Hi! I was solicited as a subject for this research survey, which raised certain concerns for me which is why I am contacting you (your e-mail address is the listed contact for MIT's COUHES at http://web.mit.edu/research/.)
I'm fairly sure this project was never reviewed by COUHES, and if it were the instrument presumably was not.
The survey was conducted using the Google Docs platform, which violates subject privacy as well as any presumptions of confidentiality.
The survey does not attempt to gain informed consent. Subjects are never informed who the group of researchers are, the title of the research project or grant, the goal or purpose of the research, or any contact information other than Yunzhi Gao's e-mail address in original invitation; subjects do not know who the PI may be.
I understand a student project might be expected to be less rigorous, but I would expect a somewhat higher level of review.
Amgine
-------- Original Message -------- Subject: Wiki Loves Monuments survey from MIT researchers Date: Tue, 9 Oct 2012 13:10:59 -0700 (PDT) From: Yunzhi Gao gaoyunzhi@gmail.com Reply-To: wmca-public@googlegroups.com To: wmca-public@googlegroups.com
Dear Wiki Loves Monuments organizers,
We are a group of researchers at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. We are interested in the impact of copyright free media on a variety of different industries. In my current project our team is studying the impact that Wikipedia Loves Monuments and other similar projects that make free images of geographic places are having on our society. With a view to better understanding how such projects work and how exactly they achieve their objectives. We are interested in interviewing certain key Wikipedians that make such projects possible.
I am writing this email to see if you would be willing to be interviewed to guide us in conducting in our research. I am including a link to a Google form with 6 (short) questions about WLM. Your replies would be invaluable in helping us understand how free media is transforming one important sector of our economy – tourism, and helping people discover new monuments and places of interest.
You can find the interview questions here : https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/embeddedform?formkey=dFUtZ0x2ejVMZHFFWmd...
Thank you again for reading this email and looking forward to receiving your replies.
Yunzhi Gao