other high-tech weapons in the continuing conflicts between Israel and its enemies. The report also features another military technology devised for urban warfare and "low density" conflict. Here is an excerpt: "The company also showed off a system resembling a video game that allows soldiers to control unmanned ground vehicles. The green console has a small flat screen and two joysticks, one on each side. ... " Teaching Tip: The report documents a few key points in Interpersonal Divide, including the process of military inventing the technology for battle or surveillance and then companies adapting it for entertainment-based consumer use.  Universities often are places where such technology is created for the military, as was the case with the Internet. In this case, the report notes, Carnegie Mellon University has worked with the company featured here in a similar project titled "Gladiator." In discussing this technology, be sure to focus on that rather than the political debate about Middle East conflicts. The point here is to show how military contracts with universities--perhaps the university in which your class is being taught--create technology that eventually enters the consumer marketplace, with the focus usually on entertainment, as in a video game.

Title: "Utah Cell Phone Study" Author: News Release Citation: University of Utah,  10 February 2005 URL:  http://www.utah.edu/unews/releases/05/feb/cellphones.html Description: This news release discusses a cell phone study at the University of Utah, documenting that 18-to-25-year-old drivers who use the device have the agility of a 65-to-74-year-old. Older drivers who use cell phones became less able to brake suddenly to avoid a crash. The study reports “there was also a twofold increase in the number of [simulated] rear-end collisions when drivers were conversing on cell phones.”  The Utah researchers also disclosed in another 2003 study that motorists using cell phones "are more impaired than drunken drivers with blood alcohol levels exceeding 0.08." Teaching Tip:  Cell phone discussions are lively--and that's good, especially in class, because talking about technology underscores the importance of interpersonal communication. Accordingly, a recent column by Mark Rutledge, distributed by Cox Newspapers, is based on the Utah studies but takes a personalized approach that students might find appealing. Graduate students seeking paper ideas might want to investigate any rise in head-on and rear-end collisions, data available from the State Highway Patrol, to discern if rising cell phone use correlates with those accidents.

Title: "Superbowl XXXIX is a High-Tech Playground" Author: W. David Gardner Citation: TechWeb News, 7 February 2005 URL:  http://www.techweb.com/wire/networking/59301125 Description: This news story chronicles the NFL Web sites, high-definition television subscribers, and online gambling outlets that make this year's Super Bowl between the New England Patriots and the Philadelphia Eagles a high-tech playground, according to the author W. David Gardner who writes: "The Patriots' management likes to think that some of the success of its technology and Web site has spilled over to the team's success. ... The team's management and coaching staff are heavy users of technology." Certainly, without technology, the most-watched television show in the nation would not be broadcast; but that is not the point, either. The Super Bowl brings out the interpersonal in everyone, reminiscent of 1950s TV-watching when family and friends gathered to enjoy their favorite show. Across the nation there will be parties at neighborhoods, taverns, restaurants and even churches. Recipes will be shared in advance of the game during which cell phones will be shut off or rung at their own risk. Teaching Tip:  Have students chronicle their Super Bowl parties and gatherings. What makes this broadcast different than others? Certainly there are other events beside the Super Bowl that stimulate interpersonal and familial bonds. What might they be? The end of a long-running series, for instance? The premiere of a long-awaited new season? What makes television watching special on some occasions and ordinary on others? If there is a difference, then why do we watch it during ordinary times rather than be with others? Finally, for all the hype about technology, which might facilitate online gambling better than other media, why do viewers on this Sunday forsake home computers and/or mobile devices to gather in physical place--not only to enjoy the game but each other's company?

Title: "Cyberbullies Turn Technology Against Their Victims" Author: Peggy O'Crowley Citation Newhouse News Service, 16 January 2005. URL:  http://www.newhousenews.com/archive/ocrowley112904.html Description: This feature story focuses on bullying in the playground which, increasingly for teenagers, has become the cyber playground of the computer and associated softwares and spygears. One source in the story calls the Internet the new "bathroom wall," where slurs can be left for the viewing public. It's not just the Internet, however, attracting cyberbullies. According to the article, "Cell phone features such as text messaging and video are used to ridicule others. Obsessive boyfriends or girlfriends can monitor their partners' every move via cell phones and computer spyware. Every new technology provides more opportunities to harass or bully someone. ..." The article also cites a study documenting that children bullied online often feel more intimidated, not only because of the wider public nature of the slurs but also because "the safe haven of home had been violated," underscoring the blurring of lines as emphasized in Interpersonal Divide. Teaching Tip: Discuss the difference between the Internet as a digital restroom, where slurs can be for the viewing public, and a real restroom where names can be erased or crossed out and are seen by a relative few. Is it possible, using a list serv or email address, for a cyberbully to stereotype or otherwise intimidate a teenager with the entire school being made privy? Perhaps more serious, with respect to interpersonal communication, is the inability to work things out face-to-face in the public school yard. Another complexity is combination of social isolation combining with the physical isolation of computer use in a room that allowed cyberbullying into the confines of the home.

