Netizens-Digest Wednesday, September 21 2005 Volume 01 : Number 541 Netizens Association Discussion List Digest In this issue: Re: [netz] Online debate about Korean subway incident and netizen response Re: [netz] Online debate about Korean subway incident and netizen response Re: [netz] Online debate about Korean subway incident and netizen response Re: [netz] Online debate about Korean subway incident and netizen response Re: [netz] Online debate about Korean subway incident and netizen response Re: [netz] Online debate about Korean subway incident and netizen response [netz] My recent trip to Beijing and Seoul [netz] A written version of Ronda's talk. Re: [netz] My recent trip to Beijing and Seoul [netz] Article about Netizens in Korea and OhmyNews [netz] Yahoo's role in 10 year prison sentence for Chinese Journalist Re: [netz] Yahoo's role in 10 year prison sentence for Chinese Journalist ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 13 Jul 2005 20:18:22 +0200 From: "Ronald John Bartle" Subject: Re: [netz] Online debate about Korean subway incident and netizen response > On Wed, 13 Jul 2005, Ronald John Bartle wrote: > >> All she needed to do was to clean up the mess - end of story! >> >> ron b. >> >> >> / -- / >> >> > The question is an interesting one. What would more democracy look like? > In any case the dog poop story was important in Korea because it was about > people trying to act or trying to figure out how to act instead of calling > on a state separate from the people to act for them. The woman's act > against society was minor but real and some Korean netizens acted to deal > with it. If they can find how to act in correct proportion to the little > crime they will have accomplished something. Ronda was reporting on the > importance of this experimentation toward extending democracy. > Jay - I can see that there are larger issues addressed here. The specifics of the case though make it very plain to me that there is basically one point. If she had cleaned up the mess there would have been no outcry and the matter would have been resolved right there and then. She opened herself up to censur when she decided not to remove the mess. Has she tried to explain herself, or otherwise responded to the critisism? ron b. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 13 Jul 2005 16:28:47 -0400 (EDT) From: Jay Hauben Subject: Re: [netz] Online debate about Korean subway incident and netizen response >> The question is an interesting one. What would more democracy look like? >> In any case the dog poop story was important in Korea because it was about >> people trying to act or trying to figure out how to act instead of calling >> on a state separate from the people to act for them. > > Are you saying, then, that proper netizen conduct only exists with ad-hoc > collaboration in anarchy? Even direct democracy, which is NOT consensus > decisionmaking, needs a moderator for the meeting. No I was saying that the Korean netizens were trying to find how to be active citizens. Their online discussion of this event was for me their effort to find the proper response of citizens to an anti-social act. I am focusing on the discussion after the events as a constructive process. Jay ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 13 Jul 2005 22:48:50 +0200 From: Dan Duris Subject: Re: [netz] Online debate about Korean subway incident and netizen response > We may have very, very different definitions of democracy. To me, having > democracy without a state is either a contradiction in terms, or a euphemism > for voluntary anarchy. Could you agree that there could be community democracy based on rules accepted by community (not state necessarily)? Daniel ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 13 Jul 2005 22:33:10 -0400 From: "Howard C. Berkowitz" Subject: Re: [netz] Online debate about Korean subway incident and netizen response At 10:48 PM +0200 7/13/05, Dan Duris wrote: > > We may have very, very different definitions of democracy. To me, having >> democracy without a state is either a contradiction in terms, or a euphemism >> for voluntary anarchy. > >Could you agree that there could be community democracy based on >rules accepted >by community (not state necessarily)? > >Daniel It can work, to a limited extent, in small communities. I see no evidence that it can scale to any appreciable size. Historically, it worked in small US towns, as long as the population was willing to wait until the extremists talked themselves into exhaustion. In my local jurisdiction, an urban county with a 2000 population of approximately 189,000 residents, there is a five-member elected County Board. It has a public meeting every Saturday. The Board (and the County Manager and professional staff) are quite willing to read documents sent to them; people do have their input, but not necessarily all the public time they might desire. At the open meeting, however, there is an public comment period following the formal board meeting. Over a number of years, perhaps five individuals with opinions on nearly everything, which they were prone to lecture on at great length, monopolized the microphone. Fairness reeentered after rules were introduced specifying that at a given meeting, one individual could: speak only on one topic speak for 5 minutes if the topic had been addressed by the board, or for 10 minutes if it was a new subject. So, no, I do not agree there can be community democracy by consensus rules in a community of any appreciable size, at least with the social customs prevalent in the USA. This may work for small and isolated agricultural communities, where there is a real sense of interdependence. Have you examples of that working in an urban, industrialized area of appreciable population? I know of no modern examples. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 14 Jul 2005 11:16:33 +0200 From: Dan Duris Subject: Re: [netz] Online debate about Korean subway incident and netizen response Howard, I do not have any examples and was just curious if you agreed on small communities ruled by consensus, which you do. I do agree with your point of view however, that there can't be democracy without some formalized rules in larger communities or nations such large as USA are. Daniel > > So, no, I do not agree there can be community democracy by consensus > rules in a community of any appreciable size, at least with the social > customs prevalent in the USA. This may work for small and isolated > agricultural communities, where there is a real sense of interdependence. > > Have you examples of that working in an urban, industrialized area of > appreciable population? I know of no modern examples. > > > ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 14 Jul 2005 09:53:33 -0400 From: "Howard C. Berkowitz" Subject: Re: [netz] Online debate about Korean subway incident and netizen response At 11:16 AM +0200 7/14/05, Dan Duris wrote: >Howard, > >I do not have any examples and was just curious if you agreed on small >communities ruled by consensus, which you do. I do agree with your >point of view >however, that there can't be democracy without some formalized rules in larger >communities or nations such large as USA are. Actually, no, I don't agree that small communities, much larger than a group of families, can operate by consensus. I do agree that there are a reasonable number of communities, with populations in the low thousands, that do operate by direct democracy -- which is not the same as consensus. One of the limiting factors for either will be a shared cultural context, and reasonably homogeneous values. In the US, we speak of the "New England Town Meeting", where small communities, which can trace their origins and practices to colonial days, still use direct democracy. It often takes decades for a newcomer to be accepted fully - -- or need to go into additional generations. Those town meetings may tolerate, in amusement, one or two eccentric individuals that want to spend an hour or two addressing all of their personal complaints to the assembly. Allowing this in my home jurisdiction simply didn't work with the number of eccentrics in a population approaching 200,000. There's a fair amount of social science experience that shows that consensus models, among people that don't have strong common values and bonding, tends to be dominated either by charismatic individuals, or the people who can speak for the longest time without having to visit the toilet. Charisma or continued speaking counts less in a direct democracy with sufficient rules to require a vote after some finite period of time. An additional problem of scaling direct democracy is protecting the interests of minorities. No perfect system exists for this, but there are various models, usually appropriate to republics rather than direct democracies. These models include proportional voting, or the US congressional model with two legislative bodies, one apportioned on population and the other apportioned in a way that strengthens the role of small states. > >Daniel > >> >> So, no, I do not agree there can be community democracy by consensus >> rules in a community of any appreciable size, at least with the social >> customs prevalent in the USA. This may work for small and isolated >> agricultural communities, where there is a real sense of interdependence. >> >> Have you examples of that working in an urban, industrialized area of >> appreciable population? I know of no modern examples. >> >> >> ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 17 Aug 2005 11:20:03 -0400 (EDT) From: Ronda Hauben Subject: [netz] My recent trip to Beijing and Seoul Hi Everybody I just got back from a 2-1/2 week trip to Beijing and Seoul. I was in Beijing at the end of July for the 22nd International Conference on the History of Science http://2005bj.ihns.ac.cn/ There were almost a thousand people attending the conference I was co-organizer of a symposium on "Computer Networks, the Internet and the Netizens: Their Impact on Science and Society" The url for the symposium is: 2005bj.ihns.ac.cn/symposia/SYMPOSIUM%20SC9.HTM Being in Beijing was quite exciting as Beijing is a flurry of construction to prepare for the 2008 Olympics. The people I met from Beijing were in general excited about the developments going on, but also considering what should be the direction for China. I will be trying to do some summary of the trip and will see about writing a more detailed