Do you understand how to be a good digital citizen?
Everybody wants to be a good digital citizen but when was the last time you downloaded a song without paying for it or streamed a video from a suspect streaming site? Do you use a virtual private network (VPN) to make websites think you are from another country so that you can watch shows and sports that you can’t legally watch here? If you have done any of these activities then you have broken the law and you’re not a good digital citizen.
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Acceptable use policies and youDid you know that you have to follow the college’s Acceptable Use Policy (AUP) whenever you are using the college’s networks, computer systems, and other equipment, wherever you are using them, in the college, at home, or anywhere? The penalties for not working within the AUP can be very serious. If you are a student you can be asked to leave the college. Members of staff may be fired. If the offense is serious enough, the police could be brought in. So make sure you follow the college's AUP wherever you are to ensure that you are a good digital citizen.
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Ethical use of online materialsYou have to be very careful to comply with copyright and other laws if you intend sharing another person’s ideas, writings, images, videos, or anything else created by that person. It is an offense to claim that the work of another is your own either explicitly or by omission. Keep on the right side of the law:
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Technology and cheating - it's not worth it!Cheating isn’t just glancing over and reading answers from another student’s work, sending notes, or whispering answers. Cheating now involves technology at the highest level. The average smartphone has many times the processing power of PCs from a few years ago. They can store thousands of images, notes, sound files, videos, and they can link to every website available via a data connection.
Don’t forget that the penalties for cheating can be very severe and instructors and colleges are fighting back. If you cheat by copying from the internet your work can be analyzed by anti-plagiarism software. Such software can compare your work with any other similar samples. Beware you will be caught if you cheat (Cheating, 2017). |
Other inappropriate uses of technologyA good digital citizen has a responsibility to other citizens too. As they say, “If you see something, say something (See Something, 2017).”
As a good digital citizen, you should report any instances of cyberbullying or threatening behavior sent via email, texting, or social media, to the appropriate authorities. Likewise, you should report anyone you suspect of distributing inappropriate images of you or anybody else. Find out more on the Digital Communications page. (What is Digital Citizenship?, 2011)
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This work by Stephen Taylor is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.