This e-text is copyright Tomas F J Kriha 1994. All rights 
reserved. Do not distribute or publish this e-text without the
express prior permission of the author.

This e-text is based substantially on a paper submitted for
assessment towards a BA majoring in political science at 
Victoria University of Wellington (New Zealand). All opinions
expressed are the author's own and do not necessarily represent the
opinions of Victoria University of Wellington, nor any of its
staff. 


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                    C Y B E R A N A R C H I S M
                         Tomas F J Kriha
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"All men are equal and free: society by nature, and destination, 
is therefore autonomous and ungovernable." -- Pierre-Joseph 
Proudhon, _Les Confessions d'un Revolutionnaire_

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I N T R O D U C T I O N
****************************************************************

"[The] Internet has for years been a nearly perfect laboratory 
for testing the democratic principles of free speech and self-
governance." [1]
-- Peter H Lewis, _New York Times_ correspondent 

"Most people who get their news from conventional media have 
been unaware of the wildly varied assortment of new cultures 
that have evolved in the world's computer networks over the past 
ten years. Most people who have not yet used these new media 
remain unaware of how profoundly the social, political, and 
scientific experiments underway today via computer networks 
could change our lives in the near future."
-- Howard Rheingold, editor of the _Whole Earth Review_ [2]

The Internet has recently received unprecedented mass-media 
exposure as a potent device for influencing the political 
decision-making process. Most of this coverage ignores the 
implications of the new *kind* of communication the Internet 
enables, and the new *kind* of community it produced: a 
community of **voluntary associations based on common interests 
within an environment lacking centralised coercive authority**. 

This paper examines the nature of this anarchist society--a 
community without a state. Max Weber defined a state as a "human 
community that (successfully) claims the _monopoly of the 
legitimate use of physical force_ within a given territory"; 
consequently, "if no social institutions existed which knew the 
use of violence, then the concept of 'state' would be 
eliminated, and a condition would emerge that could be 
designated as 'anarchy', in the specific sense of the word". [3] 
The Internet is capable of creating precisely such an anarchy.

The object of this paper is *not* to analyse the Internet's 
influence on the external world as the mass-media has done; 
rather, it is to analyse the implications of the Internet as a 
political environment **in its own right**. 

****************************************************************
P A R T  O N E
The Global Network of Networks: the Internet
****************************************************************

"Each of the small colonies of microorganisms--the communities 
on the Net--is a social experiment that nobody planed but that 
is happening nonetheless." [4]
-- Howard Rheingold 

A brief overview of the technical history of the Internet is 
necessary  in order to explain why the Internet tend to 
encourage, as a matter of structural necessity, an anarchist 
environment.

****************************************************************
A Short History of the Internet [5]

The word "Internet" means, literally, a network of networks. The 
first prototype of today's Internet was an experimental four-
node network--between UC of Los Angeles, Stanford University, UC 
Santa Barbara, and University of Utah--a quarter of a century 
ago in 1969. This "internetworking" project (hence "Internet") 
was patronised by the United States Department of Defense 
Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) which hoped to design 
a computer network that could survive partial destruction in the 
event of a nuclear attack. This objective resulted in three 
fundamental design elements of the Internet:

(1) The networked computers are capable of remote operation. 
Further, the network allows an assorted range of computers 
communicate "transparently".

(2) The network has no centralised administrative core required 
for it to operate. Any two connected sites are able to 
communicate.

(3) The model governing communication between source and 
destination sites *assumes* that the network is unreliable and 
expects the imminent collapse of any portion of the network. In 
this event, sites merely re-route data packets around the 
collapsed portion.

This research culminated in the Advanced Research Projects 
Agency Network (ARPANet) which was "delivered" to the Defense 
Communications Agency as an operational network in 1975. The 
core of the ARPANet system of networks was a mutually agreed 
method of communicating: the TCP/IP [6] Protocol Suite.