description of some of the experiences and conversations with people during the trip to Beijing. After Beijing, my husband Jay and I went to Seoul. I was happy to be back in Seoul and to see a few of the people I had met earlier during the June OMNI conference and a number of new people. During the past several months before the trip I was interested in the netizen phenomenon in South Korea. During my recent trip I was able to speak with a number of netizens, including people who had been involved in the Nosamo club (that helped elect Roh as President of South Korea), about their view of what was happening with netizens in South Korea. Also I was invited to give a talk at Seoul National University about the Internet and netizen research I have been doing over the past 12 years. I gave the talk from slides but also have written a version of the talk that I have submitted to OMNI at Jean Min's request. I learned also that the book "Netizens: On the History and Impact of Usenet and the Internet" that Michael and I put online in 1994 (and is now in a print edition) was known by students at SNU. (The url for the book is http://www.columbia.edu/~hauben/netbook/) Also I did an interview with Mr. Oh, the founder and CEO of OhmyNews and plan to write an article about OhmyNew. If anyone has any suggestions of what I should think of including, feel free to write me and send the suggestions. I visited the web team at the Blue House (the equivalent of the US White House for South Korea). There is a netizen section for the Blue House web site. This makes it possible for people to post their problems and/or comments online and for others to see these posts. I was interested in the history of this development and its actuality. Other interesting experiences during this recent trip include meeting with some students who described a number of the interesting online developments and their thoughts and concerns about them, talking with someone who had just written her master's thesis about blogs in South Korea, an interesting discussion with two OMNI correspondents about how netizenship in Korea has developed before citizenship, concerns they had about how to help young people who get online learn how to be netizens, and other concerns, learning a bit about the development of some online forms and web sites that are getting lots of discussion. I learned a little about the anti impeachment actions in 2004, and some about how people are trying to have some impact on their political officials. The next election for President in South Korea is now a little more than 2 years away and so some are thinking of what will happen to prepare for that. The last election was won with the significant help of netizens, and is described as an example of "netizen power". Also there were some interesting discussion with Professors about their observations about what was happening. And in general there was concern among the people I met that there be some way to understand what was happening in South Korea as the fact that 80% of the population have broad band Internet access makes the situation in South Korea pioneering with regard to the impact of the Internet on society. There is concern that developments seems to be going very fast and a desire to have some way to make sure that there is reflection on what is happening so it goes in a good direction. I hope to write up my notes from the trip in some form. I welcome thoughts and questions etc about the trip and the experiences and the developments in China and South Korea. with best wishes Ronda - -- Netizens: On the History and Impact of Usenet and the Internet http://www.columbia.edu/~hauben/netbook http://www.ais.org/~jrh/netizens.news ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 20 Aug 2005 17:13:20 -0400 (EDT) From: Jay Hauben Subject: [netz] A written version of Ronda's talk. Hi, Ronda gave a talk about science of the Internet and the emergence of the netizens in Beijing and again with some additions in Seoul. Readers of this list might find the talk of interest. The written version of the talk appears in the Korean online newsjournal Ohmynews. The title of the article is: Dawn of the Internet and Netizen The url it is: http://english.ohmynews.com/ArticleView/article_view.asp?menu=A11100&no=242311&rel_no=1&back_url= I am sure Ronda would be happy to get your comments on her work. Take care. Jay ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 08 Sep 2005 15:09:55 -0400 From: xz2129@columbia.edu Subject: Re: [netz] My recent trip to Beijing and Seoul Hi, Ronda, Are you here at school today? If so, maybe we can meet each other at 5pm. I will check the email at 4:30pm and see the result. Let me know your availability after you see this mail. Thanks! Best, Cynthia ------------------------------ Date: Sat, 10 Sep 2005 22:37:55 -0400 (EDT) From: Ronda Hauben Subject: [netz] Article about Netizens in Korea and OhmyNews An article about Netizens in Korea and the online newspaper OhmyNews appears in Telepolis The url for the article is Advancing "News guerrillas" OhmyNews and 21st Century Journalism Ronda Hauben 08.09.2005 http://www.heise.de/tp/r4/artikel/20/20853/1.html I welcome comments and discussion on the article. The disaster in New