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| Online Communities: Alloys of Silicon and Flesh |
| Citizen reporter Inkyu Kang ponders how the Internet has changed the world in the past 10 years |
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Inkyu Kang (internews)  |
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Published 2005-01-12 15:08 (KST) |
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 |  | |  Cambridge, Massachusetts, site of the Harvard University "Internet & Society" forum. | | | ©2005 Kang I.K. | The Berkman Center's 2004 Internet & Society conference that was held at Harvard University from Dec. 9 to 11 was a deeply meaningful experience in several ways. This is because we could calmly look back at the influence the Internet has had on the entire world up till now. The Internet has become more deeply embedded in the lives of everyday people, but the hopes and fears the medium initially inspired have in large part receded.
Starting from the U.S. Defense Department's ARPANET information network, the Internet is entering its 35th year. The Internet only began to have an influence on the general population, however, after the graphic-based web browser "Netscape" appeared in 1995, meaning this year would represent the 10th year of the popularization of the medium. How has the Internet changed the world over the last 10 years?
The most notable thing is the change in the understanding of the Internet. This mood was expressed in the academic conference, where it was hard to find the kind of excitement that existed previously in the attitudes of the presenters. When you think about how every "New Media" that has come into existence throughout human history has experienced a period of excitement followed by a cooling off period, the change in how people view the Internet shouldn't be too surprising.
When radio first appeared in the early 20th century, people were so excited they thought they could now communicate with Martians. When television appeared, people welcomed it saying that the magic jewel dreamt about by the wizards of old was now in the hands of the people. When the Internet first appeared, things weren't much different.
 | | | | An advertisement from 1933, when televisions were first marketed. | | | ©2005 Kang I.K. | With the Internet, there were people who excitedly predicted that "New Media" would solve all of mankind's problems, while to their opposite, there were those who predicted apocalypses caused by disasters brought on by the Internet. The "futurists" declared that human relations no longer required people to meet corporally in physical space. They said the "molecular age" in which individuals met physically was over, and people now contacted one another in the form of digital signals called "bits" through a cyberspace that transcended time and space.
The passionate prophesies of 10 years ago are now cooling within an atmosphere of calm reflection. The Internet & Society forum was a product of this reflection. Rather than trumpeting a cyberspace beyond temporal space, the participants focused on rather simple possibilities such as how the medium could concretely help small groups in regional society.
Bowling, pizza, beer and the Internet
Unlike what was hoped for in the past, rather than serving as a substitute for real-world human relations, the Internet is being used as a means of support for real-world meetings, and the participants were united in their opinion that this is where the possibilities of the Internet could be found. Harvard political science professor Robert D. Putnam, a participant in the forum, criticized the current understanding of Internet communities as "cyberspace," and stressed how the Internet was mixing with the physical space of reality.
|  | | | Panelist Robert D. Putnam, a political science professor at Harvard | | | ©2005 Kang I.K. | For example, online communities such as "Meetup" have global networks, but the members of the community meet with small groups of those with similar interests not in cyberspace, but in "real space" like coffee shops and public libraries. Putnam said the example of Meetup put an end to the tedious debate over whether cyber communities on the Internet were real communities.
Meetup founder Scott Heifermann was invited to speak at the forum. He said he had read Putnam's book, "Bowling Alone," and received inspiration for creating an online community where people could meet in the real world. He said Putnam's book, which provided the theoretical basis for "Meetup," showed how human relations have been destroyed in American society since the middle part of the 20th century.
Putnam is putting into theory as "social capital" the trust and reciprocity between society's constituents. According to him, social capital functions as an intangible asset that makes democratic participation possible. The professor claims, however, that the solidarity and interaction among citizens that forms the basis of democratic development have weakened over the least 30 years.
People go bowling more often, but they no longer bowl while hanging out with others, laughing and making noise. They go alone, or at the most, they go with their families and just toss their bowling balls down the lane in silence. Putnam claims that it's hard to find people talking with others over beer and pizza after bowling like you used to in the past. As Habermas found his place of discussion in the teahouses, Putnam found his in the post-bowling pizza parties.
 | | | | Robert Putnam's bestseller "Bowling Alone." Putnam explains that the phenomenon of more and more Americans bowling alone is linked to the decline of social capital, or community ties, in the U.S. | | | ©2005 Simon&S. | If so, why was social capital in decline? Putnam counted as one reason the individualization of leisure activity. One of the trends that most characterizes the 20th century was the individualization of leisure time through scientific technology. As recently as the early 20th century, you had to go to a concert hall and sit with other people in order to listen to music. Modern day man can sit in his room and listen to music that "takes you there" from high-tech music players.
Nothing changes when these people head outside on the crowded street. This is because the iPod they listen to is both a portable, private concert hall and at the same time a wall that blocks communication with other people. The countless selection of channels offered by "individualized media" on radio and television has made people's interests more fragmented and sophisticated, making communication with others more difficult.
About this issue, there are three schools of thought concerning the Internet. One is composed of those who believe that the Internet may solve the problem, another believes it will make it worse, and a third believes the Internet doesn't differ that much from existing media. Putnam was skeptical about whether the Internet could help recover the relationships between people.
