In the waning days of the 20th century the internet was still in its infancy, an exciting new service that made accessing information much easier. But it wasn’t yet an essential part of life: in the year 2000, only half of the U.S. population was online. And much of the rest of the world hadn’t yet begun to use it.
Today, what was once a service has become a basic need. The internet now governs many aspects of our lives; it has also threatened our right to privacy. Though we often bemoan its power, to not have access to the internet is to be seriously left out of modern society.
Paolo Granata is keenly aware of this, and the associate professor of Book & Media Studies at St. Michael’s College in the Faculty of Arts & Science is determined to protect people’s rights in a digital world. In 2019, he created the Media Ethics Lab to study the ethical issues and social questions surrounding digital media practices.
Currently, the lab has three core areas of research: Digital Equity, or the creation of inclusive, equitable communities that serve everyone; Digital City, which considers the role digital media plays as a key part of urban infrastructure; and Digital Literacy, which seeks to help communities develop the skills they need to fully engage with the world around them.
We have a chance to consider these technologies as vital environments in which people can thrive, participate and be involved in our democratic society. With our Media Ethics Lab we are trying to foster the vision that we don’t just use media — we live in the media.
“We have a chance to consider these technologies as vital environments in which people can thrive, participate and be involved in our democratic society,” says Granata. “With our Media Ethics Lab we are trying to foster the vision that we don’t just use media — we live in the media.”
In March 2020, when the fledgling Lab was barely three months old, the COVID-19 pandemic began — and with that, Granata’s mission became more urgent.
“At the time I was concluding a course in media ethics. But rather than simply ending the course the students and I said, what we can do in this moment? How can we use technology to get people closer to each other?”
Thus was born a unique social media project called the #DigitalCloseness campaign. Granata, along with his students and research assistants, came up with a number of ideas to create a sense of community at a time of isolation.
Working on this report presented an opportunity to team up with other universities and really step out of academia and into the city. In fact, making a difference in the city is kind of a motto for the Media Ethics Lab.
Among other things, #DigitalCloseness urged telecommunications companies to forgive late payments; called on cultural organizations to move exhibits online and offer them for free; and requested that organizations such as banks and grocery stores offer services by phone instead of online. On a personal level, the campaign suggested that citizens could help less tech-savvy neighbours with their own computer needs, such as lending them a device if they didn’t have one.
These were crucial calls to action in the city of Toronto, where half of low-income households, and half of those with people over 60, currently lack access to high-speed internet. And right now, 34 per cent of households worry about their ability to pay internet bills — a concern that is sure to be accelerated in the event of an economic downturn.
These statistics come from another project to which Granata contributed during the pandemic: a cross-institutional report entitled Mapping the Digital Divide. Issued in January 2021, the report offered the most detailed picture yet of digital inequality in Toronto.
“Working on this report presented an opportunity to team up with other universities and really step out of academia and into the city,” says Granata. “In fact, making a difference in the city is kind of a motto for the Media Ethics Lab.”
When crises happen, such as the pandemic or the massive Rogers outage in July 2022, the extent to which all of us are tied to the internet is woefully revealed.
To illustrate this dependence, Granata recalls a quote made famous by Marshall McLuhan: “Fish know nothing about water, since they have no anti-environment which would enable them to perceive the element they live in.”
It’s time to learn from our mistakes and involve civil society, policy makers and institutions to forecast the ethical implications of those emerging technologies. They are not just services: they are the environments in which we live. And because of that, they have real implications for our lives.
Digital services for people in the city, says Granata, are like water to a fish — something we take for granted, unconscious of how tied we are to them. Outside the city, that dependence is just as bad but the situation is worse: the internet there is frequently slow, expensive and unavailable, which puts rural citizens at an economic disadvantage.
These problems are all multiplied on a global level, given that almost 40 per cent of the world’s population is still not online at all — due in no small part to repressive actions in numerous countries. In 2011, the United Nations declared that access to the internet was a basic human right.
The UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) include reduced inequalities, as well as peace, justice and strong institutions. As a member of the SDGs@U of T steering committee, Granata says ensuring that global citizens have access to and ability to use digital technology — as well as privacy protections — fits right into the SDG mandate, which seeks fulfilment by 2030.
“We made a big mistake with the internet,” he says. “Back in the ‘90s, we thought of it as a service like any other. Policy makers let it grow like a wild forest. And eventually, it became controlled by a few private companies.
“It’s time to learn from our mistakes and involve civil society, policy makers and institutions to forecast the ethical implications of those emerging technologies. They are not just services: they are the environments in which we live. And because of that, they have real implications for our lives.”