Example of essay on unavoidable ethical questions about social networking

Utilitarianism entails the balance of harm caused to society to benefit from the social network sites. There might harm caused by the social networks such as Facebook and Twitter. However, the benefits should be evaluated together with the harms caused; the benefits should be maximized, and detriments minimized. The hacking of Petaluma High school MySpace students’ accounts shows that the private life of person is at a risk of being negatively exposed to the outside world without his consent.
The challenges that come with social websites are numerous and increase day in day out. However, the more they increase, the more inventions are invented to curb them. It would be difficult to live in a world without the social websites now that even big corporations have embraced technology to conduct their businesses. In that sense, technocrats are working on the vices that come up with the social websites in order to maximize the gains and reduce the drawbacks of the social websites.
The question whether social websites have the right to privacy is a tricky one. Should employers be barred from accessing their prospective employees’ social websites? Social websites should be treated as personal space that should only be accessed by close friends and not prospective employers. However, in the event that the employers want to recruit the best members into their business, they resort to all available to discern the prospective employer’s character.
Laws regulating online privacy are being breached day and night given that it is very difficult to control people on a social platform. The only remedy for such crime is to set appropriate privacy modules for their online account so that they restrict the people who have access to their information.
Those social websites offer ultimate egalitarianism is a qualified fact. Knowing someone online is different from knowing someone in real life. ‘ Soft copy’ people are fake since one fakes pictures or even some use avatars. Some people go as far as using celebrity photos as their avatars. This makes social website users lose the ability to socialize with others on the ground.
Some people use the social networks to look for people whom they share interests or life situations. Whether this is for their common good is an issue under criticism; do they achieve the common good? Whether the common good achieved in the social network, is compatible with the common good in real life is a question worth a discussion. Most are the times when people connect well on the social network and share their values and interests. Some of the ideas and stories shared online may be of benefit if applied to real life situations. So the social network sites may be of common good.
Meeting and transacting with people online is somehow unreal. Communications are best done face to face where one can discern the facial expressions of the other. Facial expressions are very important in determining the emotions of a party during the communication. In addition, one can discern the truthfulness of the information being relayed by one party. Gestures and facial expressions enhance communication in that they make relaying of information real and efficiently. Moreover, it is cheaper. How can one discern the honesty of a statement made online? Companies may incur huge amounts of losses when they transact businesses online
In conclusion, the social networks have brought more benefits than harm. The current society will barely survive without the social networks. It is, therefore, prudent for scientists to continue innovating ways and means of curbing the shortcoming that come along with the technology.