What Does the The Australian Law Reform Commission Have for Flustered Australians

In this age of camera-enabled smart phones and hardcore social media usage, nothing goes undetected and undocumented especially if it is something  controversial and defamatory at the expense of others. 

If you wake up the next day with your news feed on Facebook showing compromising photos of you from an event you attended the night before, The Australian Law Reform Commission is having the European Union consider its proposed "right to be forgotten” now “right to erasure" amendment. 

This “right to erasure” proposal urges organisations especially social media providers to delete compromising information on their platform at the request of the person who is the subject of that information. This right applies only to information uploaded with the person’s consent. They should have the right to withdraw their consent and have the necessary erasures done immediately upon their request.  

However, this may seem like a pretty ambitious solution since information such as photos and videos when deleted are naturally backed up and archived. To erase history is an exercise in futility, and this definitely applies in digital media. 

Is “right to erasure” truly the solution to compromising information uploaded to the web? If it comes with our consent, then there is the assumption that we have thought about it before sealing our fate on the web. However, what is most glaring in the proposal is that the “right to erasure” does not apply for information uploaded without the person’s consent. Should it be the other way around?

What are the lessons that we can pick up from this?

First, it is our responsibility to control the information we give about ourselves. This prevents the dilemma of erasing every single embarrassing photo uploaded on Facebook and hoping that it is too early for Google to index it all the way to eternity. 

Second, be careful in the photos and videos that you make about yourself and others. Just because it has been captured on your smart phone does not mean that it has to be shared with everyone in your network. If the intention is to stir unnecessary attention even after receiving the consent of the parties involved, be the bigger person in the situation.

And third, learn from other people’s experiences. While compromising photos and videos may seem trivial to others, the impact it has on the person involved can be psychologically damaging. For some unlucky ones, their embarrassing photo or video has made them the subject of cyberbullying. The internet can be a great place to spend time in, but the same cannot be assumed for everyone.

What is your personal take on this?

Throwback Thursday: Fax Machines

 

Fax machines may have been essential office equipments back in the 70s, but it does not have as much significance today with the availability of so many alternatives to send documents. Along with the slight obsolescence of landlines is the declining need for fax machines that also run through copper wires. Although it has been previously reported that at least 700,000 fax machines were sold in the last 2 years in the United States alone, technologies that we have today are slowly and undoubtedly replacing these machines.

With the rise of camera-enabled smart phones, anyone who owns one can simply take a photo of a document they need to send and deliver it to its intended recipient via email using the same device. Just as it is easy to capture a photo and send it too via email using only a smart phone, the role of fax machines truly becomes dwarfed mostly in terms of convenience. 

Also, with the speed and easy of use of scanners, you get to have a hard copy of the document you want to send, save it in your ‘My Documents’ folder and deliver it to your recipient via email as well. If your recipient needs to sign the document, all he or she needs to do is to print the scanned document, scan it back and deliver it to you via email. Although printing it, signing it then scanning it back again may entail some work, it is naturally more cost-efficient than using a fax machine for its transmission. After all, who does not own a printer and a scanner anyway in the 21^st century?

Also, did you know that there are Scan-PDF-Email website applications that you can use? It's pretty much self-explanatory, but using these websites such as www.scantopdf.eu or www.onlinerocr.net allows you to convert to PDF format any document that you scan before sending it via email. This makes it a lot fitting for formal documents that you need to send. And with the ubiquitous capability of so many devices such as iPads and iPhones aside from laptops to read PDF documents, you won't have to worry about your emailed document not read by your recipient. You can even password-protect scanned PDF documents for that extra layer of security.

How about you? What do you think are great alternatives to a fax machines? Send it to us privately on Facebook!