Homework #5 - Ethics

This is a short research and writing assignment. The purpose of this assignment is for you to think closely about an ethical issue related to programming (and more broadly, to technology). You’ll read an article, then write 2-3 paragraphs in response to prompts about the article.

Instructions

Choose one of the articles below to read. If you would prefer to find a different article to write about that follows the theme of ethics and technology and is of personal interest to you, that’s fine, too. Make sure to indicate which article you’re responding to at the top of your assignment.

• Experts debate the ethics of LinkedIn’s algorithm experiments on 20M users
• Facebook ads have a problem. It’s called digital redlining.
• How Target Figured Out A Teen Girl Was Pregnant Before Her Father Did
• The Best Algorithms Struggle to Recognize Black Faces Equally
• Closed Captioning Not Provided: Why the new era of streaming TV is making life hard on deaf viewers
• EA: Loot boxes actually “surprise mechanics” that are “ethical and fun”
• Parents sue TikTok after 7 kids die from profitable Blackout Challenge videos
• Duolingo cuts workers as it relies more on AI
• Behind E-Books, Libraries Find Restrictions and High Costs
• ‘There is no standard’: investigation finds AI algorithms objectify women’s bodies
• 23andMe bankruptcy underscores health privacy gaps
• The trouble with Roblox, the video game empire built on child labour
• Pokewalking while black: Pokemon GO and America’s ‘e-quality’ of life

Next, write a 2-3 paragraph reflection about the article you’ve chosen to read. Your reflection should contain:

1. The title of the article you read. (If it isn’t one of the articles above, also include a link to the article.)

2. Summarize: write 1 paragraph describing the ethical issue the article talks about, in your words.

3. Reflect: write 1-2 paragraphs reflecting on the article. Specifically, think about the issue in terms of programming and design: what decisions were made in the creation of the technology (or in the marketing or use of the technology) that led to the issue(s)? What, if anything, do you think could be done to address the issue? When thinking about systems or technologies you might be involved with working on in the future, how might thinking about the possible costs of the technology affect how you approach your work?

Note: these are hard questions to answer, and there’s no right answer. Don’t feel like you have to answer them definitively. You may do more research into the issue if you wish, but it’s not required. The goal of the assignment is to get you to think more deeply about the potential consequences of technology and to put into words what you think about it.

Turn in

Turn in your reflection in on D2L either as a Word doc or a PDF under Assignments -> Ethics and Programming. This assignment at the end of the day on Wednesday in Week 13.

Additional reading

If you’re interested in the topic of ethics and technology and want to read more about it, here are a few books (all available through MSU’s library) that may be of interest:

• Algorithms of oppression: How search engines reinforce racism by Safiya Umoja Noble
• Weapons of math destruction: How big data increases inequality and threatens democracy by Cathy O’Neil
• This is why we can’t have nice things: Mapping the relationship between online trolling and mainstream culture by Whitney Phillips
• Technically wrong: Sexist apps, biased algorithms, and other threats of toxic tech by Sara Wachter-Boettcher
• Bad blood: Secrets and lies in a Silicon Valley startup by John Carreyrou

All Tech Is Human (a non-profit devoted to responsible tech) also has a very long and comprehensive reading list that might be interesting to look through.