The early 1980s saw a consolidation of many diverse local area 
networks as they adopted the TCP/IP protocol and connected to 
the Internet in increasing numbers. The formation of the 
National Science Foundation Network (NSFNet) in 1986 initiated 
the diversification of Internet sites from government agencies 
to the educational, commercial, and private sectors. Since then, 
in the words of Vinton Cerf (who worked on the ARPANet project 
since 1969), the Internet has been "well beyond critical 
mass" [7] and steadily expanding at an exponential rate. 

Far surpassing the modest ARPANet which initially networked a 
mere one thousand users in 1969, the Internet currently houses 
an estimated 30 million virtual residents (growing by 15% per 
month). [8] The Internet is no longer the exclusive domain of 
United States government agencies; it is rapidly becoming 
commercialised, privatised, and internationalised. More 
importantly, the recent convergence of two previously 
independently developing technologies--high speed global 
telecommunications and cheap yet powerful personal computers-- 
has made the Internet widely accessible to the wider public. 

****************************************************************
The Internet Today

The Internet's ARPANet military ancestry explains--apart from 
why acronym dictionaries are so common on the Internet--the 
origins of its essential characteristic: the lack of centralised 
structure, authority, and funding. Whether or not the anarchist 
nature of the Internet was consciously cultivated by its early 
population (among educational and an public service 
professionals) is often debated, but is largely irrelevant. The 
decentralised design structure of the Internet will inevitably 
encourage the development of an anarchist environment, and this 
is reflected in its management and funding structures.

The closest approximation to a ruling body the Internet has is 
the Internet Society (ISOC), a voluntary membership organisation 
promoting information exchange via Internet technology. The 
Society's most influential role, of developing and maintaining 
network protocols, is carried out by the Internet Architecture 
Board of ISOC created in 1983 to coordinate technical management 
and direction of the Internet. (Despite this apparent central 
authority, the development of Internet protocols is largely, and 
increasingly, the product of "a collaboration among cooperating 
parties".) [9] Each section of the Internet is self-funding, 
though in practice some networks receive subsidies from 
governmental and corporate sponsors. (Although the public supply 
of technical and financial means is diminishing due to escalating
commercial investment throughout the Internet, it is still
relatively influential in the United States, France, and Japan.) 
[10] Any site using the TCP/IP protocol can connect to the 
Internet merely by establishing a telecommunications link (at 
its own expense) with an existing Internet site.

This environment produces an organisational structure remarkably 
similar to Robert Nozick's vision of a minimalist state: a 
"meta-utopia" within which smaller utopian communities (such as 
Internet sites) develop as free associations. In his words, 
"though the framework [of the meta-utopia] is libertarian and 
_laissez-faire_, _individual communities within it need not be_, 
and perhaps no community within it will choose to be so". [11]

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P A R T   T W O
The Global Village: Cyberspace
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"Cyberspace [is a] consensual hallucination."
-- William Gibson, novelist [12]

An entirely distinct environment--parallel to the "confederal" 
Internet structures--emerged: cyberspace. The term 
"cyberspace" was coined by William Gibson in his novel 
_Neuromancer_ to describe an abstract conceptual reality created 
by Computer Mediated Communication (CMC). Cyberspace is an 
abstract space of knowledge and communication. Although 
cyberspace is very much a "virtual reality" in that it does not 
*physically* exist--for it is merely a representation of 
knowledge and communication in the minds of network users--it is 
*a* reality nonetheless. (Indeed, for many it *is* reality!) 
Gibson derived "cyberspace" from the word "cybernetics" (the 
study of communication and control systems). 

Communication and information is the life-blood of cyberspace; 
cyberspace is, for want of better terms, an "infocracy" or 
"cybercracy". Cyberspace has reduced political society to its 
essence: social interaction facilitated by communication.

