Chapter 4 Research Links, Composing Cyberspace

Chapter 4 index || Forward Thinking || Discussion Threads || More Online Readings & Resources |

1. Both Howard Rheingold and John Perry Barlow write in this chapter about their experiences from the early days of the West Coast-based online community the WELL (Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link), and Amy Bruckman discusses the "female-friendly" New York-based online community, sometimes compared to the WELL, called ECHO (East Coast Hang Out). If you have Internet access, explore both Web sites and if possible, join both communities as a guest, then compare your experiences. Alternatively or additionally, explore other Web-based virtual community efforts such as HotWired or The River, two offshoots of the WELL. Research the recent history of the organizations you explore and write a paper, or create a set of Web pages, in which you compare and evaluate their success as virtual communities.

2. Besides founding MediaMOO for adult media researchers, Amy Bruckman has created a virtual community for children aged 9 to 13 called MOOSE Crossing. On the welcome Web page, Bruckman writes that "younger kids are welcome to try it out, and folks older than 13 can apply to become rangers, and help kids on the system." Explore what other online community resources exist for children on the Internet, and evaluate their state of development. If possible, ask younger siblings or friends in the appropriate age group to try out one or more of these resources and give you their opinions. If you are an experienced Net participant, consider applying for a volunteer position, such as Bruckman's "rangers" on MOOSE Crossing.

3. It is widely agreed that most Internet users in the late 1980s and early 1990s were affluent, white, male, and young. John Perry Barlow decries the lack of cultural diversity in cyberspace and, like Amy Bruckman, suggests that diversity is crucial for the success of online community. Search current newspaper and magazine indexes for the latest demographic information about the Internet: In the late 1990s, how diverse has the Net become in terms of gender, race, ethnicity, language or national origin, age, economic class, or other measures of social status? Not surprisingly, you can find numerous surveys and demographic studies about the Internet on the Internet itself; you can locate these using Web indexes or search engines. Collections of online links to Internet demographic resources include Georgia Tech's WWW User Surveys and Joshua Cooper Ramo's article in this chapter but also in Charlise Lyle's "CyberFaith: Promoting Multiculturalism Online" (in Chapter 3) and Mark Fearer's "Scientology's Secrets" (in Chapter 8). In addition, Richard Rodriguez looks at gaps between the religious and the electronic global village in "A Future of Faith and Cyberspace" (Chapter 6). Choose a religious affiliation that you share or are interested in (or an alternative philosophy such as agnosticism or atheism), and explore to what extent this group of believers has actively used or been affected by electronic technologies. If you belong to a church or synagogue, compose a set of questions based on the articles you've read, and use these questions to interview members of your group and religious leaders. On the Internet, especially in Usenet newsgroups, there are hundreds of ongoing discussions about religion and spiritual beliefs. If Web sites are devoted to the group you're exploring, evaluate their effectiveness in communicating the group's beliefs or promoting a community of shared values. If you know or are willing to learn how to publish Web pages yourself, consider creating a site that explores your own religious or spiritual values.

5. How would you compare the future vision of the social impact of technology presented in E.M. Forster's "The Air-Ship" with that presented in William Gibson's "Johnny Mnemonic" (Chapter 1)? Despite the drastic differences in the two representations of society -- one apparently egalitarian and rigidly centralized, the other hierarchical and more anarchistic -- do you see some surprising similarities? For an extended research project, read more works by Forster and Gibson along with critical and historical sources, and analyze how the current state of technology influenced each writer's science fiction vision.