Google has deplatformed, or banned from its environs, numerous articulate and high profile conservative spokesmen such as Alan Dershowitz, Andrew Roberts, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Heather MacDonald, Steven Harper, Robert Florczak, Dennis Prager. This is the merest tip of the iceberg in this regard. But does not this private company have a right to say “Yea”...
Read MoreDesktop “Militants” and Public Intellectuals
Invited paper to be read at the “Symposium on Re-Publicness” Sponsored by the Chamber of Electrical Engineers. Ankara Turkey, December 9 – 10, 2011 Introduction The relation of information technology (IT) and more specifically the internet, to politics is a central issue facing contemporary social movements. Like many previous scientific advances the IT innovations have...
Read MoreAmerica’s Problematic Internet Strategy I have an article up at Asia Times, US Internet Declaration Bugs China, about Secretary Clinton’s “freedom to connect” speech and its implications for China. In this context, it is interesting to recall how middle class priorities can get repackaged as legal rights and essential human freedoms. Back in 1996, when...
Read More
The Internet has changed many things; for example, remember opening a letter from an old friend? I am afraid our children will never do that, and if you don’t have children, there is a good chance you are young enough to never have done it yourself. Personal communication has changed immensely, mostly by format and...
Read More
The discussion of Web 1.0, 2.0 and 3.0 has focused on the features of websites and the internet in general. The categorization provides at least one way to see the web progressing and it creates potentials for 3.0, which still lies almost entirely in the future. Many bash this as hype and techno-talk, but it...
Read MoreA report from the Front Line in the Cyberwar
The Information Warfare Monitor (a joint venture of Toronto University’s Citizen Lab at the Munke Centre for International Studies and a Canadian think-tank called SecDev) teamed up with the Tibetan Government in Exile for a nine-month multi-continent investigation to develop a remarkable report on cyberwarfare operations targeting areas of concern to the People’s Republic of...
Read More