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Computer Mediated Communication

"Although the network was originally supposed to connect people 
with computers, what they really spent time doing was connecting 
with one another."
-- Sara Kiesler, social psychologist [13]

Although ARPANet was designed with the remote operation of 
computers in mind, the TCP/IP protocol also made possible the 
remote communication of information by network users (viz. CMC). 
The communication of information is now the primary function of 
the Internet. The assorted cybermedia [14] (communication and 
control media) used on the Internet--from e-mail to Usenet news, 
to real-time conferences, to file archives, to 
hypertext/hypermedia--all perform functions which may be 
classified according to three kinds of CMC defined by the number 
of senders and recipients: personal *correspondence*, 
*publication*, and *conferences*. Particular cybermedia need not 
be restricted to a single CMC function, though many are. 

KINDS OF CMC

TYPE          SENDER(S)   RECIPIENT(S)
--------------------------------------
Personal      Single      Single 
Publication   Single      Multiple
Conference    Multiple    Multiple 

For example, the Usenet news network organises conferences in 
over 9,000 [15] globally distributed newsgroups defined 
heirachically by subject-matter. (Such as soc.culture.new-zealand,
alt.politics, or alt.politics.libertarian.) Sites are free to 
choose which newsgroups they "carry" to and from other  sites. 
Any user may view, post, and reply to messages in  newsgroups
carried by their site. Therefore, Usenet is a  "conference"
cybermedia. 

By contrast, e-mail may be used to send private messages to a 
particular address ("correspondence"), a group of addresses on a 
recipient list ("publication"), or to a mailing list 
("conference"). In the later case, list subscribers may send 
messages to the list address, which then automatically forwards 
the messages directly to all other subscribers. 

***Cyberspace is created and maintained by the collective use of 
these three kinds of cybermedia by CMC.***

****************************************************************
Liberti, Igaliti, Fraterniti... and Cyberspace

"Ben Franklin would have been the first owner of an Apple 
computer. Thomas Jefferson would have written the Declaration of 
Independence on an IBM PC. But Tom Paine would have published 
_Common Sense_ on a computer bulletin board."
-- Dave Hughes, online activist [16]

Cyberspace is characterised by the *technical* equality and 
liberty of cybercitizens to access and communicate information--
individuals' *practical* equality and liberty being limited by 
their knowledge, ability to communicate ideas, and computer 
literacy.

****************************************************************
Cyberliberty

"People in virtual communities do just about anything people do 
in real life, but we leave our bodies behind."
-- Howard Rheingold [17]

"Other than flaming by the indignant and self-policing by 
commercial service providers who give subscribers access to 
cyberspace, there is no means for enforcing the 'netiquette' as 
it is called, of the Internet."
-- Peter H Lewis [18]

Cybercitizens have an almost unfettered *technical* ability to 
access and communicate information on the Internet. Their 
*practical* ability to access and communicate information may 
subject to three sources of restraint, if it is subject to any 
at all:

(1) Domestic law: Most cyberspace activity will be subject to 
domestic laws (such as privacy, defamation, intellectual 
property, and censorship). However, most laws may be 
circumvented by emerging technologies, particularly those 
facilitating anonymous CMC (where the sender's identity remains 
unknown) and encrypted CMC (where the information communicated 
remains unknown to anyone but the intended recipient).

(2) Internet providers: The provider of Internet access will 
often regulate Internet usage to a certain extent (for example, 
some sites refuse to carry "pornographic" Usenet newsgroups). 
However, the relationship between the Internet provider and the 
cybercitizen is one of contractual voluntary association and the 
cybercitizen often has alternative routes of Internet access.

(3) Cybercommunity: Cybercommunities invariably develop societal 
norms of behaviour which are self-enforced on an ad hoc basis. 
These fluid norms are similar to Thomas Paine's "great 
fundamental principles of society and civilisation--to the 
common usage universally consented to, and mutually and 
reciprocally maintained". [19]

However, should a cybercitizen wish to exercise his or her 
ability to communicate, the Internet's decentralised structure 
makes it technically difficult, if not impossible, to regulate 
that communication as "the Net interprets censorship as damage 
and routes around it". [20] While this has made the Internet an 
invaluable forum for political dissidents and activists in 
countries where other communication media is censored, [21] it
has also proved invaluable for cybercitizens flouting the law or 
cybersocietal norms.

