Contemporary Issues in the
Information Age

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Class of Year 2003
Class of Year 2001
Syllabus URL: http://classes.maxwell.syr.edu/psc300_103
PSC 300, Section 103
Time:
2:00-3:20, Tuesday, Thursday
Meeting Place: Eggers 032
Instructor:
Jongwoo Han
Senior Associate
of Center for Technology and Information Policy
Email: jonghan@maxwell.syr.edu
Phone Number: 443-5856
Office: 532 Eggers Hall
Office Hours: 3:30-4:30, Tuesday & Thursday and by
Appointment
Korea
Course Description
We are living in a period of major a historical
transformation, Information Technology
Revolution,
as was the 18th century the Industrial Revolution. The extensive and systematic use
of scientific knowledge and networked information technology
in a society introduces new forms of relationship
in the
economy, state, society as well as in our
private life. Contemporary society witnesses the unprecedented
transformation in the processes of production and distribution changing the material basis
of the human species, which will shape new sets of relationships
in our political system and culture. In such
a newly emerging networked
society, there are many
challenging socio-economic and political issues
to be addressed. For
example, Internet and politics of election campaigns, global civic alliance, taxation/security in the global and domestic Electronic Commerce, disputes over
various kinds of intellectual property rights, new management system in the Internet,
censorship and privacy in the virtual space, and new forms of regulation policy in the
telecommunication industry. Furthermore, this networked society has to deal with
the structural crisis of the legitimacy of the political community and identity
as well as political changes from the cyber public
sphere. Good
examples are changes in the gender relationship, the future of the
nation state, and Internet impacts on social capital. This course is designed to examine such major contemporary socio-economic
and political issues in the advent of Information Society. This course will be
based on active student research and presentation.
Course Design
This course is mainly composed of three parts:
1) an introduction on the impacts of networked information
technology upon our community, especially on "online community" and the
issues of "bonding" or "Bridging" and the brief
review of topics for student presentations, which count a substantial part of
the total grade; 2)
Preliminary presentations and lectures on 7 topics; and 3) Final group presentation. In
the first part, this course includes an
official session of Website-building. Every student should attend
the
session and learn how to build a Web site for the final presentation. And we will briefly go over 6 major topics so that
students and each group can choose one topic for the preliminary presentation
set. Each group will present its preliminary report for 20 minutes. The
second part will review 7 topics: Topic 1 Information Society; Topic 2 Privacy;
Topic 3 IT and Political Change; Topic 4 IT and Election Campaign; Topic 5 IT
and Government; Topic 6 IT and Online Community; Topic 7 IT and Security & Trustworthiness in the complex system.
Each student is obliged to read assigned
materials in the course website and is supposed to be ready to answer to
the questions
in the class.
The last part is
for the final group presentation. Each group works a specific presentation topic
already chosen in the beginning of the course.
Information
about the Maxwell Computer Account :Non-Maxwell students will be given the Maxwell computer
account for the use of Maxwell computer system and for the access of the
Interactive Media Lab (IML, Eggers 064, Monday through Friday from 9
to 5). After a session of how to build a Website, Students will have full
access to consult with IML consultants and to use IML facilities for the
construction of websites for your presentations.
Guideline for assignments
-
Guideline for a Paper and a Presentation: for
both Preliminary and Final presentation and paper
- Example:
NSI & Privacy (Civil Liberties)
- Meeting with Instructor: At least
two meetings with Instructor before and after your preliminary
Assignments and Grade Policy
- Attendance:10%
(Not more than three times of absence throughout this course)
- Assignments: 15%
1) An analytical paper on Intelligent Cities Project Report due on September
1, Thursday
2) Group presentation on Online Community due on September 20,
Tuesday and 22 Thursday.
- Preliminary Group Presentation (October 27 and
November 1 classes) with 3-page group report& Web Building Project:15%
- Final-term Exam: 30%
- Final Presentation: 30%
Course Materials:
All the reading assignments are either in course Web
site with hyperlinks or digitally
available at the Web site of Bird Library. Go to SU Bird web and click Course
Materials and then find reading assignments under instructor name Jongwoo Han
or Course number PSC 300103.
