Ed and anyone else who is interested, a few published citations that might help you understand the points that several of us have made repeatedly throughout this thread and which are based in sound ethical and human subjects knowledge and experience. Keep up the debate folks, we never should accept "rules" proforma, but open your minds to what others are saying...we do this work as well...and even if the writer doesn't sport a PhD after their name, they may still have information that can help you...assuming that is really your goal. I have given authors full names to make searching for these citations easier. This list is not exhaustive by any means - in fact I know there are at least two books waiting to be entered into my reference program - but it is the citation list I use regularly in my teaching and my research. Reference List Bassett, E. H. & O'Riodan, Kathleen (2001, December). Ethics of Internet Research: Contesting the Human Subjects Research Model. In. Lancaster UK: Computer Ethics: Philosophical Enquiries (CEPE). Retrieved from http://www.nyu.edu/projects/nissenbaum/ethics_bas_full.html Bruckman, Amy S. (2001, December). Studying the Amateur Artist: A Perspective on Disguising Data Collected in Human Subjects Research on the Internet. In. Lancaster UK: Computer Ethics: Philosophical Enquiries (CEPE). Retrieved from http://www.nyu.edu/projects/nissenbaum/ethics_bru_full.html Capurro, Rafael & Pingel, Christoph (2001, December). Ethical Issues of Online Communication Research. In. Lancaster UK: Computer Ethics: Philosophical Enquiries (CEPE). Retrieved December 14, 2001, from http://www.nyu.edu/projects/nissenbaum/ethics_cap_full.html Efimova, Lilia (2005, October). Not documenting, doing: blogging as research. Presented at the meeting of the Internet Research 6.0: Internet Generations, Association of Internet Researchers, Chicago IL. Retrieved October 14, 2005, from http://conferences.aoir.org/viewabstract.php?id=238&cf=3 Elgesem, Dag (2001, December). What is special about the ethical issues in online research? In. Lancaster UK: Computer Ethics: Philosophical Enquiries (CEPE). Retrieved December 14, 2001, from http://www.nyu.edu/projects/nissenbaum/ethics_elg_full.html Ess, Charles (2001, December). Internet Research Ethics Introduction. In. Lancaster UK: Computer Ethics: Philosophical Enquiries (CEPE). Retrieved December 14, 2001, from http://www.nyu.edu/projects/nissenbaum/ethics_ess.html Ess, Charles (2004). The cathedral or bazaar? The AoIR document on internet research ethics as an exercise in open source ethics. In Mia Consalvo, Nancy K. Baym, Jeremy Hunsinger, Klaus Bruhn Jensen, John Logie, Monica Murero, & Leslie Regan Shade (Eds.), Internet Research Annual: Selected Papers from the Association of Internet Researchers Conferences 2000-2002 (pp. 95-103). New York: Peter Lang. Ess, Charles (2005). International Restrictions Affecting Internet Research: Conflicts, Risks, Resolutions? Charles Ess's Academic Homepage. Retrieved July 5, 2005, from http://www.drury.edu/ess/NCEHR_CNERH/ESS.htm Ess, Charles. (2005, June 12). Re: [Air-l] ethical issues in chat room research. Frankel, Mark S. & Siang, Sanyin (1999). Ethical and legal aspects of human subjects research in cyberspace: Report of a Workshop. American Association for the Advancement of Science. Retrieved from http://www.aaas.org/spp/sfrl/projects/intres/report.pdf Jones, Robert Alun (1994). Internet research (Online). Internet Research: Electronic Networking Applications and Policy, 4(3) King, Storm A. (1996, June). Researching internet communities: Proposed ethical guidelines for the reporting of results. The Information Society, 12(2), 119-127 Morris, Jeremy and Middleton, Catherine (2005, October). The Net Generation? Exploring the Complexities of Innovation Adoption among Youth. Presented at the meeting of the Internet Research 6.0: Internet Generations, Association of Internet Researchers, Chicago IL. Retrieved October 19, 5 A.D., from http://conferences.aoir.org/viewabstract.php?id=220&cf=3 Sharf, Barbara F. (1999). Beyond Netiquette: The ethics of doing naturalistic discourse research on the internet. In Steven G. Jones (Ed.), Doing Internet Research (pp. 243-256). Thousand Oaks CA: Sage Publications. Thomas, Jim (2003). Reexamining the Ethics of internet Research: Facing the Challenge of Overzealous Oversight. In Mark D. Johns, Shing-Ling Sarina Chen, & G. Jon Hall (Eds.), Online Social Research: Methods, Issues, & Ethics (pp. 187-202). New York: Peter Lang. Walther, Joseph B. (2001, December). Research Ethics in Internet-Enabled Research: Human Subjects Issues and Methodological Myopia. In. Lancaster UK: Computer Ethics: Philosophical Enquiries (CEPE). Retrieved December 14, 2001, from http://www.nyu.edu/projects/nissenbaum/ethics_wal_full.html White, Michele (2001, December). Representations or People? In. Lancaster UK: Computer Ethics: Philosophical Enquiries (CEPE). Retrieved December 14, 2001, from http://www.nyu.edu/projects/nissenbaum/ethics_whi_full.html Lois Ann Scheidt Doctoral Student - School of Library and Information Science, Indiana University, Bloomington IN USA Adjunct Instructor - School of Informatics, IUPUI, Indianapolis IN USA and IUPUC, Columbus IN USA Webpage: http://www.loisscheidt.com Blog: http://www.professional-lurker.com