I believe Bailey was just teetering on the edge of being unethical regarding using posts for the Le murder story. Granted, she was accepted as a „Friend“ and kept on the page, but her declining an interview shows that Del Rocco did not want to take part in an interview, and may not want to share her personal information.
That Bailey did not identify herself outright is not acceptable; just, as when a journalist calls an individual or business, they must identify their affiliation upon introduction, which Bailey failed to do. Messages can be sent along with requests; hers should have stated her reasons for wanting to ‚friend’ the woman. This would clear up any confusion outright as to whether Del Rocco should be aware her posts are being monitored or not. Even if she had agreed to an interview, I believe her Facebook posts are still not ‚part of the deal’ unless they would be accessible to a large enough group of people to be public. (I can’t think of a number off the top of my head, but, perhaps something beyond 600+ friends-- indisputably far above Dunbar’s number.)
I think an easy litmus test can be applied to Facebook posts to see if they are usable. First, see who can read the posts; is it fully public, part of a large network (schools, businesses over, say, 200 employees, government organizations.) Is it part of a location based network, be it town or state? A good rule of thumb is, could anyone access the information without actually becoming friends (which requires special permission) with the individual or joining a group? If not, then the journalists must identify themselves before gaining acceptance if they wish to use any content they gather.
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