Information Privilege

Let's go through a scenario to see how the concept of information privilege might play out in life outside of Davidson. You have graduated from Davidson, and are working for an organization whose mission you are passionate about, but which does not pay you much. You are covering your bills every month, but just barely. You are also a vlogger and maintain a weekly video blog on the side. [[Continue]]

You find some useful information on the New York Times, but after viewing only 10 articles you hit the following paywall informing you that you have reached your monthly limit. <img src="http://s3.amazonaws.com/libapps/accounts/25656/images/NYT_paywall.jpg"> This is how much you would have to pay for continued access, which you can’t afford in your current financial situation. <img src="http://s3.amazonaws.com/libapps/accounts/25656/images/NYT_prices.jpg"> Do you want to see what information might be available at the [[Public Library]]? Or try using [[Google Scholar]]

You go to Google Scholar and start searching for articles. As you're searching, you realize that there are no PDF Full Text symbols. You finally find an article that looks promising: <img src="https://sarahecrissinger.files.wordpress.com/2014/02/journal.png?w=620"> You find out that it costs $37. Due to your financial situation, you realize that it would cost you **over half of a day of work** to pay for the article. Do you: [[Pay for the article]] Or [[Give up on your research]]

You look up the hours for the Public Library and realize they close at 5 pm on Saturdays, and won’t open until 9 am on Monday. You’ll have to wait until after work on Monday to continue your research. <img src="http://s3.amazonaws.com/libapps/accounts/25656/images/library_hours.jpg"> [[Give up on your research]]

This past summer, we asked Davidson students to analyze a description of a scenario similar to the one you just experienced. Specifically, we asked students to comment on what assumptions the vlogger made and what opportunities he/she missed due to lack of awareness or lack of access to information. Here are some of their comments: "The vlogger's **ignorance** toward the subject and **laziness** during his research results in him overlooking the importance of having multiple perspectives on a subject" "The vlogger is both **lazy** and **harmful** in her approach" "The vlogger could, also, just **man up and pay the fee**" How much information privilege does the Davidson community take for granted? [[Reflect on this exercise]]

You have a great deal of information privilege as a Davidson student. **You will soon lose this privilege.** After you graduate, you will no longer have access to our databases. Learn more about why this is & find free sources you can use here: http://davidson.libguides.com/alumni You can change the system! By sharing your own work openly-- regardless of if it's scholarly or creative-- you can increase others' access. Have questions and want to know more? Ask the librarians and peer research advisors at this booth!

You pay the $37 to access this article, possibly sacrificing money you need to pay rent, eat, or care for your dependents. You open the article and quickly realize that it doesn't have as much helpful information as you thought it might after reading the abstract. However, you look at the references and you see two other titles that look promising. You use Google Scholar to find those articles and quickly realize that those also cost money. You can't afford to buy any more articles until your next pay check at the end of this month. [[Reflect on this exercise]]

You come across the following news article by Michael Reagan, entitled "Obama’s Executive Action Won’t Slow Gun Violence” and the following quotes stand out to you: "When the White House and Hillary throw out the claim that '30,000 die from gun violence a year' **they are deliberately being deceptive"** "There reportedly are more than **300 million privately owned guns** floating around the USA" "In 2014, according to the FBI, there were 8,124 gun homicides... that means **0.00002708 percent of the guns in America were used in 2014 to kill someone** and .99998 percent were not" You decide to refer to this article in your vlog. To begin your research, start with either: [[The New York Times]] for news sources [[Google Scholar]] for more scholarly sources