Faculty and Facebook

Here is an interesting short paper on student/faculty relations in Facebook by a couple of researchers from Georgia Tech [pdf]
Crossing Boundaries: Identity Management and Student/Faculty Relationships on the Facebook
Anne Hewitt and Andrea Forte
GVU Center, Georgia Institute of Technology
ABSTRACT
This report “describes preliminary results from an ongoing investigation of student/faculty relationships in the online community Facebook. In spring of 2006, a survey was conducted in two large courses at a mid-sized public research university to understand how contact on Facebook was influencing student perceptions of faculty. We found that contact on Facebook had no impact on students’ ratings of professors. We found it striking that one third of the students we surveyed did not believe that faculty should be present on the Facebook at all. Some raised concerns about identity management and privacy issues. We discuss the implications of these findings and the potential for further research in the area.”
I remember similar debates when the web started having .com (commercial) folks ‘invade’ it. It was an interesting debate and it was inevitable anyway. Now we have discussion what humans are allowed in what walled gardens. Hmmmm. It’s an ongoing study so further results will be even more interesting.
Free culture is free culture.
Stephen