on air-l Una McCormack asked:

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Can anyone give guidance on ethical conduct when quoting material from publicly accessible websites? Has the aoir produced any guidelines for this?

The aoir ethics working committee is attempting to develop guidelines for these and other cases encountered in Internet Research (IR). A preliminary report is now under discussion by the committee, in preparation for presentation and further discussion at aoir 2.0. So I'm afraid that a more complete response will not be available for another month or so. BUT - I can report that recent discussion of the question of protecting subjects' identity has pointed toward the following: there is _clear_ agreement that we must protect subjects' identity - but that there are levels of such protection that IR should ensure their subjects, depending very much on the context of research, ranging from strong protection (no use of "real" nicknames - e.g., on a Thai webboard as researched by Dag Elgesem) to moderate protection (use of "real" nicknames - e.g., in the case of chatrooms researched by Malin Svenningson and performance-oriented folk on IRC as researched by Brenda Danet) to no protection (use of nicknames and real subject names when necessary for research, appropriate permissions have been obtained, etc.) Again, these are provisional suggestions based on committee members' experience and discussion. They need further refinement - especially in light of cross-cultural differences that we're attempting to identify and document. But this may be a good start for your reflection. Please feel free to forward any questions, suggestions, etc., for clarification, improvement, additions, and so forth. Cheers and best wishes, Charles Ess, Chair AoIR Research Ethics Working Group http://www.cddc.vt.edu/aoir/ethics Director, Interdisciplinary Studies Center Drury University 900 N. Benton Ave. Voice: 417-873-7230 Springfield, MO 65802 USA FAX: 417-873-7435 Co-chair, CATaC 2002: http://www.it.murdoch.edu.au/~sudweeks/catac02/ "Egos appear by setting themselves apart from other egos. Persons appear by entering into relation to other persons." -- Martin Buber, _I and Thou_ "Ethics does not furnish recipes any more than do science and art. One can merely propose methods." -- Simone de Beauvoir, _The Ethics of Ambiguity_