Frequently, self-regulation of the cybercommunity (the third 
restriction described above) has proved the most effective. 
Cybercommunities regulate themselves, not according to domestic 
law (which is rather a meaningless concept on an international 
network), but according to evolving norms which are 
"established, challenged, changed, reestablished, rechallanged, 
in a kind of speeded up social revolution". [22] Their 
development is governed by a curious blend of Weber's three types 
of authority: *traditional* (norms develop according to precedent 
to a certain extent), *charismatic* (norms can be influenced by
high-profile cybercitizens), and *legal-rational* (norms are usually
enforced only if they achieve some rational  purpose). [23] These
norms can range from the trivial (typing in ALL CAPS is regarded
as the equivalent to shouting and is considered rude) to the
complex (the creation of a Usenet newsgroup usually follows a
loose procedure: a "call for discussion" of the proposal, a 
period of public debate incorporating many "requests for comment",
and finally a vote). 

Earlier this year, a husband and wife law partnership in Arizona 
posted adverts in over 5,000 Usenet newsgroups. [24] This act did 
not breach any domestic law, but breached conventions against 
"spaming" the Internet (that is, the voluminous and 
indiscriminate random posting of messages in inappropriate 
newsgroups) and as such the pair were "considered pariahs because
they openly expressed disdain for Usenet rules and 'netiquette' and
vowed, despite pleas for cooperation, to do so again". [25] A 
professor of computer science at Georgetown University 
complained: "It took me longer than an hour to clean  up their 
mess. I rely upon Internet news for many professional tips and 
bits. They didn't just take away one hour of my leisure time--
they cut me off from my source of news about my work". [26]
Further, the cost of Usenet news is borne, not by senders, but by 
recipients via network fees. 

Cyberterrorism ensued: "flames" (scornful messages) and 
voluminous junk mail was transmitted in random e-mail, fax, and 
voice mail attacks; their home address, credit card numbers, and 
credit reports (cyberspace has also "democratised" the ability 
to snoop!) were published; and even e-mail messages containing 
death threats, forged in their name, were mailed to the 
President. As one computer consultant explained: 
"disproportionate response or not, they knowingly incited the 
wrath of the Net community by flagrantly abusing a communal 
resource shared on a cooperative basis by millions of people all 
over the world" and that "a lynch-mob style reaction is to be 
expected". [27]

****************************************************************
Cyberequality

"Hierarchy is irrelevant, because everyone has equal access to 
the network, and everyone is free to communicate with as few or 
as many people as they like." [28]
-- Benjamin Woolley, freelance journalist 

"It is common [for virtual acquaintances meeting in real life 
for the first time] to be surprised by the physical appearance 
of people they know only by streams of text. In cyberspace; 
physical disabilities, racial or ethnic differences, 
socioeconomic stratas and even gender issues tend to disappear."
-- Peter H Lewis [29]

The above quotes describe two distinct kinds of cyberequality. 
First, cybercitizens have an equal technical ability to access 
Internet resources and communicate information. Second, in the 
absence of physical contextual clues (such as gender, race, 
wealth, disabilities) cybercitizens are distinguishable only by 
their knowledge and ability to communicate.