Reserved materials
at
Reserve Desk of Bird Library. Books recommended
for your own additional readings
This course encourages
students to check various sources of News on IT
every day basis:
Major Daily News:
www.abcnews.go.com, www.nyt.com,
www.wired.com/news/
Major Political Webs: www.meetup.com,
www.moveon.org,
www.rockthevote.com,
http://www.unitedforpeace.org/
Examples of Contemporary
Social Problems
FLASH MOB Comics
1, 2,
3
Illegally
imported drugs
Credit
Card Fraud
Organized Transnational Crime
Research, Statistics and Survey
on Information Society
Y2K
Groups and Team Leaders
Class Schedule
- (Aug. 30, T) Course
Introduction and Policy &
Brief Review of 7 Topics
1) Assignment: A 3-page analytical report on
"The Intelligent Cities Project Reports",
due on Sep. 1
- (Sep. 1, Th)
Major issues in the
Information Age Overview I &
Lecture Note &
Topic and Group Selection
1) Reading:
The
Intelligent Cities Project Report by Global Affairs Institute &
Institute for
Electronic Government, IBM.
2) From Nowhere
to Everywhere and
Lecture Power
Point
- (Sep. 6, T)
NNIs and Social Capital: "Bonding" or "Bridging"?
Lecture Power Point [DL: 2, 7]
1)
Introduction by Robert Putnam,
Better Together
2) Chapter 11: Craigslist.org: Is Virtual Community Real?
- (Sep. 8, Th) Digital Integration I
(PowerPoint
& Print Format)
Reading [DL
13]: Andy Covell. Digital Convergence on "What is
convergence.
1) Chapter 2 Conventional Technologies
2) Chapter 3 How Digital Does It Differently?
- (Sep. 13, T) Digital Integration II
1)
Digital Integration: Technologies
-- Analog,
Analog vs Digital,
Morse Code
-- Circuit vs Packet Switching,
-- ASCII, ASCII
Scan Code,
-- TCP/IP,
How Data Travel,
-- Domain Names
--
Shutter Telegraph (Optical
Telegraph)
- (Sep. 15, Th)
Building Website Using FrontPage in the Maxwell Computer
system by Matt Coulter (Maxwell Webmaster)
Tutorials:
http://www.maxwell.syr.edu/ict/knowledgebase/software/frontpage/default.asp
Maxwell
Accounts
- (Sep. 20, T) Online Community I: Presenting the Most
Popular Websites (The
Best of the Web):
Peer Evaluation
3 groups and 20 minutes for each group:
David (Online
community group),
Amy (Privacy Group), and
Ellen (Government group)
1)
Activist Organizations
2)
Blogs/Opinion
3)
Chat/Community/Personal Networking
4)
Government
5)
2004 U.S. Election
**
Top 100
Web Sites by Country
- (Sep. 22, Th) Online Community II: Presenting the
Most Popular Websites (The
Best of the Web):
3 groups and 20 minutes for each group:
Ahl (Election
group), Emily (Security group),
David Robbie (Political Change group)
1)
Activist Organizations
2)
Blogs/Opinion
3)
Chat/Community/Personal Networking
4)
Government
5)
2004 U.S. Election
**
Top 100
Web Sites by Country
LECTURE
on meetup.com as an example of "Online Community"
PEER EVALUATION &
Outcomes
- (Sep. 27, T)
U.S. Telecom Policy I &
Lecture Note
Readings:
[DL: 3, 44]
-
(Sep. 29, Th) US Telecom
Policy II
Readings: [DL: 3, 44]
Review of Major
7 Issues in the Information Age
- (Oct. 4, T) Topic 1:
Information Society: Theory
Readings: [DL:
29, 30, 32, 33]
1) Information Society
(Guideline) I
& Class Lecture
2) Knowledge or
Information Economy
(Guideline)
3)
Class
Lecture on Historical Materialism
(Print
Format)
4) Taylorism and
Industrial Age
5) Values of Information
6) IT and
new economy Digital Economy (PowerPoint &
Print
Format)
--
Teleworking
-- Virtual Aliens: Global
Business Process Outsourcing
- (Oct. 6, Th) Topic 1: Information Society: America
1)
Pew’s Internet and
American Life Project