Title: "Live Digital TV for Your Cell Phone" Author: Not listed Citation: MobileTechNews,  7 January 2005 URL:  http://mobiletechnews.com/info/2004/10/21/113301.html Description: This news release describes the technology behind the latest cell phone assimilation--digital television. News reports about "cell phone TV" were reported widely at the start of 2005, but this 2004 article explains the technology and plans for the device. The first paragraph asks a telling question: "Addicted to reality TV programming? It won't be long before you can watch your favorite real-life TV broadcasts on the go. ..."  A chip developed by Texas Instruments makes possible the "cell phone TV" which, according to a company spokesperson, "will combine the two biggest consumer electronics inventions of our time - the television and the cell phone." Aptly, the new phone is called "Hollywood." Teaching Tip:  To use a Hollywood metaphor, and "Star Trek" allusion, the cell phone is the Borg of technology, assimilating electronic gadgets into its handheld, mobile casing. Ask students what technology the cell phone already has assimilated and what remains to be assimilated. Also, what are the public and social consequences of cell phone users watching television "on the go," as the article predicts. Will the cell phone, initially marketed for security and safety reasons, and then to be in contact with friends and family, now do what Interpersonal Divide predicts: isolate the consumer apart from others in order to sell product?

Title: "Case of Stolen Fetus, Mother's Slaying" Author: FBI, Special Agent Craig M. Arnold Citation: U.S. vs. Lisa Montgomery, 17 December 2004. URL:  http://news.findlaw.com/hdocs/docs/kidnap/usmntgmry121704aff.html Description: This affidavit files a criminal complaint against Lisa Montgomery who allegedly strangled and then stole the fetus from eight-month's pregnant Bobbie Jo Stinnett in a highly publicized media event near the holidays. The criminal complaint at the above URL details how the FBI tracked messages posted in a canine chatroom from Stinnett's computer in Missouri to Montgomery's computer in Kansas, leading to the arrest. Teaching Tip: The affidavit contains several concerns raised in Interpersonal Divide, including cybercrime vs. security issues; premeditation in virtual habitat vs. killing in physical habitat; and chatroom participants as digital witnesses vs. neighbors as physical witnesses. Perhaps most important in conveying the lesson--the medium is the message--is the mundane chat exchanges that really were a prelude to murder. To view them, click here.

Title: "Does E-Science Work?"  Author: Jeffrey R. Young Citation: Chronicle of Higher Education, 13 December 2004. URL:  http://chronicle.com/temp/reprint.php?id=gq5aud33l1rrvyk3amxgnzk7a6ah9r3p Description: This article questions the effectiveness of science projects coordinated via email and Internet to overcome physical distance of principal investigators. There was much hope that technology could bring together scientists at different institutions, enhancing productivity. Instead, the data show that the opposite might have occurred. Interpersonal skills, not often associated with science, proved to be important. Email proved to be inefficient, undermining trust. The article states that challenges to e-science include the "lack of face-to-face interaction," which "can make it harder for scientists to build trust, and without that trust, participants may be reluctant to share their data." Teaching Tip: Discuss the importance of place is building trust. Trust is a theme throughout Interpersonal Divide, but especially in Chapter Three, whose dominant message is: "Media and technology may inspire many things but not trust. Community does that" (page 63). Possible discussion topics include: How is communication essential to science? How is trust essential to science? If there is such a thing as e-science? How can universities build "e-trust"? These topics are appropriate in senior and graduate seminars, especially ones in which team projects have been assigned.

Title: "Kennedy Assassination Recreated in Video Game"  Author: Not listed Citation: Reuters, 21 November 2004. URL: http://portland.indymedia.org/en/2004/11/304130.shtml Description: This news story describes a new video game, downloadable via Internet, in which players get to shoot at President John F. Kennedy's motorcade from a digital Texas School Book Depository window. The goal is to fire three shots and match Lee Harvey Oswald's slaying of the President, with points deducted if Jacqueline Kennedy is shot by mistake. This story is noteworthy as an example of the interpersonal divide, not because of the poor taste or violence, but to underscore the new generation gap as described in Chapter Six, "The Medium is the Moral," noting that Baby Boomers view technology as communication and current youth, as entertainment. Teaching Tip: Build a lecture file on "the new generation gap," documenting how news and historical accounts have crossed over to gaming, videos and other formats. When news and history become entertainment, what are the learning consequences? Are the entertained inspired toward social justice ... or civic apathy?

