This is a discussion taking place on the TOES list that I think Futureworkers would be find interesting. Hugh McGuire Hi! John, I think your comments are poignant, and you articulated the issue more clearly than I did. When the Internet was being innovated by the National Science Foundation, it was an academic oriented entity. Once it was released to the commercial market a new dynamic was introduced that I think, as you said: "I'm not inclined to assume unlimited access and lateral connectivity will be around indefinitely unless political steps are taken to protect it." I think many of us are making that assumption and we are complacent about the continued existence of this resource. In many respects it is like the privilege to vote. We don't treasure and protect that resource and, as a result, we allow many forces to emerge that are intent on denying or undermining our franchise. I agree with you that this could happen with the lateral connectivity of the Internet. If this is seen solely as a commercial medium, then there is no reason for those who control access to this medium to continue providing a public service that could potentially undermine their corporate interests. I agree with you that this requires political diligence, and I don't see that diligence building anywhere, either with respect to the Internet or our right to vote for that matter. I see complacency. Economic and political power continue to accrue among a smaller number of interests, and one resource we have to oppose that power we are not protecting. I think the Seattle protests alerted global corporate interests to the danger of popular insurgencies, and the role Internet communication plays in organizing those protests. Thanks for your comments. Hugh McGuire Date: Tue, 15 Feb 2000 16:17:26 -0800 From: John Rogers <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: Re: Hegemony To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Re: open / affordable access AOL's acquisition of Time-Warner made me wonder how long big business would see lateral network communications as an asset. Merging content with delivery at this scale creates the opportunity to bundle unlimited access (800 numbers) and content for a monthly fee, like cable TV. If this market segment is large enough to satisfy ecommerce development, lateral connectivity will not be required. The advantages of reaching a captive audience may offset the reduced number of potential customers. At that point non-bundled access, such as "traditional" ISPs, could face per minute access charges without threatening business access to consumer markets. Per minute charges would drive consumers to providers offering bundled services--quite a temptation for media conglomerates offering bundled services who have the clout to impact telecommunications policy. Lateral networked communication, such as this list, if offered on the open internet, could be expensive and inaccessible to subscribers of bundled services, or, if offered within a bundled service, could then be subject to AOL style content review and control and only reach subscribers to that service/content provider. Hope I'm wrong about this..., but I'm not inclined to assume unlimited access and lateral connectivity will be around indefinitely unless political steps are taken to protect it. ~j ----- Original Message ----- From: Susan Hunt <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Tuesday, February 15, 2000 11:30 AM Subject: Re: Hegemony | Dear Hugh, | | I may be wrong, but I think that because academia so powerfully | influences internet policy in the U.S., and because money is tight for | academics (compared especially to the 60's and 70's for scientists), | there is not much chance that prices will be raised. At least for | academics. The Univ. of Penn. is proposing that it stop being an ISP and | that faculty and students off-campus should pay for some other internet | service provider. There was a bit of an outcry. There is a big difference | between a free ISP and any alternative where you have to pay. | | Also, it's not clear to me that politicians in general are | exactly opposed to internet organizing. I see a sigh of relief coming | from many unexpected quarters after Seattle, and they are thanking their | lucky stars that the internet helped facilitate a resurgence of 60s-type | activism. There must be ways to put up firewalls without resorting to | raising internet access prices above the ability of most of us to pay. | For Sun Microsystems to be saying that internet access should be | restricted seems like a proposal to shoot themselves in the foot! Why | would they want to restrict their market? I don't believe Ford would be | supplying free computers and subsidized internet access (cost to | employee: $10/month) to every one of its employees worldwide if your | fears were justified. Big business seems to think cheap and universal | internet access is good for big business. | | -- Susan | | THE TEXT OF YOUR MESSAGE FOLLOWS: | > | > There was an interview with someone from Sun Microsystems on the syndicated radio program, "Newsweek on Air," Sunday morning. Although I was taking a shower at the time and not listening with full attention, the comments this person made frightened me d | eeply. The interview concerned the recent "Denial of Service" Internet attack. The person from Sun Microsystems commented that one of the reasons such an attack was possible was the low cost or no-cost of e-mail communication. The Sun Microsystems person | suggested that if the e-mail cost were increased, by charging customers in a way similar to how cell phone calls are billed, with people paying for both receiving and sending messages, then the conditions that permit a "denial of service" attack would be | eliminated. | > | > At the moment this comment was made, I was paralyzed with fear. There is no doubt that those who control the economic and political levers of power have noticed the success NGOs and other protest groups are having using e-mail to mobilize their adherent | s, and the healthy global civic culture that has been developing. These elites are also aware of how destabilizing a healthy civic culture can be for a plutocratic, patronizing, narrow-based, corporate power structure. I began to wonder how long it will b | e before communication such as through listserv lists is restricted by increasing its economic cost. Right now we can send and receive an unlimited number of messages of any length at either a low fixed monthly cost or no cost. That is what permits the NG | Os and listserv lists to proliferate and expand. If the Internet is envisioned by the political and economic elites as solely a commercial medium, like television, then there is little reason for them to allow us to continue eng! | > aging in non-commercial conversations at no cost. | > | > We have two political traditions in the United States. The first is republicanism that was created in New England and that involved participation in public affairs among most adults, subsistence yeoman farmers, and merchant capitalists. The second tradi | tion is a narrow-based aristocracy created in the South, which controls the best land and most of the other economic resources, distributes economic benefits through patronage, and discourages mass public education in order to preserve a compliant lower i | ncome population. Both traditions continue to this day in the United States. Cynthia M. Duncan's book, "Worlds Apart", gives an excellent analysis of how this plutocratic power structure from the early days of coal mining and plantation agriculture, coal | operators and plantation bossmen maintained tight control over workers-not just in the workplace but in every dimension of social and political life. | > | > The danger, today, is that with the bifurcation of economic wealth into two social-classes, both political and economic power will be absorbed by the upper twenty percent of wealth holders, and the model by which this can be achieved is the history of p | ower distribution in the American South. | > | > Antonio Gramsci, an Italian socialist in the 1930s who died in one of Mussolini's prisons, identified two distinct forms of political control: domination, which referred to direct physical coercion by police and armed forces, and hegemony which referred | to both ideological control and more crucially, consent. For Gramsci, hegemony is shared ideas or beliefs which serve to justify the interests of dominant groups. The unique achievement of the southern Bourbon class was that they were able to dominate th | e economic life of the South without having to resort to physical coercion or oppression. By reducing the opportunities for the development of a healthy civic culture, economic elites can control the conditions that perpetuate their own hegemony. | > | > Hugh McGuire | > |
