In communication history, we know who invented which technologies, however, undoubtedly forget how the technologies surpass suppression and rise to maturity. We overlook factors that initiate for newer innovations and development. One example is the U.S. wireless radio broadcasting, which has endured institutional social, political, and economic transformations in historical context. Throughout the twentieth century, the meaning of wireless radio broadcasting has evolved from three critical phases: beginning of the industry and its commercialization (1920-1934); the golden age of radio and development of networks (1935-1949); and the rise of local independent stations and the fall of national networks (1950-1965).

Each time period of the wireless radio broadcasting further penetrate extensive ideas for transformation with socioeconomic new development models and content by the twenty-first century. The power of wireless radio broadcasting in disseminating content for mass consumption is similar to what end-users see of establishment in podcasting in the year of 2001. Radio broadcasting have been used as a synchronous media channel for limited purposes in the past, such as enhance latest public awareness and news, live music, and mobile marine communication system.

Today, podcasting reveals similar concept of channeling content like radio broadcasting in the past, but in a asynchronous way. Furthermore, mobile wireless technology advances in education, particularly iPod, cell phones, and PDAs, are absolutely the recent trend in many academic institutions. Wireless companies and networks have piled huge invenstments to seamlessly made technology access convenient and compatible to every end-user’s busy, on-the-go lifestyle at work and at school.

Without a doubt, education is one of the most important sectors which the government does not isolate in the U.S. In the year of 1999, the U.S. government spent over $7 billion on school computers, internet access, software, and related items. Installing new technologies in classrooms and learning institutions benefit both the teachers and students from K-12 to universities. The dynamic of teacher-student relationship drastically have improved with better time-management, and focus of understanding the learners’ needs. By the year of 2001, more than 75% of U.S. households subscribe to wireless services, and majority of teachers use computers everyday in classroom and access the world-wide-web for instructional purposes (Altalib, 2002). Within the last two years, more dynamic technological changes have happened from K-12 schools with adoption of mobile wirless technlogies in daily curricular activities. As a consequence, many university professors must acknowledge that incoming freshmen are not the average book-smart students (since approximately the past five years). They are extremely technology-savvy with valid background in mobile learning (m-learning).

Case Study
Having a very late start in Spring of 2006, University of Washington is far behind other academic institutions to incorporate mobile wireless technologies in higher education. I hypothesize that mobile wireless technology advances give reasons to not only benefit building a sense of positive constructive academic community, but also the social necessity for all university professors to adopt in the future.

What do you think of all this? Just blog it!

Elina

Professional journalists, and in effect their employers, rely on their credibility to do good work. Because the nature of their work requires them to be fair and even-handed, it is not surprising that some newspapers are hesitant to allow journalists to maintain blogs. If a political reporter writes her opinions on a candidate in a blog it would obviously be inappropriate for her to cover that candidate. However, if a political reporter keeps a blog with the latest developments in a candidate’s campaign (assuming she isn’t only writing about one candidate) such as campaign contributions of fundraising stops, these are details that might not necessarily make it into the paper, but which some people might be interested in knowing about.

When I worked at The Spokesman-Review the newspaper had several blogs from writers who did not even work at the newspaper. The site has since expanded and includes blogs by reporters, editors and anyone else who might have something interesting to say. When one of my fellow copy editors went to New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina to volunteer (she is from Baton Rouge) she kept a blog so those of us in the Northwest could know a little bit about the chaos going on there from someone who we actually knew.

Blogs are an excellent source of news and information. But newspapers have a fear of releasing their editorial control. I think this is one of the reasons why newspapers have been slow to include blogs, discussion boards and other reader-produced content that they don’t have the resources to monitor it.

What Dan Gillmor makes clear in his book, however, is that the point of having an interactive media is to allow the readers to contribute, and help monitor, the sites. As we learned with Communities in Cyberspace, users are more than willing to take on responsibilities for user-driven sites. If newspapers included a way to alert editors of inappropriate content with the click of a button, I think users would report the content – probably more efficiently than the newspaper is able to monitor the site. I’m not saying editors can leave interactive features of their Web sites unmaintained. It’s important for readers to see that the sites are active with both reader content and editors’ oversight.

