Week 6 Politics & The Internet

Week 6
Politics & The Internet

 There are two types of democracy when the internet is concerned the first of which is cyber politics; which are the politics of the internet that exist online. New media has revolutionized the political game, from voters to fully integrated online campaigns plans. Cyberpolitics are interpersonal, as they are public. Being digitally driven, political action does not always have to be conscious, yet can be an expression of belief expressed or published with no political motive. A note I have found while doing some research is the notion that Cyberpolitics render physical strength irrelevant, so one excuse for removing women is removed. In the world of the internet, any voice can be any human anonymously, so thoughts and anger are expressed more freely with decreased potential for negative backlash, such as in real life situations.

The second type of democracy is eDemocracy. The term is described as  being internets role in real world politics, that exists predominatley off the internet.

 During the Lecture:

We watched 'juice rap news', a sarcastic play on the upcoming election.

Cyberpolitics & eDemocracy
-politics= a relationship between citizens
-polis = a greek city
-government central, but extends power to all relations
-corporations (business) -interpersonal(relations) -biopolitics(function)
Politics are defined by human needs, eg. health, education, crime management

The internet presents a variety of new pathways for parties to connect & communicate with voters.

Defining democracy
-cyberpolitics - politics of the internet that exist predominately ON the internet
-eDemocracy - Internets role in real world politics, that exist predominately OFF the internet

Types of Democracy
-direct democracy from the Greeks (participatory) the people have a connection to the decision & how it is made
-representative democracy - as here in Australia as impossible to gather every citizen at once to one place
-monitory democracy- monitoring governments
All types of democracy understand that people need to have their say

The growing and shrinking of the public sphere in democratic and authortarian societies.

The Global Village - Mcluhan

Citizens of the Media

Internet and Politics Issues
-digital divide - dividance of nations based on their digital capabilities
-viral campaigning - tv always a consistent, mail for local members
-memes - Abotts Spedos, light hearte campaigning
-Dystopia, vs Euphoric ideals- the Euphoria the leaders promise - dystopia is more realistic
-cosmopolitanism- Greek - the person who would declare to be a human of the universe
In contrast to the new world order

Free speech and censorship
'who is it that i can not critisize?'
-the information wishes to be free - Stew Brand - San Fran
-he saw the potential to use the internet to share information, more easily and effectivley

'seceret history'

the net interprets ccensorship as damage and routes around it to get to its destination -John Gillmore

-China vs. the Clean Feed - what is censorship?
the censoring of bad material & attempted blocking of unnecessary material.

1970's & 1980's censorship was relatively easy, physical information and substance could be permanently deleted (burnt).

-the military entertainment complex
-information warefare
-sigint - signals intelligence, relating back to the analysis of information sent and received by enemies
-psypops - psychoperations
-americas army, the game created to encourage young Americans to join the army when they grow up
-The beverly Hills summit, a meeting of bg Hollywood producers to encourage the storylines of future films to depict the army as heroes and Terrorists as bad guys. The positive interaction of the government.
-citizen hackers -Julian Assange Wikileaks

Hackers have been around as long as computers have existed.
Hackers do more than steal credit cards,
Inventors, problem solvers, creators
-to create computers people had to hack through problems and glitches-inevitable
-the internet a network of governments & corporations
-or opportunity for 'citizen journalism' - public
-athenian militants made democracy work
-property rights on information? difficult.
- How to hack? stay alert, hidden angles can be revealed through publicly available government reports and documents.

Wiki leaks means you can dump information anonymously