RSA Animate The Internet in Society: Empowering or Censoring Citizens?
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Evgeny Morozov The Internet in Society: Empowering or Censoring Citizens?
We have heard a lot of stories about the impact of the Internet in protest movements
We have heard a lot about the information revolution and how it's transforming
countries like: China, Iran, even many of the countries in the former Soviet Union
and you know the assumption, so far has been that
the Internet is basically a very good thing when it comes to promoting democracy
So, many of these illusions were put together in the mid 90's
by a thinker who ____ _____ called Cyberutopians
People who really believe in the transformative power of the web
to change societies and to change it for the better
So, the most famous quote was that if social african blogging was around in the early 90's
the genocide in Rwanda wouldn't have happened. Which it's now
Which is now _____ This quote will illustrate the very naive view that people have back at the time
So... Many of the people who still believe in this really think that
Blogs are, more or less, what faxes and Xerox machines where in the late 80's where
the great dissident movements in Poland and Eastern Europe really embraced this technology...
So, essentially this argument is about Economics and Logistics
The Internet and the Media had made it really cheap
for people to put this content and enforce the Activists and the NGO's
will inevitably use the technology in order to push for Reform & Change, right?
and so, if you really want to sum up this view
If you have enough connectivity and enough devices
Democracy is almost inevitable
and that explains what we have seen so many pushes
to, you know: Get China On-Line, get Iran On-Line and get Russia On-Line
and make sure that people have enough connectivity
and make sure that people know what Blogging is
and make sure that people know what Connectivity is
and somehow, all in all, this would explain how exactly these people
will use this tools to ask for more democracy and you know, colaborate together
and do some more stuff, and you know, one of the main swich ____ have developed
let's use "iPod Liberalism": It's believed that people who have iPods or any other sort of modern Western technology
will also be very likely to support Western values and Western Democracy
So, the assumption here is that if you give all Chinese, or Iranians or Russians
enough iPods, or enough Laptops or enough fax-machines
They will all, somehow, in their own aspire to Democratic Change, right?
and of course this would make a fascinating title
for a column by Thomas Friedman "Drop iPods, not bombs"
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