Melissa de Zwart

‘I like, stalk them on Facebook’: Teachers' ‘privacy’ and the risks of social networking sites

Social networking sites (SNS), including MySpace and Facebook, and other media rich websites with social networking functions such as Bebo, Flickr and YouTube, offer new and varied ways to communicate for both students and teachers. This paper focuses on the complexities, particularly legal complexities, that may arise from teachers and students sharing social networks. For example, in October 2009, Queensland State School teachers were issued with a Code of Conduct prohibiting them from using SNS to contact or access students and mandating that any ‘private use’ of social networks by teachers must be kept ‘appropriate and private’. However, this interdiction is deeply problematic, especially as SNS are designed to increase the number of users and their connections and by their very nature resist being private. Drawing upon Australian and overseas examples, this paper describes a SNS landscape in which traditional notions of privacy are much harder to maintain and can have risks, including legal risks, for teachers.

New Laws for New Space? Using Law Reform to Drive Commercial Space Initiatives

This paper considers the use of domestic laws, and the consequent need for law reform, to encourage broader engagement with commercial space innovation. It will consider, in particular, the Review of the Space Activities Act 1998 (Cth) currently being undertaken in Australia, which examines whether existing legislative arrangements “provide an appropriate balance between supporting emerging commercial opportunities and ensuring Australia meets its international obligations for the use of space”. It undertakes an examination of the history of civil space activities in Australia and addresses the failure of space policy in Australia since the 1960s to encourage the development of a commercial space industry. The example of the early success of Australia as a space-faring nation, being the fourth country in the world to launch a satellite from its own territory, followed by a period of almost complete inertia, provides an excellent case study through which to explore how law reform may drive the development of a commercial space industry. In particular, it considers the early cooperation of Australia in the ELDO project, the focus on being a launch provider and the emerging recognition of the role space research and development may play in innovation and commercial success. This paper looks at how the domestic laws of Australia were designed to implement obligations under the international Outer Space treaties and the impact that decisions made in that legislation may now be impeding the growth of a New Space industry in Australia.

Data retention, journalist freedoms and whistleblowers:

As members of the ‘fourth estate’, journalists have enjoyed certain limited protections for themselves and their sources under the laws of various countries. These protections are now uniquely challenged in the context of metadata retention and enhanced surveillance and national security protections. This article examines the recent changes to laws in Australia and the position of journalists as investigative watchdogs. It considers the nature of the new laws, the responses of journalists, the broader context of commercial journalism and the rise of the infotainment business model, and the role of the ‘networked fourth estate’ and non-institutional actors in creating accountable government in Australia.

Randoms vs Weirdos: Teen Use of Social Networking Sites and Perceptions of Legal Risk

This article reports on research to identify the risks relevant to teens when using these services and provide them with practical guidance regarding how to miminise and avoid such risks. The authors, drawn from the education and law disciplines, undertook to ascertain the actual scale and nature of use of SNS among teenagers in years 7 to 10, the perceptions of risk associated with such use and the actual legal risks. The project produced both a report detailing the outcomes of the research and an educational resource to be distributed to all Victorian schools that may be used to assist students, teachers and parents to discuss and critically consider the risks and legal implications of using SNS. This article discusses some key outcomes of the study related to use of SNS and perceptions of legal risks.