When bloggers or people on discussion boards get it wrong who is at fault and what should newspapers do about it? This is a real concern for newspapers. Hopefully, the same open process that allowed the content in the first place will allow it to be quickly corrected. However, should newspapers take responsibility for fact-checking assertions made by readers? Even if they are not legally obligated to (which I don’t think they are judging from this article I saw today, newspapers may fear that incorrect information from readers could hurt their credibility. Hopefully, the more familiar people become with blogs, the more they will understand that information must be questioned. Also, as we saw with Newsvine, even nonjournalists can earn credibility with readers. Regular contributors and readers of blogs will be able to judge for themselves after several posts whether a person is credible or not. Newspapers may also consider a ranking system like Newsvine uses, in which regular contributors gradually earn more control over the site.

This view of citizen journalism could be a very empowering thing for people. If people feel they have some ownership over the news they are consuming, they will probably be more faithful readers as well, which is good for newspapers in the long run. The BBC experiment iCan, in which citizens were given the tools for local activism, was inspiring in the way it helped to focus a small community on a pressing issue for that community. They found they could uncover the problems without the need for a professional to do it for them.

Kristina ]]>

Netizens: An Anthology, The Net and the Future of Politics: The Ascendency of the Commons . FOCUS On pp1-5, 10-12, 15-22, 24-25

Assignment:
Synthesize reading(s) and supplement discussion material with at least one additional reading per group member. Blog, a reaction to the assigned reading(s)* that includes a short abstract (with link) of the supplemental resource. Posts are due 6 pm day of class.

Netizen’s transcribes the two-week November 1994 Virtual Conference on Universal Service and Open Access to the Telecommunications Network (see NTIA) as an example of public and open discussion to examine e-government.

Views on Internet and democracy:

• 19th Century Political Theorist, James Mill – democracy as desirable but impossible to maintain.
• Recent Scholar Professor Christopher Lach –is the press and modern journalism equivalent to a public forum for representative government?
• Traditional town meeting limitations – is everyone allowed to speak?
• At the conference – Internet identified as a public good.

Optimism at the conference:
“The development of the Internet and of Usenet is an investment in a strong force towards making direct democracy a reality. These new technologies present the chance to overcome the obstacles of preventing the implementation of direct democracy…Usenet newsgroups are discussion forums where questions are raised, and people can leave comments when convenient, rather than at a particular time and at a particular place…newsgroups and mailing lists prove that citizens can both do their daily jobs and participate in discussions that interest them within their daily schedule (2-3).”

Over ten years later government net uses are still being envisioned…UW Professor Philip Howard quotes in his book on page 36 about digital democracy:
“The general public will have ready access to government information and services over their computers. The internet will be an agent for democracy, as each community has an electronic town hall…citizens will vote from home by computer on daily and weekly issues which are raised by their elected representatives (Bainbridge 2003, 320).”

Internet Access in Libraries:
The ALA (American Library Association) includes the Internet as part of its Intellectual Freedom policy. Libraries defend the use of the Internet for everyone and try to resist filtering, however the courts upholding CIPA in 2003 required libraries receiving public funds to limit the sites which are accessible to children.

Questions:

• How do we create a public forum through the net?
• How do we use communication technology to drive direct democracy?
• Is accessing the Internet a citizen right?

DEFINITIONS:
NTIA~ National Telecommunications & Information Administration – a former branch of the US Department of Commerce sponsored the email and newsgroup conference).

Intellectual Freedom~ Intellectual freedom is freedom of the mind, and as such it is both a personal liberty and prerequisite for all freedoms leading to action. Moreover, intellectual freedom, protected by the guarantees of freedoms of speech and press in the first Amendment, forms the bulwark of our constitutional republic. –American Library Association, Office of Intellectual Freedom, Intellectual Freedom Manual

CIPA Children’s Internet and Protection Act~ forces libraries to filter the content of computer usage.