Orleans in the US shows the great need for a press that would help to point up problems that needed serious attention before Katrina hit and the levees were breached. Unfortunately, there was no press in the US about to get serious attention to this problem until after the devastation. The problem was not spotlighted earlier by a press powerful enough to have the problem considered news. There is an ever more urgent need for a progressive press in the US that can get the proper attention to serious problems before another catastrophe hits. So I hope there will be some discussion of my article and of OhmyNews and of how to bring about the changed environment in the press that is needed in countries where the need is great like the US. with best wishes Ronda ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 21 Sep 2005 09:31:11 -0400 (EDT) From: Ronda Hauben Subject: [netz] Yahoo's role in 10 year prison sentence for Chinese Journalist The role of Yahoo in convicting a Chinese journalist to a 10 year prison sentence is being debated in the press as it had been debated online in recent weeks. I thought this would be of interest to those on the netizens list: Some articles relating to it include Chinese journalist Shi Tao sentenced to 10 year in prison for email that Yahoo helped to track http://english.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?no=248907&rel_no=1 Yahoo's mess of pottage http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/09/20/news/edbowring.php A Cooler Look at Yahoo in China The U.S. portal is getting pilloried for its role in the imprisonment of a Chinese journalist. The affair, however, isn't so simple http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/sep2005/nf20050921_9883_db065.htm with best wishes Ronda ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 21 Sep 2005 16:10:41 +0200 From: "Ronald John Bartle" Subject: Re: [netz] Yahoo's role in 10 year prison sentence for Chinese Journalist It seems to me that the problem here is that the regime in China as a repressive take on most forms of critisism. Yahoo had just invested 1Bln $ in the Chineese market. The operate within China and as such have to comply with the (bad-) laws that exist there. Ask Yahoo`s sharholders if they should just pull stumps and leave China to the less scrupolous competetition? There is plainly a bigger question here - should western firms/corperations be operating in China. Furthermore - if one answers "no" to this - shold the west in general be involved with China at all as a trading partner etc? Most will feel the above questions are purely retorical. The _rest-of-the-world_ has no real choice but to engage with such a massive entity as the PR China with it`s vast markets and (human-) resources. Perhaps we would all be best advised to concentrate our efforts on any and every doeable means of encouraging a more democratic and just situation - in China - as elsewhere. So the Chineese have imprisoned a person they consider a State Enemy. How many innocent civilians (and others-) have died in Iraq today? How much moral indignation are we all going to produce in response to thier deaths - as compared to the moral indignation raised by a journalist who fell foul of his own countries laws? Without the mega- Billions of Dollars spent world wide on military forces - humanity could be a whole lot further along the line of progress and enlightenment in general - including a bit more democracy in China. Who has an address for Shi Tao in jail? Perhaps we would do more good by sending him a care package or two? As a (foreign-) resident of Berlin - I can`t help remembering how the East German leader Erich Honnecker was reveived with practically full "military honours" by Chancellor Kohl of West Germany - and then a few years latter thrown in a cell in Berlin-Moabit, apparently for the crimes he was commiting at the time he was being received as head-of-state by Kohl. Double standards. Profiting from massive trade with and in China and then "pretending" to be oh so upset when the Chineese Police enforce Chineese laws. Poooh Baaah. ron b. - ----- Original Message ----- From: "Ronda Hauben" To: Cc: "Ronda Hauben" Sent: Wednesday, September 21, 2005 3:31 PM Subject: [netz] Yahoo's role in 10 year prison sentence for Chinese Journalist > > The role of Yahoo in convicting a Chinese journalist to a 10 year > prison sentence is being debated in the press as it had been > debated online in recent weeks. I thought this would be of interest > to those on the netizens list: > > Some articles relating to it include > > Chinese journalist Shi Tao sentenced to 10 year in prison for email that > Yahoo helped to track > http://english.ohmynews.com/articleview/article_view.asp?no=248907&rel_no=1 > > Yahoo's mess of pottage > http://www.iht.com/articles/2005/09/20/news/edbowring.php > > > A Cooler Look at Yahoo in China > The U.S. portal is getting pilloried for its role in the imprisonment of a > Chinese journalist. The affair, however, isn't so simple > http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/sep2005/nf20050921_9883_db065.htm > > > with best wishes > > Ronda > > ------------------------------ End of Netizens-Digest V1 #541 ******************************