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being pathetic in constantly seeking approval by collecting “Likes” for our pictures and posts? Is social
media use leaving us feeling more alienated, alone, and depressed?
Based on your critical research, consider what happens to people who use social media—do they
find positive social connections, do they feel like they are missing out, do they feel bullied, or does their
Step 5: Engagement
The fifth state of the critical process—engagement—encourages you to take action, adding your own
voice to the process of shaping our culture and environment.
Studies about happiness routinely conclude that the best path to subjective well-being (that is,
happiness) and life satisfaction is to have a community of close personal relationships. Social
psychologists Ed Diener and Robert Biswas-Diener acknowledge that the high use of mobile phones, text
According to Diener and Biswas-Diener, “The close relationships that produce the most
happiness are those characterized by mutual understanding, caring, and validation of the other person as
worthwhile. People feel secure in these types of relationships, and are often able to share intimate aspects
#
Although acquaintances and casual friends can be fun, it is the supportive close relationships that are
essential to happiness.”7
One way to take action might be to think about how to use social media without creating FOMO
1. Lev Grossman and Matt Vella, “iNeed?,” Time, September 22, 2014, p. 44.
2. JWT, “Fear of Missing Out,” May 2011. 15 Feb. 2017. Internet Archive.
3. Andrew K. Przybylski et al., “Motivational, Emotional, and Behavioral Correlates of Fear of Missing
Out,” Computers in Human Behavior 29 (2013): 1841–48.
5. Przybylski et al., “Motivational, Emotional, and Behavioral Correlates of Fear of Missing Out.”
7. Ibid., 51.
#
Extended Case Study: Patriot or Traitor? Unveiling Government
Surveillance of Us (9th Edition Update, 2015)
system administrator working for a government contractor and a former employee of the Central
Intelligence Agency (CIA) and the National Security Agency (NSA).
Americans are split on their opinions of Manning and Snowden—they are either great patriots or
horrible traitors. But it’s likely that most people aren’t certain of exactly what Manning and Snowden
leaked and the impact of what they leaked.
In this edition of Media & Culture, a new Extended Case Study (“Patriot or Traitor? Unveiling
central ethical dilemma: Is this case about a traitor undermining the state, or a whistleblower providing a
check on excessive and unaccountable state power?
Using the five stages of the critical process, students will evaluate the main articles revealing the
Snowden leaks written by Glenn Greenwald, then a columnist on civil liberties and U.S. national security
issues for The Guardian, a major newspaper in London; and Barton Gellman, a Pulitzer Prize–winning
Government Surveillance of Us” whenever you draw connections between news media, ethics, and the
#
relationship between the audience and media. You also may want to discuss journalism’s coverage of this
topic.
If you organize your course by industry, you may want to use the Extended Case Study to discuss
government surveillance either during your time with Chapter 2 (The Internet, Digital Media, and Media
Convergence), Chapter 8 (Newspapers), Chapter 14 (The Culture of Journalism), or Chapter 16 (Legal
Controls and Freedom of Expression).
Specific ideas
the textbook lists several of the essential articles written by Glenn Greenwald and Barton Gellman.
Below are a few suggestions of other sources they could look at:
• A Washington Post video interview with Barton Gellman, published on August 12, 2013. See
“Washington Post’s Barton Gellman on NSA Privacy Violations,” YouTube,
• A video interview Greenwald did with Snowden published on June 9, 2013, on YouTube is a good
place to get an overview of Snowden’s reasons for the leak. See Freedom of the Press Foundation,
“NSA Whistleblower Edward Snowden: ‘I Don’t Want to Live in a Society That Does These Sort
of Things,’” YouTube, June 9, 2013, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5yB3n9fu-rM.
• For another good video insight, see Howard Kurtz’s interview with Greenwald on CNN’s Reliable
Sources, June 12, 2013, http://www.cnn.com/2013/06/12/opinion/kurtz-snowden-
greenwald/index.html.
