As Professor Semitsu discusses in his article, "From Facebook toMug Shot," not even George Orwell would have predicted that "anomniscient Big Brother" would result from government inactivity asopposed to a totalitarian takeover. There has been much criticismregarding post-9/11 changes in law allowing the government toaccess certain electronic files without a warrant or even probablecause. However, the U.S. population has ultimately surrendered itsright to privacy to corporations. If government ever tried topersuade the average citizen to permanently document his or herevery action and thought, there would be mass resistance andoutrage. But when a teenage Harvard-drop out created a website forjust that, hundreds of millions of people began voluntarilydocumenting their life (and crimes) with amazing precision. TheFourth Amendment provided U.S. citizens with over 200 years ofprotections to their persons, papers and effects. But today, in2011, the Fourth Amendment does not cover anything having to dowith the government's seizure of Facebook activity, email olderthan six (6) months, or much of our web activity. Technology allowsus to neatly document our day-to-day activities, while the lawallows the government to seize these writings and use them todeprive people of life and liberty without the due process grantedto other papers and effects.

Argue for or against Professor Semitsu's proposition that thesystem is broke and needs fixing.
Should U.S. citizens enjoy the same constitutional protections totheir social networking communications and emails as they do totheir personal diaries and hand-written correspondence? Or, shouldthe government have ready access to public or semi-public socialnetworking commentary for the purposes of legitimate lawenforcement investigations without a warrant? If the police ask theFacebook legal department, without a warrant, for social mediarecords, is that similar to a detective going into a bar andinterviewing people; or, is it closer to the seizure of letters ordocuments?

Part 1 - Write your original response. Be sure to include atleast one (1) descriptive hypothetical situation.