Special Issue 5/1/02                                      Volume 11 No. 1
           In Memory of Michael Hauben: Discoverer of Netizens
 
[11]                        A Tribute
                                 by Claudia Hill
                                 ch255@columbia.edu
                                                                         
Although I never met Michael, his parents, Jay and Ronda have asked me
to write a few words about how I view Usenet as part of a tribute to
Michael, forever a citizen of the Net, a Netizen.

My view of Usenet is analogous to an architectural structure.  Usenet
is made up of individuals exchanging information electronically
through newsgroups to form a virtual architectural structure of
information in much the same manner that collaborations between
architects, builders, and construction workers result in real
structures perhaps made of brick, concrete, mortar and wood.  The
foundations of each Usenet newsgroup depend on the agreement between
participants who make decisions about the group as its users.  This
seems to me like an architectural plan of a building which developers
agree to follow once drafted.

Along the way, architects' plans may become altered or improved and
likewise, newsgroups may change direction or be influenced by views of
one sort or another.  Newsgroup participants are accountable for the
traffic on a Usenet newsgroup, much like architects and resultant
buildings they design.  Buildings, once constructed, can be modified,
expanded or abandoned, and newsgroups too can undergo changes in their
virtual structures as more and more information is sent over the
networks between newsgroup participants.

But, Usenet, a virtual architectural structure, has enduring
characteristics which real architecture does not.  While real
buildings are subjected to the harsh elements of time; from inclement
weather conditions acting on natural and artificial materials,
man-made acts of destruction, changes in the whim of architectural
fashion to economic downturns, Usenet seems to have immortality to it.
Once a participant or citizen of Usenet, the individual becomes a part
of this virtual architectural "net" structure.  Usenet participants,
or "Netizens," then are the sum total of the views on a particular
topic and in some sense are immortalized within the virtual
architectural structure.  Usenet as an architectural structure, albeit
a virtual one, is a credible analogy and one, that I hope you will
agree, seems boundless in its reach and limitless in its potential.

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Reprinted from the Amateur Computerist Vol 11 No 1, May 1, 2002. 
The whole issue or a subscription is available for free via email. 
Send a request to jrh@ais.org  or see  http://www.ais.org/~jrh/acn/
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