Sara Kiesler, a social psychologist, observed that the use of 
CMC within organisations "can break down hierarchical and 
departmental barriers, standard operating procedures, and 
organisational norms". [30] Cybercitizens are able to experiment 
with different forms of communication and self-representation
[31]--especially in real-time interactive cybermedia, such as
Internet Relay Chat and Multi User Dungeons, where users may
manufacture fictitious identities and personae. Consequently,
writing becomes a performing art in virtual communities: 
"elegantly presented knowledge is a valuable  currency. Wit and 
use of language are rewarded in this medium, which is biased 
toward those who learn how to manipulate attention and emotion 
with the written word". [32] 

The combination of this egalitarianism with cybermedia capable 
of "publication" or "conferencing" CMC--those which give senders 
the ability to communicate with multiple recipients--is a potent 
mix indeed. Never before has it been possible for any member of 
a community to publish to an audience of millions for no more 
than it costs (in terms of labour and capital) to communicate 
privately:

"[The Internet gives users] access to alternative forms of 
information and, most important, the power to reach others with 
your own alternatives to the official view of events. Changes  in
forms and degrees of access to information are indicators of 
changes in forms and degrees of power among different 
groups." [33]

****************************************************************
Cybercommunities

"A full-scale sub-culture was growing on the other side of my 
telephone jack, and they invited me to help create something 
new. It became clear to me during the first few months of that 
history that I was participating in the self-design of a new 
kind of culture."
-- Howard Rheingold [34]

That communities should develop at all in an environment without 
a centralised coercive authority would be a surprise to many of 
the most respected political theorists. For Plato, complex 
societies required an effective division of labour, and 
therefore a hierarchical state. [35] Aristotle held that because 
individuals are not self-sufficient, the state is natural and 
therefore exists prior to the individual. [36] Thomas Hobbes 
predicted that the "state of nature", where all individuals are 
equally free, would be a state of war; life would be "solitary, 
poor, nasty, brutish, and short". [37] The creation and  maintenance
of civil society required that sovereignty be vested  in a
"leviathan" wielding absolute power over citizens.

However, the history of the Internet has demonstrated "whenever 
CMC technology becomes available to people anywhere, they 
inevitably build virtual communities with it"; [38] but they are 
built *without* constructing Weber's state (social institutions 
monopolising the legitimate use of force within a given 
territory). This would suggest that John Locke was correct in 
distinguishing between the dissolution of government and the 
dissolution of society, [39] and Thomas Paine in asserting that:

"The instant formal government is abolished, society begins to 
act: a general association takes place, and common interest 
produces common security." [40]

There is no "single, monolithic, online culture" but an 
"ecosystem of subcultures" [41] --cybercommunities are formed, 
not on mutually exclusive communities of *location*, but on
overlapping communities of *interest*, which may be defined by a 
shared culture, religion, profession, value-system, or hobby. 
Because in cyberspace, time and location no longer restrict 
communication and the exchange of information, "place" is 
conceptualised in terms of interests (viz., the subject-matter  of
the information communicated). As these new *kinds* of human 
associations incorporate emotional place-like and practical 
tool-like functions, they are founded "on a shared need for 
information and emotional support". [42]

Marc Smith [43] observed that cybercommunities are formed by 
isolated individuals banding together in a competitive environment
and are bound together by three kinds of "collective goods":
social network capital, knowledge capital, and communion. The
common interest of members of the community in its collective
goods results in an informal (and often unnoticed) social contract
creating an information "gift- economy":

"In some cases I can put the information in exactly the right 
place for ten thousand people I don't know, but who are 
intensely interested in that specific topic, to find it when 
they need it. And sometimes, one of the ten thousand people I 
don't know does the same thing for me." [44]

Whether one is motivated by an indirect self-interest where one 
vicariously benefits from the community, or a proximate self-
interest, the effect is much the same: a economy based on 
indirect reciprocity (quite unlike conventional economies) 
develops: 

"Sure, it may take a few days, but I can get a number of answers 
on virtually any subject or field of endeavour just by asking, 
and those who take their time to reply do so for no reward other 
than increasing the chance that their future queries will 
likewise find willing respondents." [45]

The gift economy is accentuated in smaller cybercommunities 
where individual members are well-known:

"A sociologist might say that my perceived helpfulness increased 
my pool of social capital. I can increase your knowledge capital 
and my social capital at the same time by telling you something 
that you need to know, and I could diminish the amount of my 
capital in the estimation of others by transgressing the group's 
social norms." [46]

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P A R T   T H R E E
Cyberanarchism?
****************************************************************

"There is an intimate connection between informal conversations, 
the kind that take place in communities and virtual communities, 
in the coffee shops and computer conferences, and the ability of 
large social groups to govern themselves without monarchs or 
dictators."
-- Howard Rheingold [47]

"Government is no farther necessary than to supply the few cases 
to which society and civilisation are not conveniently 
competent; and instances are not wanting to show, that 
everything which government can usefully add thereto, has been 
performed by the common consent of society, without government."
-- Thomas Paine, in _The Rights of Man_ [48]

This paper has described the nature of two distinct but parallel 
political environments on the Internet. One is the physical 
Internet infrastructure, having its origins in the ARPANet 
military research network; the other is cyberspace, the virtual 
reality created by CMC:

PARALLEL POLITICAL ENVIRONMENTS

ENVIRONMENT            PHYSICAL (INTERNET)    VIRTUAL (CYBERSPACE)
------------------------------------------------------------------
Communal unit:         Internet provider      Community of
                                              interest

Structure:             Confederal             Anarchic

Relations governed by: Contract               Communal norms based
                                              on gift economy/self
                                              interest

The most controversial claim in the above table is that 
cyberspace is an anarchic environment. Some anarchists and 
libertarians have argued that cyberspace cannot be considered 
truly anarchic, and is only anarchic superficially, because of: 
first, the role of the United States government in establishing, 
developing, and maintaining the Internet; secondly, the continuing 
influence of domestic law and Internet providers on the 
behaviour of cybercitizens; and thirdly, the unequal distribution 
of power caused by practical variations in computer literacy and 
the ability to communicate.

All these claims may be countered to a certain extent by 
recalling Weber's apt definition of the state as: social 
institutions monopolising the legitimate use of force within a 
given territory. Applying this definition, cyberspace is 
anarchic *as a matter of fact*--whether it fulfils any 
anarchist ideals is another matter entirely. Unless anarchy is 
universal, no anarchist environment will be immune to *external* 
influences (such as other governments). *Internal* sources of 
authority (such as Internet providers, cybersocietal norms, and 
other cybercitizens) are natural anarchic elements, *provided* 
they do not monopolise the legitimate use of force. Indeed, such 
sources of authority strongly resemble those found in anarcho-
syndicalist and anarcho-communist theory, such as Kropotkin's 
mutual-aid communities. (It should also be noted that, by 
insulating individuals from the need for physical contact, 
members of a cybercommunity are insulated from the worst effects
of any potential coercion.)

What of the future of cyberanarchism? Rheingold believes that 
the futures of both cyberspace and of human community, are 
inextricably linked. There is certainly *potential* for 
cyberspace to bypass the increasingly centrally controlled and 
funded conventional media and perhaps even to resurrect citizen 
based democracy (at least in cyberspace itself). Cyberspace 
could become Habermas' ideal public sphere where opinions are 
formed in public by citizens free from coercion--a global 
citizen designed and citizen controlled electronic _agora_ in 
the Athenian tradition. However, as in any citizen controlled 
information system, "responsibility for organising information 
shifts from the writer to the reader". [49] CMC may create 
intellectual, social, commercial, and political leverage, within 
cyberspace, "but the technology will not in itself fulfil that 
potential; this latent technical power must be used intelligently
and deliberately by an informed population". [50]

It seems clear that for cyberanarchism to survive as a 
functioning form of organisation, there needs to be a consensus 
among community members to respect the equal liberty of all 
other community members. Whether this consensus can survive the 
rapid influx of newcomers, who have not been socialised 
according to this set cybersocietal values, is uncertain.