SUPPLEMENTAL SOURCES:
Howard, Philip N. (2006). New media campaigns and the managed citizen. Cambridge, NY: Cambridge University Press.
A University of Washington professor, Howard uses an ethnographic approach to examine the “networked computer” and “political campaign establishment.” Survey data and social network analysis provide an evolutional look at political campaigns over time from 1996 to 2004.

Lord, Catherine. (2006). Intellectual Freedom: Understanding and Supporting Access. King County Library System, Training 10 November 2006.

– Stephanie

Was anyone else surprised by this article? I’m not oblivious to the diversity of opinion on population, nor do I think Hardin is totally off-based, but couldn’t he have left a little room for religious ideology as a possible exception to the rule. His “Puritan inheritance,” as he states, is almost used as a derogative. My religious background commends Hardin’s uses of mutual coercion, mutually agreed upon by the majority of the people affected (Hardin), but still leaving room for Deity to finalize our decisions, which is where I think we would find our impeding barrier of disagreement. With this theory of the commons with regards to the Internet I can see great correlation to his take on population with this. If Hardin and I were to tackle the Internet as the source of our problem I think we would have been much better friends.

Apart from outer space, the Internet is the most expansive interval I can appeal to. Anyone can access it as if it were as common as the air we breathe. Ok, a little farfetched, but you get the point. So, where there is accessibility to such an extensive resource freedom of thought or expression races hysterically through digital highways reaching from the largest cities to the islands of the sea to young and old alike. So, how does this impact us? Well…that depends! I’m not going to go into a lot of detail how the free flow of thought through the Internet impacts us, but needless to say there are a lot of creepy people out there that take no thought of (Hardin would say they have no conscience) how their content will impact their neighbor.

Hardin mentions in a still more embryonic state is our recognition of the evils of the commons in matters of pleasure (Hardin). The Internet is full of “pleasurable” things, which I will not go into. And yes, I’m using the word pleasurable as a self indulging derogative. Who is there to regulate this? Sure there have been steps to do so such as governing laws, firewalls, encryption, and penalties to keep us away, but the problem is people are finding loops, so it’s not really regulated enough to make much of an impact. In other words to answer Kathy’s questions as to how I rate edemocracy, well I rate it very poorly for the reasons just mentioned. The only way to beat it is to strengthen our moral ethics, but I’ll save this argument for another day. I will conclude; however, with my own declaration that there is truth out there without taking away our right to think, so ponder as Hardin quotes Hegel who said “Freedom is recognition of necessity.”

Steve

‘Communities in Cyberspace’ alluded to the notion that online communities and the emerging means by which to engage them are offering sensory experiences so advanced that it is difficult to distinguish user behavior here apart from that of the ‘real world’. Second Life is one such MUD – growing considerably in popularity and hosted features.

[The YouTube clip and NPR story] provide video and audio insights to the advantages and appeal of Second Life. It is a 3D virtual reality platform founded by Linden Labs and former RealNetworks CTO Philip Rosedale. Hearkening greatly to Keller & Smith’s discussion concerning extended ‘identity’ (those who opt for digital interpretations of their ‘real’ selves or go for more egotistic interpretations), Second Life users can choose their appearance and are given tools to alter and interact with the virtual world around them. A network community, it operates and evolves independently of any one user. Fluid (or dynamic) access as such is representative of the progressively dominant real time forums that are emerging – echoing real life as synchronous worlds of their own.

In the discussion of gender and racial issues, I thought the complexity of those issues, in terms of digital extensions, owe much to the choices that users are presented with. Users in Second Life can follow more real world confines in the creation of their digital self : choosing between man and woman, African American and Asian, etc. Or they can create fantastic creatures and characters entirely unavailble in reality. This forum hosts both dominant emergent viewpoints as to how cyberspace should be engaged.