• It might also be interesting to discuss how privacy and government surveillance are treated in other
#
recognize as a journalism enterprise covered by the First Amendment), an interesting related topic
is the new media organization being set up by billionaire eBay founder Pierre Omidyar. Because
of his “concern about press freedoms in the US and around the world,” Omidyar has committed
$250 million to the venture. Glenn Greenwald left The Guardian to join Omidyar’s start-up in
2013, and several other top journalists also joined later that year.
Venture,” Politico, November 13, 2013, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/michael-calderone/eric-
bates-pierre-omidyar-glenn-greenwald_b_4267249.html.
• Glenn Greenwald’s reporting on the NSA and Snowden’s leaks heightened a debate over what is
the appropriate style of journalism—advocacy/adversarial style, or impartial/objective style? See
Greenwald addressing the need for advocacy journalism in his interview with David Folkenflik on
http://reliablesources.blogs.cnn.com/category/glenn-greenwald/.
#
•The initial exchange between Greenwald and Keller was in Bill Keller, “Is Glenn Greenwald the
Snowden’s revelations of the vast surveillance apparatus constructed by the National Security
Agency. He has also been an outspoken critic of the kind of journalism practiced at places like
The New York Times, and an advocate of a more activist, more partisan kind of journalism.
• Finally, perhaps the most important angle to discuss is what is the story—Edward Snowden, the
person who leaked the information, or undisclosed NSA surveillance, the content of the leaked
information? A July 2013 Washington Post story found that at that point, the story about Snowden
was getting far more news media attention than the NSA domestic surveillance he disclosed. Why
Story,” Washington Post, July 3, 2013,
https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/07/03/how-ed-snowden-became-a-
bigger-story-than-nsa-spying-in-two-charts/.
interpretation, evaluation, and engagement—which we touch on throughout Media & Culture.
#
The ‘Anonymous’ Hackers of the Internet” (pp. 56–57) are directly relevant to this Extended
Democracy” (pp. 308–309) is also relevant to the Extended Case Study.
• Chapter 14 includes the sections “Modern Journalism in the Information Age” (pp. 487–492),
“Ethics and the News Media” (pp. 493–496), “Resolving Ethical Problems” (pp. 496–497), and
“Reporting Rituals and the Legacy of Print Journalism” (pp. 498–503). All three sections have
ideas relevant to the Extended Case Study. The feature “Examining Ethics: WikiLeaks, Secret
Documents, and Good Journalism?” (p. 514) discusses the WikiLeaks release of classified
547–560), provides the legal framework for discussing the Extended Case Study. Also, the
government leaks could be a good discussion starter on the section “Models of Expression” (pp.
548–549).
The full text of the Extended Case Study begins on the following page.
#
Extended Case Study: Patriot or Traitor? Unveiling Government
Surveillance of Us (Full Text) (9th Edition Update, 2015)
In the past few years, there have been two extraordinary cases in which employees of the U.S. federal
government have leaked classified information to the public.
In the first case, Pvt. Bradley Manning,1 an army intelligence analyst assigned to a unit based in
Baghdad, Iraq, was arrested in 2010 for transmitting classified information (including U.S. airstrike
videos, more than 500,000 army reports, and more than 250,000 diplomatic cables) to WikiLeaks and a
few news organizations. In 2013, Manning, age twenty-five, was sentenced to up to thirty-five years in
prison for offenses that included violations of the Espionage Act.
In the second case, Edward Snowden, a twenty-nine-year-old computer system administrator
working for government contractor Booz Hamilton and a former employee of the Central Intelligence
Agency (CIA) and the National Security Agency (NSA), leaked details of U.S. and British government
domestic surveillance programs, including Internet surveillance and collection of supposedly private data,
to the news media in May 2013. By the next month, the U.S. government had charged Snowden with
violations of the Espionage Act and theft of government property. Snowden fled to Hong Kong, and as of
this writing had found temporary asylum in Russia.
army colonel and a professor of history and international relations at Boston University, suggests that the
interests of the federal government and its institutional authority aren’t always aligned with the interests
of the American people. He asks, “To whom do Army privates and intelligence contractors owe their
#
agenda [and] stealthily but inexorably accumulates power, privilege and prerogatives”?
