Archive for March 1st, 2003
The World Economic Forum and “Accidental Privacy Spills”
My friend Colin emailed me a couple of fascinating links. The first is this–the text of a private email that a well-respected journalist, Laurie Garrett, sent to a group of friends after attending the recent World Economic Forum. The message, informally written and full of behind-the-scenes observations that are clearly not meant for public consumption, makes for an informative read.
But more interesting, it turns out, is what happened in the weeks after Garrett hit the send button. The message was forwarded on to scores of people, as remarkable emails so often are, and it wound up being automatically archived on the Web. Then the email was linked to, analyzed, and (sometimes cruelly) deconstructed on MetaFilter, a Weblog and message board.
When several people emailed Garrett to verify the authenticity of her musings, she eventually confirmed that she had, indeed, penned the missive. And then she launched a stunning tirade that 1) displays a shockingly naive view of how information spreads virally via email, and 2) is full of righteous indignation: she’s mad at the Internet community, and MetaFilter users in particular, for disregarding her privacy.
For an in-depth look at the various dimensions of the situation, see “Accidental Privacy Spills:” Musings on Privacy, Democracy, and the Internet.