****************************************************************
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The development of concepts discussed in this paper was assisted 
by private correspondence with the following persons (among 
others who wish to remain anonymous):

altaf@crl.com (Altaf Bhimji)
bandit@cruzio.com (Bandit)
bis4cg@de-montfort.ac.uk (Chris Gillie)
brunell@gate.net (Dave Brunell)
crm@lems.brown.edu (Christopher R. Maden)
gcf@panix.com (Gordon Fitch)
gmcgath@mv.mv.com (Gary McGath)
inst1229@cl.uh.edu (Don Blick)
john@waikato.ac.nz (John Houlker)
klacobie@agoric.com (Kevin Lacobie)
kurt@data-io.com (Kurt Guntheroth)
misc248@cantva.canterbury.ac.nz (Nicky Green)
mg.crawshaw@auckland.ac.nz (Mike Crawshaw)
muisca@aol.com (J. Rifkind)
nagesh_rao@brown.edu (Nagesh Rao)
petersod@cs.colostate.edu (David Peterson)
porterg@gems.vcu.edu (Greg Porter)
rschmidt@panix.com (Robert Schmidt) 
rsumner@osf1.gmu.edu (Robert T Sumner)
spam@telerama.lm.com (Steve Marting)
tom.biggs@dscmail.com (Tom Biggs)
yngmar06@its.uct.ac.za (Mark Young)

****************************************************************
Annex I: _Cyberanarchism?_

I posted the following request for feedback in several relevant 
Usenet newsgroups on the morning of 12 October 1994 (New Zealand 
Standard Time), and received over 50 well considered replies. My 
thanks to all respondents.

Newsgroups: alt.society.anarchy
From: tomas.kriha@actrix.gen.nz (Tomas F J Kriha)
Subject: Cyberanarchism?
Lines: 53
Date: Tue, 11 Oct 1994 22:11:14 GMT

I am working on a short research paper analysing the Internet
community as a functioning anarchist society--that is, a 
community lacking centralised coercive authority.

Many political philosophers have predicted what such a community 
would be like--most in an attempt to rationalise the imposition 
of a centralised coercive authority such as the state. Thomas 
Hobbes described life in the "state of nature" as "solitary, 
poor, nasty, brutish, and short". By contrast, Thomas Paine 
argued that the dissolution of government need not entail the 
dissolution of society: "The instant formal government is 
abolished, society begins to act: a general association takes 
place, and common interest produces common security". 

In _The New York Times_ (11 May 1994), Peter H Lewis described 
the Internet as "a nearly perfect laboratory for testing the 
democratic principles of free speech and self-governance". What 
do *you* think the results of this experiment have shown? I 
would like to hear any comments you might have on the following 
issues which I will be covering in the paper (some in more 
detail than others):

* The origin and development of the Internet.

* The nature of cybercommunities/cybersocieties/cybercultures. 
IMO, cyberspace reduces political society to its lowest common
denominator: social interaction facilitated by communication. 

* Development of societal norms/conventions in cybercommunities.

* The degree to which human nature can be said to be cooperative 
or competitive in cyberspace. 

* Liberty on the net: The *technical* ability of cybernauts to 
act, and the *practical* ability to breach societal 
norms/conventions (at the risk of peer-sanctions).

* Equality on the net: The *technical* equality of cybernauts to
communicate and to access, distribute, and publish information. 
The decreasing influence of traditional sources of inequality: 
wealth, ethnicity/culture, religion, gender, opinions/beliefs, 
&c.


Please reply to me *personally*--preferably by Saturday 15 
October--at: tomas.kriha@actrix.gen.nz 

BTW, if you don't wish to be quoted in the paper, please say so.

Many thanks in advance; T.
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Tomas F J Kriha    Email: tomas.kriha@actrix.gen.nz       </'
                          *******@******.***.govt.nz      /)
                   Phone: +64 (4) 566-0534               (/`
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FOOTNOTES
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1.  Lewis (1994d): D1.
        
