the rain won't wash away the ashes underneath your nails

(Continued from part X.)

First, a note relevant to today.

Next, we're going back to the Information Privacy Principles (of California, at least). We'd covered 1 to 4; here's the next one.

5. Right to Know Principle

Individuals have the right to know what types of personal information we gather and use.

• We will tell you what types of personal information we gather and how we use the information.
• We will tell you what types of personal information we share with other organizations and the authority for sharing the information.
• We routinely inform the public about our information privacy policies and practices.
• We provide, upon request, information about our privacy policies and practices, including the names of staff responsible for overseeing our compliance.

What does this one mean?

Again, bad things for the JLU. They would need to be proactive about determining what information they need, and why they need it. They would need to have a policy announcement in place outlining the kinds of information they're keeping, how long they're keeping it, and where they're getting it. They would need to provide upon any request information about their information privacy policies, practices, up to and including naming names about who's on the team securing that personal information. Above all, they would have to be open and honest, two things I don't see them changing any time soon.

6. Right to Inspect & Correct Principle

Individuals have the right to inspect the personal information we maintain about them and to request that we correct errors.

• We have an accessible and simple inspection and correction process.
• We respond to your request within a reasonable time and at minimal or no cost to the individual.
• We correct the personal information when more accurate or complete facts are established.

What does this one mean?

For the JLU, it would mean keeping large sections of their wiki open to the public, even in unchangeable form. However, if they prevented changes to their information by the public, they would still have to set up and maintain policies by which individuals named in their documents could challenge that information. They would not charge for changing the information, and the information once changed should not be reverted.

7. Right to be Heard Principle

You have a right to be heard if you believe we failed to adhere to our Information Privacy Principles for Individuals.

• We have an accessible and simple complaint process.
• We investigate all complaints and respond promptly.
• We take corrective measures when appropriate.

What does this one mean?

As with the above, it would involve the JLU setting up an accessible and easy way for people to register complaint, or challenge both conclusions drawn and information posted. They would need to develop a secondary investigation team beyond that, to run down these complaints or requests for corrections, in order to insure that their information is fair, truthful, and accurate. This team would also have the power to make corrections to documents retained, in order to bring them more up to date with the shifts of personal information. Likely also, this team would be responsible for deletion of private materials when the time for their use had expired.

8. Commitment Principle

We periodically have outside privacy experts review our practices to ensure that we follow our Information Privacy Principles for Individuals.

What does this one mean? I think this would be the hardest of all for the JLU to follow. Allowing outsiders access to anything that isn't tightly controlled by their group seems to give them hives. But more importantly, it's a vital part of the process, a process that should have already been in place.

But, okay, those are the eight principles that California law considers official and binding. Why were there eleven principles mentioned in the comment thread? Well, there actually isn't anything that's glaringly out of place with the eleven mentioned in the thread; I'm thinking the list I found (specific to California law, not international) simply compacts things a bit.

What was the JLU's response to this list of principles? None that I can tell, or at least, none that made it through onto SLUniverse. But then, none of them strike me as being particularly devoted to transparency.

So here's my thinking, from this point forward.

Covering this controversy has eaten up eleven entries. That's not exactly huge, these days; the Escapist controversy had more entries, and covering the Zindra debacle took months. Still, it's a chunk of time, a chunk neither my readers nor I will get back.

So from here, any additional reading I do on the topic won't be posted on the blog. It's not going to be relevant, from this point; nothing I read will change any of the conclusions I've drawn.

For the JLU, if any of you wish to contact me, feel free; you can comment on any of the JLU-centric entries, you can drop me a notecard in world; hells, if you really feel compelled, scroll down on the sidebar; there's a way to contact me by email. Just don't expect me to chase any of you down. First, I already tried that (and failed) with Kalel; second, I really don't care. I'm not on your side.

What I would say, though, to wrap things up, is that if anyone in the JLU truly believes they are an honorable person, with personal integrity and clarity of vision, and you can believe that while still doing everything you can to break open private medical and therapeutic records, and do such a slipshod job of it that those you consider in the wrong are able to waltz in and grab things to flip up out of your control...well, you are invested in a great amount of personal delusion, because you are not honorable, you have no integrity, and you are in the wrong here. No one should have to worry that some random comment on a forum thread will be pulled out and lovingly slotted into a wiki as proof of some 'illegal' act. No one should have their place of work contacted, their college contacted, or their family and friends contacted and told to cut all ties as a matter of personal safety. That is cyberstalking at best; misdemeanor to a felony at worst.

And you should be ashamed for ever considering this was a heroic action to do. You're not heroes. Heroes would know better.