To spin this back in the direction of the original thread, my main concern with the "always ask permission first" philosophy is that it gives us a world where criticism and cultural commentary can only happen at the whim of those whose words are being critiqued.
I think Gil hits it on the head here. Not everything requires permission first, either permission or waiver from the IRB, nor informed consent. Both IRB and informed consent systems come into play in very specific contexts at the federal level as best as i can tell. However, on the level of the university, the faculty can set further standards, and those standards are pretty much entirely open. One could view the push toward requiring permission first as a push against critical analysis, and there is likely a systemic subpolitics against it already in some places. So I think we need to strongly resist the tendency to say anything published in the public realm is related to human subjects issues or even university ethics issues, lest the whole lot of contemporary culture, literary, linguistic, etc. etc. studies gets sent the way of ward churchill. jeremy hunsinger Information Ethics Fellow, Center for Information Policy Research, School of Information Studies, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (www.cipr.uwm.edu) () ascii ribbon campaign - against html mail /\ - against microsoft attachments http://www.aoir.org The Association of Internet Researchers http://www.stswiki.org/ stswiki http://cfp.learning-inquiry.info/ LI-the journal http://transdisciplinarystudies.tmttlt.com/ Transdisciplinary Studies:the book series