Banned Books Week

30 Sept - 6 Oct is Banned Books Week, which is obviously AGAINST banning books. There is a home page at http://bannedbooksweek.org/ and a Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/bannedbooksweek This is a US (particularly American Library Association) organised event, but e.g. you can post your favourite "Banned" title on the Facebook page.

I am part of a Banned Books Week panel Free to read, taking place in the virtual world Second Life on 1 October at 5pm Second Life Time = US Pacific Time (1am Tuesday in the UK! see http://www.timeanddate.com/worldclock/fixedtime.html?iso=20121001T17&p1=234 for times elsewhere) on Community Virtual Library Exhibition Area http://slurl.com/secondlife/Info%20Island/61/94/24/. Other panel speakers on intellectual freedom are Pat Franks, Valerie Hill, Jane Bering, and Monika Talaroc.

IFLA #wlic2012 Internet censorship in context: the shape of things to come

Another post from the IFLA World Library and Information Conference in Helsinki, Finland. Päivikki Karhula (University of Tampere, School of Information Sciences, Tampere, Finland) spoke about Internet censorship in context: the shape of things to come. Again this was livestreamed, so should be viewed afterwards on http://express.ifla.org/videos

Karhula traced the origins of the open internet and the growing practice of control, through legislation and filtering. From about 2005-2010 the control and surveillance became more nuanced and pervasive. She felt that the latest issue was the militerisation of cyberspace.
About 20 countries are reckoned to practice pervasive levels of censorship, including very large countries like China. There are different actors in censorship and control, public and private, and an increasing range at different points in the process. Karhula gave some specific examples involving journalists and artists. She identified some worrying trends, with increased ability to identify where people were, and when they were there, integrated with other information giving new mass surveillance. She felt that digital civil rights therefore needed to be redefined. We need protective technologies (against data sharing and tracking), legislation to protect rights, and activism and lobbying to highlight these issues.
Some questions afterwards were raised about the place of libraries. The panel chair pointed to the work of FAIFE itself: notably the IFLA Internet manifesto. Obviously there are implications for information literacy here (though I'm afraid I didn't raise them - too busy blogging!), making people aware of the issues and indeed helping people understand how they can know whether such controls are being practised in the first place.

Karhula finished by showing the video: (un)LAWFUL ACCESS: Canadian experts on the state of cyber surveillance. http://unlawfulaccess.net/

A recent article by Karhula on the FAIFE site is:
Karhula, P. (2012) Data driven futures - censorship takes new forms. FAIFE spotlight. http://www.ifla.org/en/publications/data-driven-futures-censorship-takes-new-forms

IFLA #wlic2012 Privatization of cyberspace - case Google

Siva Vaidhyanathan was the first speaker in a session from IFLA's Free Access to Information and Freedom of Expression (FAIFE) group, which is taking place at the IFLA World Library and Information Conference in Helsinki, Finland. He spoke on Privatization of cyberspace - case Google. He is the author of:
Vaidhyanathan, S. (2011) The Googlization of Everything: (And Why We Should Worry). Updated Edition. University of California Press.
This whole FAIFE session is livestreamed and I think it will be available here from tomorrow: http://express.ifla.org/videos
Siva Vaidhyanathan (pictured speaking at the session) started by identifying the ways in which Google search has changed, to have more localisation and personalisation, to smooth out some more offensive sites and to screen out what they term "low quality" news: in other words making editorial decisions. I've blogged presentations from Karen Blakeman, that detail this kind of thing.
Most recently (last week) Google has yielded to pressure, and will give more prominence to "legitimate" sites for films, music and television (so bit torrent sites and fan sites will slide down the rankings). Thus it has moved towards consumerism and he saw further movement in that direction in the future.