L1.11: Discussion Assignment - Ethics of the Pin

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For this week's discussion I want to focus on ethics and specifically on the "pin" of your home that I asked for. However, before you head over to the dedicated Lesson 1 Discussion Forum to talk about the issue, here are a few prompts for this week's discussion: These are Coursera instructions.

  • Display the map showing the locations where the students of this class pinned their homes.
  • Explore the data to see if individuals pinned their home locations.
  • Argue if it was or was not ethical for me to ask you to "pin" your home location.

You might then consider that The Society of Competitive Intelligence Professionals' (SCIP) Code of Ethics is:

  • To continually strive to increase the recognition and respect of the profession.
  • To comply with all applicable laws, domestic and international.
  • To accurately disclose all relevant information, including one's identity and organization, prior to all interviews.
  • To fully respect all requests for confidentiality of information.
  • To avoid conflicts of interest in fulfilling one's duties.
  • To provide honest and realistic recommendations and conclusions in the execution of one's duties.
  • To promote this code of ethics within one's company, with third-party contractors, and within the entire profession.
  • To faithfully adhere to and abide by one's company policies, objectives and guidelines.

Decisions about making or keeping geospatial information private might consider the following:

  • Usefulness: the potential usefulness of geospatial information for nefarious acts.
  • Uniqueness: the uniqueness of the information. If alternative sources of the same information are readily available, the net privacy benefits may be minimal or nonexistent.
  • Benefits and Costs: the expected societal benefits and costs of restricting the information.

Use such tests as the following:

  • harm test: Does this option do less harm than alternatives?
  • publicity test: Would I want my choice of this option published in the newspaper?
  • defensibility test: Could I defend choice of option before a committee of peers?
  • reversibility test: Would I still think choice of this option good if I were adversely affected by it?
  • colleague test: What do my colleagues say when I describe my problem and suggest this option is my solution?
  • professional test: What might my profession's governing body for ethics committee say about this option?
  • organization test: What does the company's ethics officer or legal counsel say about this?

Discussion Grading

Participation in discussions is worth 10% of your overall grade in the class. To earn the full 10%, you need to make a total of 10 original posts or comments by the end of the class. If I were you, I'd shoot for posting twice each week. Read the Grading Policy page for more details. This applies to the Coursera lesson --- remove it?