Title: "Home Owners Make Room for New Rooms"  Author: Catherine Donaldson-Evans Citation: Fox News, 10 November 2004. URL:  http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,138066,00.html Description: This feature story documents the extinction of the "reading room" and "family room" in the typical household.  It showcases "hybrid rooms" meant for familial multitasking, combining elements of the living room, dining room, den, media room and home office. Also popular are media rooms "equipped with stereos, big-screen TVs, surround sound and Internet access, playrooms for children, fitness rooms and home offices, where telecommuters and those needing to squeeze in work at the house can tap away at the computer and do whatever else their busy jobs require." This story not only documents the extinction of rooms made for interpersonal contact; it also affirms the blurring of work-home boundaries. Teaching Tip:  Discuss this news story in preparation for the journal exercise in Chapter Four about naming rooms after their interpersonal function.

Title: "Ads Insinuated into Video Games" Author: The Associated Press Citation: CNN, Technology, 22 October 2004. URL: http://www.bizreport.com/print/8204/ Description: This news report notes a new push by marketers to  integrate advertising seamlessly into video games, with city-scapes containing billboards from Best Buy, Cingular Wireless and other advertisers. The fact that product placements are being inserted into such games is, in itself, not vastly different from such placements in movies; however, because of Internet technology, those placements can be updated on demand via online gaming. Thus, those virtual billboards can be bought and sold as in real life, with Best Buy appearing one day and Cingular the next. Marketers are tracking men aged 18-34 primarily who have decreased watching television and now are playing video games. Marketers see this as a normal expansion of advertising into new media. Teaching Tip:  This updates Chapter Six, "Icons and Caricatures," under the subhead "Icons and Advertising," which lists marketing ploys associated with video gaming. There is an ethical aspect to this phenomenon that makes for good class discussion: What if marketers download alcohol and tobacco advertising as part of in-game promotion? What are the potential security breaches in a technology that downloads advertising? Are marketers making pathways for hackers and browser hijackers and, if so, who should be liable for virus removal, especially if online gamers are paying monthly fees?

Title: "Anti-Phishing Working Group"  Author: None listed Citation: Citibank scam information, October 2004 URL:  http://www.antiphishing.org/phishing_archive/10-06-04_Citibank(Reserve)/ 10-06-04_Citibank(Reserve).html Description: The term "phishing" means what it implies--an online fishing expedition to gain access to credit card and other financial data to defraud those who take the cyberbait. To counteract this threat, corporations and other organizations support the Anti- Phishing Working Group, dedicated to eliminating the identity theft and fraud arising out of phishing and email spoofing. In the above URL the APWG explains a new credit card scam. Michael Bugeja, author of Interpersonal Divide, coincidentally, was a target of this scam. He received a phisy email message, ironically noting the threat of cyberattacks on credit cards and asking him to provide financial information and password to protect his account against fraud. To see the email, whose scam address has been changed to protect visitors, click here: http://www.interpersonal-divide.org/ miscellaneous/citiscam.html.  Teaching Tip:  Typically students receive their first credit cards upon entering college. Discuss phishing and ask them if are they less or more apt to be taken in by such online scams, because of frequent use of Internet. A visit to the Anti-Phishing Working Group site, exposing different kinds of scams, also facilitates learning.

Title: "Instant Messaging and a Stalking Obsession"  Author: Kate Walther Citation: The Athens News, 23 September 2004. URL:  http://www.athensnews.com/issue/article.php3?story_id=18189 Description: This commentary in an alternative newspaper speaks about college students' addiction to instant messaging. The author, writing in a breathy familiar tone, depicts how easily users lapse  into obsession bordering on cyber-stalking. Running through the piece is a cry of acceptance: "There's no better way to get attention or to get people to notice you. Hey, look at me. ..." The irony of the piece is that the author reveals her own overuse of instant messaging, intuiting the scope of the problem. She ends with an apt allusion: "So let's face it, we are addicted to instant messenger. It's like a very powerful drug to us. We crave it. We need it. Without it, we go through withdrawal." The commentary, while not informative, illustrates key points in the text, especially as they relate to acceptance, addiction, and idenity. Teaching Tip:  Compare symptoms of addiction with passages from suggested readings, including Marie Winn's The Plug-In Drug. Issues of addiction and identity also are discussed in Chapter Five.

