mme_hardy | Facebook update

(via

rydra_wong ) The Guardian summarizes what is known to date.

It’s become farcical. Whoever we ask, nobody seems to know anything. Did the study have ethical approval? First the answer was yes. Then it was no. Then it was maybe. Then it was no again. Was it funded by the US army? First the university said yes. Then it said no, without explanation. Why did the scientific journal not state whether the study was ethically approved, as required by its own policy? Sorry, editor Susan Fiske told me, I’m too busy to answer that question.

Another sharp-eyed person has spotted that the word in the EULA that Facebook is relying on to demonstrate consent, "research", wasn't added until four months after the study.

The defenses I've read have boiled down to "But they're a private company! They do this all the time!" and "It didn't have a *large* effect." The answers are obvious. Private companies may indeed do this all the time (and that's not a good thing), but U.S. academics affiliated with research institutions are held to a higher standard. And as to the effect, the academics had no way of knowing it beforehand. You can't justify an ethical decision based on its consequences; you have to judge it on the information available at the time.