Here are some notes to remind you of the Readings of the Week, on Work Part II (E-Commerce). Feel free to skim some papers.
Scourge of Spam: arising from the openness of the Internet - costs a pittance to send - was 70% of all traffic in 2004 - overwhelming servers and wasting time for organizations - hijacked computers and botnets - are filters working well enough? - coming from anywhere - Canada has "new" law to prevent (opt-in): is this working?
Cyberwarfare and Ransomware: a new challenge for online businesses - cases where organizations have paid up - new demands for investment in security - possible joint efforts: can this be mitigated or not? - what are your clever ideas?
Threatened business (journalism): newspaper industry under threat: asking for paid subscriptions, trying video and blogs online, different ad revenue cannot recoup losses, competition from many online sources, their resources "stolen" by others, is computerization making this whole industry obsolete?
E-Voting: governments trying to operate online - concerns about e-voting including poor interfaces, system failures, lack of transparency, fraud, lack of confidence that information is kept private, disadvantaged population - someone looking over your shoulder as you vote?- would you e-vote and do you e-file your taxes: what is the difference? - can e-voting help in emergencies (e.g. hurricanes)? - article suggests some in Canada want to move to e-vote (agree?)
Consumer behaviour: the need for businesses to be aware and attuned - article was written before the pandemic - have our online shopping behaviours now changed and how should industry be responding?
Bitcoin: should organizations support this? - is this the wave of the future or simply a problematic technology which arose due to the computerization of our life? - should banks be embracing this option or should they rise up to press for better social good?
Thinking beyond the Readings: as a bonus, Week6 will offer an opportunity to also think on your feet about a distinct issue related to Work, only raised during class time (a good experience to see if you can reflect and react)
Announcements: - A4 will be underway shortly and due Jun 23 at 10am; feel free to work on A5 concurrently - as RPEs continue, think about A6 - Jun 15 and Jul 17 feature an ethics workshop: we will look at specific scenarios from a Handout that will be posted before that week begins (and will study one scenario from Week7 readings) - Jun 13 is entirely online now and features a guest speaker on AI Ethics (a Jun 13 folder has been added to Piazza for any follow-up comments)