For this case study, we will look at one of these complicated cases—the case of Edward Snowden
and the NSA’s surveillance programs—to critically analyze the heart of the ethical dilemma: Is this case
about a traitor undermining the state, or a whistleblower providing a check on excessive and
unaccountable state power?
As developed in Chapter 1, a media-literate perspective involves mastering five overlapping
critical stages that build on each other: (1) description: paying close attention, taking notes, and
and “So what?” questions about your findings; (4) evaluation: arriving at a judgment about whether
something is good, bad, poor, or mediocre, which involves subordinating one’s personal views to the
critical assessment resulting from the first three stages; and (5) engagement: taking some action that
connects our critical interpretations and evaluations with our responsibility as citizens.
Step 1: Description
For the description phase, you will need to research and take notes on some of the major news stories and
recorded interviews resulting from this case.4
The main articles revealing the Snowden leaks were written by Glenn Greenwald, a columnist on
civil liberties and U.S. national security issues for the Guardian, a major newspaper in London, and
#
Barton Gellman, a Pulitzer Prize–winning writer and contributor to the Washington Post who writes about
administration-nsa-verizon-records.
• Glenn Greenwald and Ewen MacAskill, “NSA Prism Program Taps in to User Data of Apple,
Google and Others,” Guardian, June 6, 2013, http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jun/06/us-
tech-giants-nsa-data.
• Snowden’s rationale for the leaks is in an interview Greenwald conducted with Snowden,
published on June 9, 2013, on YouTube. See Freedom of the Press Foundation, “NSA Whistleblower
Edward Snowden: ‘I Don’t Want to Live in a Society That Does These Sort of Things,’” YouTube,
June 9, 2013, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5yB3n9fu-rM.
• Barton Gellman, “U.S. Surveillance Architecture Includes Collection of Revealing Internet,
Phone Metadata,” Washington Post, June 15, 2013,
http://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/us-surveillance-architecture-includes-collection-of-
revealing-internet-phone-metadata/2013/06/15/e9bf004a-d511-11e2-b05f-3ea3f0e7bb5a_story.html.
http://www.dni.gov/files/documents/Facts%20on%20the%20Collection%20of%20Intelligence%20P
ursuant%20to%20Section%20702.pdf. (This fact sheet was issued by the U.S. government in light of
news reports based on Snowden’s leaks.)
#
A helpful time line was prepared by the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), which is
sympathetic toward Snowden’s cause:
Step 2: Analysis
In the second stage of the critical process, analysis, you will isolate patterns that emerged from the
interviews and stories that call for closer attention. For example:
if anything, before Snowden’s leaks?
• What communications of yours (e.g., Google, Apple, Facebook, mobile phone) could have been
potentially swept up in the data-collection programs?
• Was there sufficient oversight (e.g., by Congress) of these data-collection programs?
• Was anyone put at risk because of Snowden’s leaks? Explain.
• Is it possible to verify that the various secret data-collection programs made U.S. citizens safer?
Step 3: Interpretation
In the interpretation stage, you will determine the larger meanings of the patterns you have analyzed. The
surveillance programs operating under the explicit approval of Congress, with congressional oversight?
#
Or, looking at the historical time line of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, is the history of federal
government surveillance activity one of constantly trying to find a way around the law?
Should the user data of Google, Apple, Facebook, and major mobile phone providers be tapped
by government surveillance projects without our knowledge? Should the companies submit to do
whatever the government asks?
Is there partisan support for or against these surveillance programs as a political issue, or does
for leaking to the press? Why did Snowden feel compelled to flee the United States? Is there a reason for
the government to discourage would-be whistleblowers of any kind?