Keller & Smith noted the impact of cyberspace onto the ‘real world’ when discussing political activism. Second Life offers perhaps an even more tangible avenue for this, as users accumulate ‘points’ which are convertible to actual cash. In effect, you can run a virtual business (selling property, virtual goods, rights, etc.) and reap real monetary profits. One can even create a virtual mockup of a real world conference room and run an actual PowerPoint presentation that you’ve created to show to your coworkers.

It also offers a prime example of the ultimate ‘culture layer’ : a digital replica interface of actual buildings, people, parks, streets, etc, as well as a truly interactive and randomly accessible new media portal, suggested in Principles of New Media as two of the definers of the title’s name topic. In Principles, VR auteur Jaron Lanier suggested virtual reality will void the need for language-based and symbol-based communication.

Luke

In Taiwan, especially in universities, students like to use BBS (Bulletin Board system) as a medium to communicate others and share some information and opinions. Six years ago, I initially knew how to use BBS, and then I’m captivated in BBS everyday. My friends near around have personal boards on BBS, so I can know and understand their life and feelings by reading their personal boards. Just as the article” Communities in cyberspace” said, BBS is a form of asynchronous communication that refine email discussion lists in a number of ways. A group can interact without everyone gathering at a particular time and they can still exchange messages and sustain discussion on very different schedules or in distant time zones. Thus, even though I study abroad, I can still read those boards of my friends and respond to their articles.
I sinenrely think that BBS is so convenient that I cannot understand why people in other countries don’t want to use it . The interface of BBS is simple and clear;besides, you can go through every kinds of boards in one BBS . That’s so great to me.

What’s more, one thing that has not been mentioned in this article is Blog. In recent years, more and more mass media have discussed blogs, and perhaps as a result, more and more people have begun to use blogs. In the blogosphere, the author of blogs will provide the links that they like or recommend and usually read those blogs and leave a message or issue impressions to some specific articles. At the same time, the author of blogs is also the audience of others in the community. Except for personal writing, the most important characteristic is “Conversation.” Bloggers interact by way of interlinks and mutual responses; thus, we can see some forms of social network in the blogosphere.

In a virtual community, I think people would like present another self and in order to present a better self, they will do some adjustments to conform the request of other people on Internet. They might decorate themselves and deceive other community members. This is a difference between a real life and a virtual community.

However, I agree the study provided by Wellman and Gulia “Virtual communities as communities” and Wellman found that CSSNs(Computer Supported Social Networks) can still sustain some network relationships, such as strong ties, intermediate ties and weak ties that exist in the real community. (Wellman, Barry. (1996) For A Social Network Analysis of Computer Networks: A Sociological Perspective on Collaborative Work and Virtual Community. ACM.) I like and used to communicate with my friends and relatives in this kind of virtual communities. I think I can’t deviate from BBS and blog, because they have become some parts of my life.

Chloe

What New Media Is Not from The Language of New Media by Lev Manovich

Differences between new and old media:

1. New media is analog media converted to a digital representation.
2. All digital media share the same digital code.
   (which means digital media allow different types of files to be displayed in the same computer)
3. New media allows for random access.
4. Digitization inevitably involves loss of information.
5. Digital media can be copied endlessly without degradation.
   (especially in quality, like tape or VHS)
   (the JEPG format, which is used to store still images, and MPEG, which is used to store digital video on DVD.)
6. New media is interactive.
   (in this way the user becomes the co-author of the work)

MORE

What great irony there is that the group of people who used Babbage’s simple calculating machine were, in fact, the first ‘computers’. Some of us might think of the Univac that took up several rooms as the first computer, others the PC/Apple as the first computers, or as noted in last week’s class it was predicted that “In the future, the average computer will weigh no more than 1.5 tons.”