Title: "Internet Comes to the Farm"  Author: None listed Citation: College of Liberal Arts & Sciences, 3 September 2004. URL:  http://www.las.iastate.edu/newnews/abbott0906.shtml Description: This educational feature story reports on research results of Eric Abbott, professor in the Greenlee School of Journalism and Communication at Iowa State University. Abbott notes that some 80 percent of farm households with computers in his survey were using the Internet in 2001. "As might be expected, farmers were much more likely to seek farm decision information, children were more likely to play games and use the Internet for school activities, and spouses used the Internet most for email," reports Abbott, who also recommends proactive use of Internet by university outreach and extension. Teaching Tip: For teachers near rural areas, or at land-grant colleges, invite extension officials to class to discuss the "wired farm" and how, if at all, they are appealing to that audience.

Title: "Schools Back Off Cellphone Ban"  Author: Gabriela C. Guzman Citation: Albuquerque Journal, 15 August 2004, A28. URL:  http://www.interpersonal-divide.org/2004urls/cellphoneban Description: This news story reports on Albuquerque Public Schools' deeming its cell phone ban unenforceable. Michael Bugeja is interviewed as a source, noting that a ban on cell phones was unenforceable and suggestings an area where students can use them in the schools. Also, a student claims that teachers take cell phone calls in class--a new twist on misuse of technology during school time. Teaching Tip:  Ask students to list the many ways that cell phones disrupt class time, along with the educational process, from teachers taking calls to students texting answers to questions on quizzes.

Title: "Students Say Technology Has Little Impact on Teaching"   Author: Jeffrey R. Young Citation: Chronicle of Higher Education, 13 August 2004, A28. URL: http://chronicle.com/prm/weekly/v50/i49/49a02801.htm Description: This news story reports on a survey finding only 12.7 percent of students maintaining that the greatest benefit of classroom technology is improved teaching. (About half cite "convenience" such as looking up grades as greatest benefit.)  Teaching Tip: Conduct an informal survey with your own students on use of classroom technology, from your Web page to your multimedia presentations. Ask if your own interpersonal teaching style changes when you use technology and which do they prefer--more technology, or less. Finally, view the results of surveys like this through the generational model presented in Interpersonal Divide, that teachers see technology as information and students, as entertainment.

Title: "Unshaken Hands on the Digital Street"   Author: Michael Bugeja Section: The Chronicle Review Citation: Chronicle of Higher Education, 30 July 2004, B5. URL: http://chronicle.com/prm/weekly/v50/i47/47b00501.htm Description: This essay on mobile phones notes that the technology has assimilated the public street, contributing to loss of community, and also discusses the use of mobile phones in assembling crowds for celebratory riots. Teaching Tip: Ask students about their cellphone habits and associate them with "The Seven Habits of Highly Mediated People" in Chapter Three. See comments from readers.

Title: "Why the E-Learning Boom Went Bust" Authors: Robert Zemsky and William F. Massy Section: The Chronicle Review Citation: Chronicle of Higher Education, 9 July 2004, B6 URL: http://chronicle.com/prm/weekly/v50/i44/44b00601.htm Discussion: Only a few years ago universities invested heavily in online learning, believing that students would welcome earning credits from home. As the title of this insightful essay indicates, the e-Learning Boom was a bust. Teaching Tip: Ask students to give some perspective on the effectiveness of distance versus residential learning and which they prefer ... and why. Some of the "whys" might have little to do with learning and more to do with socializing on residential campuses.

Title: "Violent Video Games: Specific Effects of Violent Content on Aggressive Thoughts and Behavior" Authors: Craig A. Anderson et. al. Citation: Advances in Experimental Social Psychology, 36, 199-249. URL: http://www.psychology.iastate.edu/faculty/caa/abstracts/2000-2004/ 04AESP.pdf Discussion: Three experimental studies assess the short-term and long-term impact of exposure to violent video games. The authors conclude, in part, that while more empirical studies need to be conducted, there is reason to believe that the video-game violence effect will be more intense than the television violence effect, because of the interactivitity of gaming. Teaching Tip: Ask students to describe interpersonal conditions that exist when they decide to play a violent video game. For instance, are they (a) alone in their rooms, (b) ignoring others in their environment, (c) bored, (d) procrastinating? Then ask them to describe their mood after playing a violent video game. What changed, and how did that impact their interpersonal conditions?