Are the leaks merely embarrassing to the federal government, or do they truly hamper important
Consider the intent of Edward Snowden in leaking information of government surveillance
programs to the U.S. public. Consider the value of the NSA surveillance programs to the American
people—and the value of potential data privacy that American people may assume they have. Are the
NSA surveillance programs good, bad, or something else? Are people like Snowden patriots who should
be praised for their whistleblowing or traitors to their country who should be charged under the Espionage
Act?
#
The fifth stage of the critical process—engagement—encourages you to take action, adding your own
voice to the process of shaping our culture and environment.
Andrew J. Bacevich argues that the ultimate legacy of people like Manning and Snowden is how
we respond to the information:
Manning and Snowden . . . threaten the power the state had carefully accrued amid recurring
wars and the incessant preparation for war. In effect, they place in jeopardy the state’s very
In the eyes of the state, Manning and Snowden—and others who may carry on their
work—can never be other than traitors. Whether the country eventually views them as
of Manning and Snowden, or you can support efforts against them.
At a higher level, consider corresponding with your members of Congress—your local U.S.
representative and your two U.S. senators—about your views on U.S. surveillance programs.
ENDNOTES
1. The day after his sentencing in July 2013, Manning said in a statement that he would henceforth be
living as a female and would like to be known as Chelsea Manning.
2. John Cassidy, “Demonizing Edward Snowden: Which Side Are You On?” New Yorker, June 24, 2013,
#
3. Andrew J. Bacevich, “Are Manning and Snowden Patriots? That Depends on What We Do Next,”
4. For more articles on this case, see special Web pages for the two newspapers: “The NSA Files,”
Guardian, http://www.theguardian.com/world/the-nsa-files; and “Edward Snowden and the National
5. Bacevich, “Are Manning and Snowden Patriots?”
#
Extended Case Study: Our Digital World and the Self-Invasion of
Privacy (9th Edition, 2014)
As we learn more and more about what kind of data media technology (and other) companies are
collecting on us and how they are using that data, it is becoming increasingly clear that the issue of online
privacy is a significant one. But how prepared are we to fight against the sophisticated tactics,
mathematical algorithms, and intentionally obtuse online privacy agreements that we agree to in order to
access “free” online content and services, like Facebook and Google, that we are increasingly dependent
on? To what extent do we consent to our self-invasion of privacy? In the ninth edition of Media &
Culture, an Extended Case Study asks students to critically analyze two or three different privacy
statements from a list of popular companies (which tend to be dry, legalistic, and hard to read): Google,
Amazon, Apple, AT&T, Facebook, Hulu, Microsoft, Netflix, Pandora, Pinterest, Tumblr, Twitter,
digital ecosystem outweighs the increasing invasion of our privacy. Then the exercise asks students to
“act” on their evaluations.
How can you teach the Extended Case Study?
topic.
#
Specific ideas
the FTC, which aims to protect children from online privacy incursions, and media technology
companies:
• “U.S. Is Tightening Web Privacy Rule to Shield Young,”
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/09/28/technology/ftc-moves-to-tighten-online-privacy-protections-for-
children.html
• “A Trail of Clicks, Accumulating in Conflict,”
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/06/technology/silicon-valley-objects-to-online-privacy-rule-
proposals-for-children.html?pagewanted=all
• “Your Online Attention, Bought in an Instant,”
advertisers.html
• An eye-opening New York Times Magazine investigative feature story, “How Companies Learn
Your Secrets” by Charles Duhigg, also from 2012, outlines how companies (not just media
technology companies) use mathematical algorithms to find out all sorts of personal data about
people—including whether a woman is two weeks pregnant and may not even know it yet (see
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/19/magazine/shopping-habits.html).
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2012/feb/28/the-end-of-online-privacy.
#
• “Users Getting Smarter About Online Privacy,” the Washington Post,
http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2012-02-24/business/35442522_1_social-media-users-privacy-
controls-social-networks.