The importance of computing power to communications, while mechanical in nature – pushing binary code through instantaneously, reflects the continuing dimunition of the dimensions of time and space. Computing allows the underlying algorithms of communications to be limited only by the speed of the processor. Verizon is embarked upon a multi-year effort to redo its network completely in fiber-optics. Given the physical properties of glass, the only limitation will be the electronics at transmitting end and, to a lesser, degree the electronics at the termination point. This simply means that in the future where a fiber-optic network exists, light will carry all information from start to finish. It’s clear that between the light spectrum and the speed of light on the side of a communications network, the idea of instant access will become a reality.

I would expect, a la George Lucas’s seminal sci-fi film, THX 1138 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/THX_1138, holograms and intelligent agents of all manner will be part of our personal space. While that movie reflects a rather dystopian view of the future, it puts across the basic idea that the techies rule society and there are holograms to entertain as well as serve as our assistants.

I am also reminded of an AT&T corporate video made in 1993 that showed home and business settings where instant communication flourished. Among the embellishments. . . An Ameican doctor and her Belgian husband talking over a digital visual connection that simultaneously (and instantly) translated conversations for parents in the U.S. and Belgium, as well as for conversations with a Bhutanese or Nepalese colleague. There also was theater involving a builder/developer and a community activist committed to keeping affordable housing available in an urban renewal project. New designs that ultimately would permit this were effortlessly pulled out of visual databases and displayed on large screens like you find in some of the newer, more sophisticated sports bars these days. . . Of course, the bold new world sat idle for awhile as the real world of $, immature technology and other forms of cash flow distracted the telecoms from building the infrastructure for this new world. http://www.newnetworks.com/chapter1.html

WWVD?
What Would Vannevar Bush Do (or say)? Well, he clearly had the mind to translate contemporary applications and extrapolate their future based on scientific principles – particularly through an understanding photons and their capabilities. My sense is that he would look more closely at the time-space continuum and draw some additional conclusions about technology and the future. Perhaps the Overlords of Arthur C. Clarke’s 1953 work, “Chilhood’s End” where a superior technological race comes to earth to supervise humanity. Once humanity realizes it is under the power of the Overlords, it loses its aspiration to/for anything and people begin to watch an average of three hours of television a day. Of course, Clarke wrote this at the dawn of the television age when three hours of TV seemed like a rather indulgent pasttime.

But Bush, more the visionary than the pessimist, today would likely see the capabilities of nanotechnology and ‘riding the light’ with communications taking us to new heights, despite the obvious potential for more lethal weapons and inhumane treatment of one another. Even as we consider the radio spectrum or light spectrum as the ultimate in communication capabilities, nanotechnology may offer us devices that we have yet to dream of. . .small implants in the eyes, ears, brain, etc. that allow the brain to move the body to some appointed task – repairing a tear in the femoral artery when help is unavailable, literally creating the necessary components from the body. A little science fictionish, but not without possibility. . . imagine these virtually invisible implants helping you connect with colleagues wherever they are to work on a group project – something well beyond web conferencing, that’s for sure, but maybe not quite telepathy!

Bush might not run as far afield in his thinking, but chances are he’d see the building blocks of a new technology in a light that would give us a sense of the future’s probabilities in communications.

– Kevin

Week 3 – It’s rather amazing to read the bit-by-bit innovations regarding the ultimate development of the telephone and how both one-upsmanship, collaboration, and exploratory integration of existing discoveries on the part of the tech-savvy “illuminati” of that day moved things forward. The propellant of transmitting sound electrically seemed to stem from the raw concept that speech is vibration – what can be oscillated naturally could be reproduced electrically.

It seems science of the day regarded the possibility as mythical – Bell was working against both the challenge of telephony but also industry-wide downlooking. Also interesting is the notion that Bell’s patent was based off of an undeveloped model : a gamble off of the guarantee that superior technology would inevitably be produced along those lines later. Is the race for technological innovation still following the same trends today? The race to control the industry between National Bell, Edison, Western Union followed invention faster than I ever realized…with that the quickness through which the telephone sufficed as an entertainment and news ‘broadcast’ medium, i.e. the technology allowed user to message reception for special events. Once released, the exploratory stage of the market plays a powerful motivator in the direction technology is to proceed.

