ah teaches web design & development (The Grey Zone lecture)

The Grey Zone

Lecture outline

Ethics, web design and development. Lecture slides will be made available on the day of the lecture (July 5).

Web Ethics

We are considering the ethics — the morality, or duty and obligations — associated with different issues on the web, and how they might relate to our work as designers or developers.

Non-binary

Many of the questions today are not binaries of right or wrong. They are complex, and we want to make sure we understand how others may perceive these issues as much as we understand how we perceive them.

Today's Guidelines

Given we will be talking about topics that you may feel passionately about, we have a couple guidelines to ensure our discussion does not veer off course too much:

• Please focus on the issues: Please remember to 'frame' personal opinions.
• Avoid rights and wrongs: You may personally view something as right/wrong, but we want to unpack more than our personal views.
• Have empathy: While you may not agree with, or understand how an issue is presented, try to take time to understand why that issue exists or has been presented that way.

Today's Format

We will work with a bit of a different format today. Please form up into groups of three or four to facilitate discussion of the quotes/questions.

Today we will be focusing on privacy and copyright.

Privacy

What do we need to consider as web designers and developers?

For Each Prompt

Please do the following for each prompt:

1. Read the questions.
2. Clarify any questions you have with myself or your TA.
3. Discuss the question and note some answers to the questions.
4. We will then regroup and discuss together.

Privacy

As a designer or developer, some questions:

• Should we be concerned with collecting data on our users?
• How much data is it reasonable for us to request of users for free services online?
• How do we communicate to users what data is being collected and how it is being used?

There are 8 minutes left.

Questions about privacy

I realize this approach may not have 'answered' the questions you posed in my ask for 'themes', so do you have any other lingering questions about privacy online?

I cannot promise the answers, but I can try and fill in some gaps.

Copyright

What do we need to consider as web designers and developers?

The web is open

"The original design specification of the first browser actually had an HTML editor built into it. So, you could clone page, edit it, and post it in one go using the browser ... [a] completely logical step that once you had the Web, you would add copyright to it, and use it as the primary regulating framework."

Cory Doctorow (The Machine Without the Factory, 2020)

View source

Keep in mind that anyone can view the source code of your webpage. Consider what information you share unencrypted in there: "Missouri teachers' Social Security numbers at risk on state agency's website."

When code is licensed

You need to pay attention to how code is licensed if you claim your own writes over the code: "Trump's social network has 30 days to stop breaking the rules of its software license."

Copyright

As a designer or developer, some questions:

• Should we be concerned with copyright of our material (i.e. portfolio projects) and others (i.e. fonts we use)?
• What is the point at which we need to be concerned about breaking a copyright?
• How do we communicate to users what copyright is in use and how it is being enforced?

There are 8 minutes left.

Questions about copyright

I realize this approach may not have 'answered' the questions you posed in my ask for 'themes', so do you have any other lingering questions about copyright online?

I cannot promise the answers, but I can try and fill in some gaps.

Coding Quiz

We will be holding the coding quiz during our lecture time on July 12.

For the quiz you will be presented with a difficult web layout to replicate. Replicating it will only require that you use HTML and CSS. There are two parts to this quiz:

1. Proposing two means of replicating the design (worth 7/10 points)
2. Replicating the design using one of those methods (worth 3/10 points)

Coding Quiz

For proposing a means of replication we suggest taking up to 60 minutes to propose two means of replicating the design.

You will be graded on quality — would it work, do you use the right terms, do you show an understanding of terms?

This will be worth 7 of 10 points. Part marks are possible.

Coding Quiz

For replicating the design we suggest taking up to 30 minutes replicate the design itself using one of the approaches you proposed and HTML and CSS.

This portion will be graded on code validity and solution completeness.

This will be worth 3 of 10 points. Part marks are possible.

What do I review for the quiz?

I highly recommend reviewing anything we have covered with regards to web layout — i.e. grids, old float grids, flexbox, positioning, responsiveness, units — in preparation for the quiz.

Coding quiz rules and requirements

• You will need your student ID to participate.
• You will need a laptop to complete the coding quiz.
• You may use the internet to look things up during the quiz.
• You are not permitted to discuss the quiz with anyone inside or outside the classroom.

What if I cannot attend?

If you have any concerns about being able to attend, please contact Andrew before the lecture. We will arrange another time to have you complete the quiz.