RESEARCH PROPOSAL

DATE: 25th November, 2010.

TO: Mr. M. Saidur Rahman (Saeed)
FROM: Faria Chowdhury; Anika Atique Chowdhury; Sibat Nuhas; Farzana Kashem; Fahima
Pervin.

SUBJECT: Proposal to write a report regarding any of the following topics

Topics 1: Facebook, the most popular community website –the controversies it

has raised in the name of social networking!

Scope: Privacy, property, and accessibility are definitely issues in the Facebook. Was this
program a breach of privacy? Is the information obtained from tracking the activity of the
Facebook user the property of Facebook since the user consented to join the social
networking website? Should other users of facebook be allowed to access this private
information? Does facebook have a right to track and distribute users' personal information?
The outrage that resulted from this incident and the apology from Facebook's CEO tells us
that the answers to these questions are no. Companies need to reevaluate their code of
ethics and be stricter in enforcing them. Use of information that can directly compromise the
customer is neither right nor good for business in the long run. Yet many companies have
continued these business practices, acting radically on personal information they have
collected for quick profits. Besides this issue of privacy facebook has also raised several
questions as providing a scope of nudity, abuse, blackmail, personal attacks and devastation
of social relationships. In this modern time we cannot even think without Facebook even if it
is associated with several threats to our personal life.

Research Objectives:

1. The examination of the debate surrounding Facebook's business.

2. The ethical conditions of the case, and the ways by which Facebook was accused of
being unethical on carrying out its networking system.

3. The ethics in dealing with intellectual property on the net, and how photo, file
sharing/music sharing in the Internet through Facebook have brought forward a new
ethical dilemma.
 4. How Facebook has taken initiatives to secure its popularity defending the raised
accusations.

5. Every new development in information technology brings new possibilities to obtain,

use, and manipulate information. Thus, we are forced to consider the ethics of
different uses of information.

6. The downside is this has led to cases of identity theft and fraud, where people hack
personal information.

Research Questions:

1. What is Facebook?

2. What kind of business operation is associated with Facebook as its revenue process?

3. Who are the main users of Facebook? The various dimensions of the users.

4. What are the ethical accusations against Facebook?

5. How does Facebook raise the major controversies?

6. How Facebook activities do violate the human rights?

7. What are the terms taken by Facebook as a precaution to defend those ethical
issues?

8. Employers are looking at the Facebook, MySpace, and blogs of prospective

employees, even internship applicants, in order to make hiring decisions. Is this
legal? Ethical?

Methodology:

According to the instruction of our faculty we will collect all the relevant information on
secondary sources. We wish to browse through the Internet and go through website, articles,
journals, blogs and forums. Our research paper will follow the general format of a research
paper with the main sections like Introduction, Background, Analysis, and Summary of the
Findings. The organization of this paper will be directed by research questions that would be
answered in the above mentioned main section

Theories to be applied:
 1. Traditional and contemporary theories such as egoism, utilitarianism, ethics of duties,
virtue ethics, the good will, categorical imperative, discourse ethics.

2. Corporate Accountability

3. Corporate Social Responsibility

4. CSR outcomes

5. Stakeholder Theory

6. Ethical consumerism

7. Ethical theories

Topic2 : The manipulative aspects of advertising as opposed to it’s informative

aspects.

Scope: In the 21st century, we can define marketing to be the soul of sales. It has two
faces. First, it is a philosophy, an attitude, a perspective that focuses on customer
satisfaction. Second, marketing is a set of activities used to implement this philosophy.
Through marketing effectively, ideas, goods, and services can be developed, priced,
promoted and distributed in such a way so that both individual and organizational goals are
achieved. The most popular ingredient of the marketing strategies till date is advertising.

Advertising is any type of paid one-way communication about a product/idea, service, etc.
Almost all companies rendering a good or a service use some form of advertising, whether it
be in the form of a multi-dollar campaign or a simple ad in a newspaper. Due to the intensity
of competition, firms are using advertising as a tool of manipulation rather than its original
target of being only informative. This issue has adverse consequences on consumer
behavior due to its unethical aspects.