**
Getting Serious Online (required reading)
**
The Internet and Daily Life (required reading)
**
The
Internet as a Unique News Source (optional)
**
How Americans Get in Touch With Government (optional)
- (Oct. 11, T)
Topic 2 Privacy I –
Lecture Note
Readings: [DL:
4, 49, 50] & "Do
Not Call List"
October 13, Thursday: NO
CLASS
- (Oct. 18, T)
Topic 3: IT and Political Change and
[Lecture
Power Point] &
Tables
1) Jongwoo Han:
Putting Social Capital to Use in Cyberspace
2) NGO Korea &
Defeat Movement
3) Salt Lake
Winter Olympics in 2002
3)
World Cup Games
and Red Devil Phenomenon
4)
Red Devils' Images:
1
- (Oct. 20, Th)
Topic
3: IT and political change Continued
1) Readings: [DL:
15, 16, 40, 47]
2) "meetup.com,
moveon.org, rockthevote.com, United for Peace and Justice"
2) Guidelines: What are these websites for and how different from each
other? How are they different
from Industrial medium? What are the problemsSYDMOB,
Mob BBC,
CNN
3) Flash Mob Lecture Note,
4)
Yong
Generation's Voting
5)
Polling Problems of Cellular Phone Users
- (Oct. 25, T)
-
(Oct. 27, Th)
Preliminary
Presentation of your Research Topics:
Government
[Evaluation],
Privacy
[Evaluation],
On-line
[Evaluation]
1) Assignments: 3-page Group Report and 20 minute Group Web-Presentation
2) Guideline
3) Critiques:
- (Nov. 1, T) Preliminary
Presentation of your Research Topics:
Political
Change [Evaluation],
Security
[Evaluation],
Election
[Evaluation]
1) Assignments: 3-page Group Report and 20 minute Group Web-Presentation
2) Guideline
3) Critiques:
- (Nov. 3, Th)
Topic
4: IT
and Election Campaign I
1)
Cyber Democracy I
(PowerPoint &
Print
Format)
2)
Reading:
Federal Election
Commission
3) Internet Campaign (PowerPoint)
4) Updated:
http://www.fec.gov/pdf/record/2005/may05.pdf
- (Nov. 8, T)
Topic 4: IT and Election Campaign II (PowerPoint)
1) Reading:
Federal Election
Commission
2)
Summary Table
- (Nov. 10, Th) Topic 5: IT and government (PowerPoint
& Print
Format)
Readings:
[DL: 18, 19]
1) David Osborne and Ted Gaebler "Preface of Reinventing
Government
2) Relyea, Harold C. 2001. "Electronic Government: A Conceptual
Overview," CRS Report for
Congress
3)
E-Government
Analyzing/Evaluation Framework
(Nov. 15, T)
Topic
5: IT and government
1) Reading: Jongwoo Han,
Governance of
Electronic Government &
Lecture Note
2)
Internet
Governance and UN
(Nov. 17, Th)
Topic 6: On-line Community:
Inhabiting the virtual city by
Judith S. Donath &
Lecture Notes
1) Readings: Part I (Chapter 2
The city and the body & 3 Contemporary on-line social environments)
2) What is online (virtual) community?
MUDs
(Nov. 22, T) Topic 7: IT and security
1) Encryption Technology:
Reading &
Lecture
(by Charles C. Mann,
Atlantic Monthly, September, 2002)
Thanksgiving Holiday, November 23, Wednesday
-- November 27, Sunday
(Nov. 29, T)
Final Presentation
I (2 groups/session and 30-35 minutes for each)
: Political Change Group
(Before:
Political
Change &
After) &
Evaluation
: Security
Group
(Before:
Security
& After)
&
Evaluation
(Dec. 1, Th)
Final Presentation II (2 groups/session and 30-35 minutes for each)
: Government Group
(Before: Government
&
After) &
Evaluation
:
Online Group
(Before:
On-line
& After) &
Evaluation
(Dec. 6, T)
Final Presentation
III (2 groups/session and 30-35 minutes for each):
: Election Group (Before:
Election
& After) &
Evaluation
: Privacy Group (Before:
Privacy
& After) &
Evaluation
(Dec. 8, Th) Final Wrap-up and
Final Exam
Review
Final-Term Exam:
December 12, Monday from 10:15-12:15 at 032 Eggers Hall
Extra