Online communities: Alloys of silicon and flesh
Putnam believes the Internet is a continuation of "personalized media." Online communities are divided according to their diverse areas of interest, and it's growing increasingly difficult to find points of commonality to bind them into one, he said. Going further, he believes that online cyber communication faces too many limits as a replacement of "old communications," during which people looked at one another. This is because it's hard to convey non-verbal communication such as facial expressions and body language online.
Putnam points out that if the Internet has possibilities, it's the merging of online and offline. As of now, discussion of a "cyber reality" would be meaningless, and it's more constructive to think about what applicable possibilities the Internet can give to physical meetings in the real world, he says.
|  | | | "Meetup," an online community in which members with the same hobbies or interests meet in "real space." The Web site persuasively shows the reciprocity between online and offline communities. | | | ©2005 Kang I.K. | For this reason, Putnam defines an Internet community as a merger between silicon and flesh. This means that at the point where the cyber world, represented by the semiconductor, and the physical body, that represents the real world, meet, we can find the possibilities of the Internet. Accordingly, unlike the predictions of the "futurists," the Internet is not the domain of pure digital signals called bytes, but rather is planting deeper roots in the domain of flesh and blood elements.
Other presenters generally shared Putnam's opinions. Bush-Cheney '04 eCampaign manager Chuck DeFeo's comments were noteworthy in that regard. He stressed that politics still occur in the real world, and he explained how his online election campaign appropriately merged online with offline. During the last U.S. presidential election, the Republicans were given credit for more effectively using the Internet than Democrats. According to DeFeo, the Internet is simply a tool to more effectively connect people in the real world.
Zack Exley, Director of Online Communication and Organization, Kerry-Edwards 2004, admitted that the Republicans more successfully used the Internet at least to connect online to the offline world. According to Exley, the belief that the Internet itself is intrinsically progressive is slowly disappearing. He confessed that compared to Republicans, his party's use of the Internet was more elitist and authoritarian. He judged that even in "grass roots" politics, which the progressives used to consider their own, the conservative lead is growing prominent.
 | | | Zack Exley, Director of Online Communication and Organization, Kerry-Edwards 2004 (left), journalist Dan Gillmor and Prof. Sunshine Hillygus | | | ©2005 Kang I.K. | | Is the Internet changing the world?
Harvard political science professor Sunshine Hillygus claimed that the influence played by the Internet during the last presidential election was exceedingly small. The Internet did remove some barriers from the citizens' political participation, but that was only for people who already had an interest in politics.
Hillygus was of the view that not only was the Internet a tool limited to those with a prior interest in politics, but also that the Internet could not resolve the issue of political apathy. In fact, she said that that the Internet made people stronger in their existing convictions, and was making communication more difficult with those of opposing views. She pointed to this "polarization" as one of the greatest dangers presented by the Internet.
According to Hillygus, the Internet provides more information to those with an interest in politics, but it keeps people without an interest in it where they are. Moreover, as the Internet tends to make one selectively look for only the information that supports his or her views, it makes it more difficult for one to hold a dialogue with those of opposite views. She felt the very real situation of the Iraq war, rather than the Internet, had the biggest influence on the presidential election.
Dan Gillmor, who recently turned in his resignation to the San Jose Mercury News and is now planning to start an alternative Internet media, said the existing media still wielded a tremendous influence on the last presidential election. Nevertheless, he thought the Internet was gradually bringing changes to news reporting. The one-way "admonishment" or "lecture"-style reporting of the existing media is changing into a two-way "dialogue." He also pointed out, however, than in order to recover the speed stolen by the Internet, the existing media has also begun to mass-producing rash and irresponsible reports.
OhmyNews president Oh Yeon Ho, who was invited to the forum as a keynote speaker, explained the successful use of the Internet in Korea within the context of Korean society and history. According to him, the rare Korean example of the Internet being used as an influential alternative media was a capacity resulting from citizens who fought against undemocratic and violent political th regimes. In the end, it was not the technology of the Internet that changed Korean society, but the people who were ready to use it as a tool.
 | | | OhmyNews president Oh Yeon Ho participates in a debate following his keynote address. To his right are blogger Jeff Ooi, the Berkman Center's Rebecca MacKinnon, and Oxford professor Stephen Ward. | | | ©2005 Kang I.K. | | The Berkman Center's Rebecca MacKinnon, who participated in the forum as a panelist, cited OhmyNews' example and said it seemed that in order for the Internet to grant power to the citizens, there first needed to be special social conditions. She said the Internet is wielding its greatest influence in those nations that are rising as newly democratic societies.
She added, however, that just because the Internet is giving people the chance to speak doesn't necessarily mean it translates into action. For that voice to translate into action, which means for online to move offline, there must be some room for people to wield public power.
The conditions required for the Internet and democratic society to interact are a recognition that one's society needs to further develop democratically, social demand for a media that encompasses the voice of the people in order to bring about that development, alternative media that can communicate that demand as public opinion, a physical space where this opinion can conduce as action, and a passion that can stand up against those forces that would try to keep that action in check.
Is the Internet changing the world? It would seem we must turn this question around. "Who is sitting before the Internet monitor?" This, too, is imprecise. One needs legs with which to run onto the streets once he or she turns the computer off, just as much as fingers to tap at the keyboard.
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©2005 OhmyNews
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