‘Supervening necessity’ comes across as a recognized industrial, social, or consumer need for an alterier application of a technology other than was originally intended. The Internet itself suffices as a prime example of this, originating as a military communications and file access network, later broadened and augmented to the average user’s whims. The concept alludes that technological success (in terms of widespread integration and use) is beholden to the needs of the market far more than the wants of the inventor.

U&G
The concept of uses and gratifications sounds very much derived from the microeconomist’s standpoint: if you can predict the habits of ISP users and understand what they respond to, you can tailor your branding to their needs. U&G explains motivations and continued use and is thus very useful for tech developers seeking long term consumership, brand loyalty, etc. Because of the multitude of user interests and uses for the Internet itself, methodology as such is an absolute necessity. ISP users who log onto cnn.com every day may not necessarily visit ebay.com. The variancies of the Internet’s audience, as a digital forum, necessitate U&G if you are to enter the market via the medium. In regards to U&G for our research projects, I have a difficult time imagining how it might relate to my topic of ICTs for Development, considering my area of focus is the most barren areas of the digital divide and do not approach the Internet in nearly the same capacity (if they approach it at all). But in the areas where supporting Internet infrastructures do exist and it claims some part of daily life, it may hold true in these areas as well.

Luke

Discuss the importance of “supervening necessity” – can you think of other examples?
According to Chapter three, it points out that the supervening necessity of speaking telephone is the limited liability company. Under my explanation, I would say that is a kind of change of social systems, industry standard or the rising needs of something. For example, if the science has idealized to the technology already, what kind of necessity is important to push this technology to the next stage “invention” or even “diffusion”? That is definitely related to the market scale. During the baby-booming generation after world war, the consumer needs were a big deal. In other words, they bought what they need such as food and clothes. In contract, if people live nowadays need information and the business can provide it matching their needs, the technology will keep moving forward and be adopted. Therefore, supervening necessity plays a key role in the development of the new technology without doubts.

Do you agree the cassette is an old-school thing?
In my childhood, a music store such as Towers Record always displayed plenty of cassettes or discs. However, with the standard changed and following the portable and convenient wants of the consumers, we no longer use the cassette. Old-school technologies such as MD, Dos are weeded out partly because the trend of the industry. Another main reason is they cannot fulfill the consumers. So here comes some points, technologies are all possible to be taken over. How to predict and understand what the future is in the industry is more critical and needs time to dig out.

What about the law of unintended consequences?
Firstable, I want to make sure that we both have the similar understanding of “the Law of Unintended Consequences”. From Wikipedia Encyclopedia, the Law of Unintended Consequences holds that almost all human actions have at least one unintended consequence. Another way of saying this is that each cause has more than one effect, including unforeseen effects. For instance, scientists alter the genes of crops and the original idea is to help people to get enough nutrition. These days the effects of genetically-modified foods are still unknown, but this issue has already caused arguments. And back to the aspect of technology, it is never one-sided in terms of technology giveth and taken away. You never know. Remember the movie ”the butterfly effect”, who can tell a butterfly’s wings might create tiny changes in the atmosphere that ultimately cause a tornado to appear?

How might U&G theory apply to your research this quarter?
There are three hypotheses in U&G Theory: the audiences are active, they look for the media that can fill their bills and the media can satisfy their needs.

Related to my topic this quarter “the impact of the new service (podcasting) on the NPR audiences”, I will apply both U &G and Diffusion of Innovation. Find out few questions:

1. Will NPR audience search podcasting on their initiative?
2. what kind of original audience of NPR will use the podcasting service and which program will they be interested in?
3. Will the audiences adopt the new podcasting service that NPR offers?
4. Which kind of adopters are the audiences of NPR?What is the present stage of NPR in AIETA Model?

– Mini