In the 21st century, the truth about the global marketplace is that intensity of competition
among firms is at its peak. As a result, in this ever-changing external environment,
companies are employing every strategy they can to hunt for customers. Advertising,
indeed, is the most popular weapon firms use in order to get their profit objectives fulfilled.
Its sole purpose is no longer to inform, persuade and remind only but rather to manipulate.

Research objective:

The aim of this report is:

• To weigh the pros and con related with manipulative advertisement.
 • Finding out and addressing the ethical issues regarding manipulative advertisement.
• Discussing the ethical issues from the perspective of different ethical theories.
• More in depth ethical analysis by using various secondary data.

Research questions:

*What is advertisement?

*What are the purposes of advertisement?

*What are the benefits of advertisement, both from the perspectives of the consumers and
the producers/service providers?

*What types of advertisements are there and the reasons behind their existence?

*What are the current advertising trends?

*What are the different factors contributing in the shift of the purpose of advertising from
being informative to manipulative?

*Is the shift ethical when it comes to influencing consumer behavior?

Theories applied:

8. Traditional and contemporary theories

9. Corporate Accountability

10. Corporate Social Responsibility

11. CSR Outcomes

12. Stakeholder Theory

13. Ethical consumerism

14. Ethical theories

Methodology: Secondary data will be used extensively in order to conduct our research
such as the resources of the library and the web. News sites, standard search engines such
as Yahoo and Google, and other business and educational sites will also aid our secondary
inquiries.
Topic 3: Does the hit TV show Dexter promote moral ambiguity amongst its
viewers

Scope: Television's popular serial killer drama series "Dexter" is said to have been meddling
with the boundaries of television decency & dangerously affected its viewer’s psyche. The
biggest problem with Dexter is that it encourages the audience to root for a serial killer, and
to hope that this serial killer is never brought to justice. Pressure groups such as Parents
Television Council (PTC) denounce the premise of such a show where audiences are
encouraged to root for a serial killer, and to hope that this serial killer is never brought to
justice. "CBS' plan is purely based on corporate greed, not what's good for families or in the
public interest," said PTC President Tim Winter. "These Showtime programs contain some of
the most explicit content on television, period. Yet CBS has no qualms about putting shows
that make heroes of serial killers and revel in sick, graphic violence or those that condone
drug use and glorify drug dealers in front of millions of children and families on broadcast
television.” Moreover, the show is said to have inspired a few cases of actual murders.
Example. Conner Conley murder as stated below:
In November 2009, Andrew Conley, 17, was arrested in Rising Sun, Indiana, US, in
connection with the death of his 10-year-old brother, Conner. In an affidavit filed in Ohio
County court, police said that Andrew told investigators that he identified with the character.
"Andrew stated that he watches a show called 'Dexter' on Showtime, about a serial killer,"
prosecutors said in an affidavit. "He stated, 'I feel just like him.'"[30] Conley is now serving
life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. – Wikipedia

Research Question:

• By humanization the acts of a serial killer, is the television show Dexter causing its
viewers to associate and condone otherwise reprehensible actions?
• Does the serial is accepted by its viewers as a source of entertainment or it has some
indirect impacts on its viewer’s mind?
• Is it really responsible for few murders took place? If yes, then what logical steps
should be considered to discontinue?
• Discussing the problem in the context of various ethical theories

• To reach a definite conclusion regarding the ethical issues

 • To provide recommendations

Methodology: This research topic would be analyzed based on the secondary data
available which includes books, articles and newspaper clips related to the topic, and online
resources.

Request for approval:

We hereby request your approval for our research proposal. If you wish us to modify or
improve our proposal, we will submit it after incorporating the necessary changes. We would
also be grateful for your advice and help in conducting our research and completing the
project.