• “Online Privacy Bill Introduced in House of Representatives,” Huffington Post,
http://online.wsj.com/public/page/what-they-know-digital-privacy.html, along with this interactive
http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2010/03/04/technology/internet/20100304-facebook-ads-
interactive.html.
• NPR’s Fresh Air interview with Julia Angwin, who writes the column “The Decoder” for the
Wall Street Journal: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=129298003.
• Resources such as the Berkeley Law Web Privacy Census, which consistently measures
Internet tracking and puts the whole topic of online privacy under a critical lens:
• For some satire, here’s an online video from the Onion critiquing Facebook and parental
surveillance: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yu4zMvE6FH4.
Make connections between the text and the Extended Case Study
The following sections in the book lend themselves well to an examination of the Extended Case Study:
• Chapter 1 outlines the five-step critical process (pp. 32–33)—description, analysis,
the media.
#
• In Chapter 2, the section “The Economics and Issues of the Internet” (pp. 57–68) is directly
relevant to this Extended Case Study, especially the material under the heading, “Targeted
Advertising and Data Mining” (pp. 60–64).
and social game advertising, which works to collect data on often unsuspecting players—directly
connecting into the Extended Case Study.
• Chapter 4 talks about the economics of the music industry in the section “Making, Selling, and
Profiting from Music” (pp. 139–143). It also details various music download and other subscription
streaming services (including Apple’s iTunes store) that capture immeasurable amounts of data
from their users, as well as social media sites, such as Facebook and YouTube, and cloud services,
such as iCloud.
• The “Economics of Broadcast Radio” section in Chapter 5 (pp. 178–182) and the “The
Economics and Ownership of Television and Cable” section in Chapter 6 (pp. 216–225) of the
main text are good places to revisit the notion that commercial media entertainment is never “free.”
In commercial radio and broadcast/cable television, the channels we watch are littered with paid
advertising messages and product placement; on the Internet sites we frequent, we put up with
commercial messages, but we also give up our personal data to access “free” content.
Case Study, a good question to ask as you introduce these chapters is: How can media industries
money in the media in a number of key places:
#
• The section “Collecting Revenue” (p. 446), distinguishes between direct and indirect payments
for media projects (self-disclosing one’s personal data being a form of indirect payment).
• The section “The Rise of the New Digital Media Conglomerates” (pp. 460–462) details the rise of
Apple, Facebook, Microsoft, and Google, all of which figure greatly into the discussion of online
privacy, as one of their key business strategies is data mining, which enables highly targeted
advertising.
The full text of the case study begins on the next page.
#
Extended Case Study: Our Digital World and the Self-Invasion of
Privacy (Full Text) (9th Edition, 2014)
A principle narrative of recent media history is the digital turn—how digital media corporations have
begun to transform the way traditional mass media businesses interact with consumers. To get this
unprecedented access to digital media content, we have handed over our credit card numbers, allowed our
browsing and buying habits to be tracked, and freely shared personal photos, stories, tweets, and status
information. All of this raises an important question: Is the convenience of our digital ecosystem worth
the increasing invasion of our privacy?
In 1969, when the Internet was just a U.S. Department of Defense project and the Web had yet to
be invented, media philosopher Marshall McLuhan wrote, “Publication is a self-invasion of privacy.”1
That is, when we write something for publication, we consent to have our personal thoughts and ideas
mean instant global distribution and perpetual existence. (See the cases of former U.S. representatives
Anthony Weiner and Chris Lee about how embarrassing photos of oneself can be globally distributed and
endure forever.)
Twitter asks us to self-disclose in 140 characters or less. Facebook encourages us to post status
updates, photos, and other personal information like our birthday, relationships, and political views.
Elsewhere, we upload audio and video, post comments to Web sites, and send frequent text messages.
• Twitter users send 340 million tweets each day.3
• More than 6 billion text messages are sent each day (more than 2 trillion per year).4
• Every day 144.8 billion e-mails are sent.5
#