2.  Rheingold (1994): 4.
        
3.  Weber: Politics as a Vocation, in: Held (1985): 111.
        
4.  Rheingold (1994): 6.
        
5.  This brief account of the origins of the Internet is based 
    upon the following sources: Rheingold (1994): 7-9, 65-109;
    Electronic Frontier Foundation (1994); Cerf (1993a); Cerf
    (1993b). 
        
6.  In full: Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol.
        
7.  Cerf: (1993b).
        
8.  Lohr (1994): D4.
        
9.  Cerf: (1993a).
        
10. Rheingold (1994): 11.
        
11. Nozick: Anarchy, State, and Utopia, quoted in: Held (1985): 
    567.
        
12. William Gibson, quoted in: Woolley (1992): 122, et seq.
        
13. Sara Kiesler, quoted in: Lewis (1994b): D2.
        
14. For an introduction to various cybermedia, see: Electronic
    Frontier Foundation (1994); Kehoe (1993); Rheingold (1994).
        
15. Lewis (1994c): D2. Many more newsgroups are distributed 
    locally.
        
16. Dave Hughes, quoted in: Rheingold (1994): 241.
        
17. Rheingold (1994): 3.
        
18. Lewis (1994c): D2.
        
19. Paine: Rights of Man, Part II Chapter I "Of Society and
    Civilisation" in: Brown (199): 382-384; Held (1985): 85-86.
        
20. John Gilmore (telecommunications network pioneer), quoted in:
    Rheingold (1994): 7. 
        
21. For discussions of recent political activities using the
    Internet, see: Lewis (1994f); Rheingold (1994). 
        
22. Rheingold describing his first contact with the Internet in
    1985, in: Rheingold (1994): 2. 
        
23. Weber: _Politics as a Vocation_, in: Held (1985): 112.
        
24. For discussion of the Canter and Siegel affair, see: Lewis
    (1994c); Lewis (1994e). 
        
25. Lewis (1994e): D7.
        
26. Peter Wayner, quoted in: Lewis (1994d): D7.
        
27. J|rgen Botz, quoted in: ibid.
        
28. Woolley (1992): 125.
        
29. Lewis (1994b): D2.
        
30. Sara Kiesler, quoted in: Rheingold (1994): 62-63.
        
31. See also: Rheingold (1994): 178, 180-181.
        
32. Ibid: 59.
        
33. Ibid: 268.
        
34. Rheingold describing his first contact with the Internet in
    1985, in: ibid: 2. 
        
35. See: Plato (1894): Book IV; Brown (1990): 58-72.
        
36. See: Aristotle (1885): Book I; ibid: 99-101.
        
37. Brown (1990): 220; Held (1985): 69.
        
38. Rheingold (1994): 6.
        
39. See: Locke: Second Treatise of Government, Chapter XIX "Of 
    the Dissolution of Government" in: Brown (1990): 294-302.
        
40. Paine: Rights of Man, Part II Chapter I "Of Society and
    Civilisation" in: Brown (199): 382-384; Held (1985): 85-86.
        
41. Rheingold (1994): 3.
        
42. Lewis (1994b): D2.
        
43. For a description of Marc Smith's "collective goods" theory,
    see: Rheingold (1994): 13. 
        
44. Rheingold (1994): 57.
        
45. Private correspondence with porterg@gems.vcu.edu (Greg 
    Porter).
        
46. Rheingold (1994): 60.
        
47. Ibid, 281.

48. Paine: Rights of Man, Part II Chapter I "Of Society and
    Civilisation" in: Brown (199): 382-384; Held (1985): 85-86.

49. Markoff (1994): 5.

50. Rheingold (1994): 4.


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Tomas F J Kriha    E-mail: tomas.kriha@actrix.gen.nz          </'
                           kriha_t@kosmos.wcc.govt.nz        /)
                    Phone: +64 4-566-0534                   (/`
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