Lying is part of daily life, and the Internet simply provides another space in which individuals can lie. Feature based theory suggests that three dimensions must be considered when examining deception – if the medium is synchronous, recordless and distributed. It has been proposed that individuals were less likely to lie in a recordable medium.
Due to the archiving feature of blogging this could suggest that bloggers are less likely to lie on their blogs in comparison to other online mediums, such as synchronous chat. However, with regard to blogging there are issues of identity concealment to consider, whilst deceptive, they are necessary to preserve the bloggers’ privacy.
Correspondingly, this research found that over 86% of bloggers indicated that they actively attempt to verify information before posting it on their blog, and 87% indicated that they had never published a lie on their blog. Of the small number of bloggers that had posted a lie, the majority done so to either to maintain their anonymity or for the purposes of fiction/satire or to embellish a story.
The majority of both bloggers and non-bloggers indicated that they had at least once attempted to double check information found on both Irish and non-Irish blogs, with only approx. 15% having never done this. However, this doesn’t necessarily indicate low levels of trust in the medium, but does perhaps point toward an awareness of the fact that blog publishing is unregulated.
Online consumerism has become a prevalent part of modern life. With greater choice of availability and 24 hour access to a global market, many are now switching to shopping on the the Internet rather than walking around high streets or shopping centers for their desired purchases. Recent studies indicate that 96% of Irish Internet users have made an online purchase. But what are the perceived risks that online consumers feel?