Blog 13: New Media & Government Transparency

A more transparent government is on its way, with the implementation of many of the new media available. President Bush started this process by updating Whitehouse.gov with various new internet communication tools like RSS feeds, videos and podcasts (Vargas, J.A., 2008). President-elect Obama has already shown us during his presidential campaign that he plans to make use of new media; the technological innovations he brings to his presidency should push forward in this direction. The use of internet media in the government will help to create an open-dialogue atmosphere and hopefully make U.S. citizens more interested and involved in political affairs.

A few issues exist surrounding the use of internet media in the government. Mr. Obama’s campaign for presidency may have been the most high-tech in history, and he feels strongly about taking the White House to the next level in terms of new media use. Unfortunately, the President-elect will be limited in terms of his ability to use these communication tools; the Presidential Records Act requires all presidential correspondences to be in the public record and thus will not allow for privacy. No past presidents used e-mail, and it is unclear if Mr. Obama will be allowed to do so due to the private nature of e-mail (Zeleny, J., 2008). In a New York Times article a reporter notes, “for all the perquisites and power afforded the president, the chief executive of the United States is essentially deprived by law and by culture of some of the very tools that other chief executives depend on to survive and to thrive” (Zeleny, J., 2008). It is ironic to think that Mr. Obama built his campaign on the notion of “change” and the use of the internet, yet he might be restricted from using many of the tools in office that helped get him there.

While there will be security and political issues that may limit some of the new media used by Mr. Obama, he already has plans to employ the use of YouTube in office. Building upon President Roosevelt’s “fireside chats” during the Great Depression, President-elect Obama is promising weekly videotaped question and answer sessions to be posted on his Web site, change.gov, as well as his weekly YouTube address to the nation (Buchanan, M., 2008). He may not have total flexibility in the internet media used in the White House, but these are both great ways to start getting people more involved. Also, Mr. Obama’s campaign addressed an issue that all candidates face; how do we get young voters interested? By holding weekly addresses on YouTube, a forum that became popular amongst youth, he has already begun the process of retaining young people’s interest. Perhaps by using these new internet technologies during his presidency he will also start drawing prospective young voters’ attentions which future candidates could benefit from.

Political pundits debate whether or not making use of new media will really create transparency in the government. The truth is, whether the medium is print, radio, television, or videos streamed online, presidential materials will always contain spin. Messages from the White House are controlled public relations efforts and no matter who produces online content, it will have spin. By bringing cameras into the White House and streaming videos online, we may have an opportunity for less secrecy, but it will still be heavily edited. That being said, trying to connect with Americans in an innovative fashion is a step in the right direction. Online discussions in response to posted videos and other new internet media may gain the attention of local politicians and actually impact their decision making. People may feel more connected to the national government if they feel included; and new media allows for a stronger, more intimate relationship between citizens and government officials.

Sources:

1. Buchanan, M. (2008, November 14). Obama Will Deliver Weekly Fireside Chats. Message posted to the Gizmodo Web Log, archived at http://gizmodo.com/5087052/obama-will-deliver-weekly-youtube-fireside-chats

2. Vargas, J.A. (2008, November 14). The YouTube Presidency. Message posted to the washingtonpost.com Web Log, archived at http://voices.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2008/11/14/the_youtube_presidency.html

3. Zeleny, J. (2008, November 15). Say Goodbye to BlackBerry? Yes He Can, Maybe. The New York Times, p. A1.

Image from:

Buchanan, M. (2008, November 14). Obama Will Deliver Weekly Fireside Chats. Message posted to the Gizmodo Web Log, archived at http://gizmodo.com/5087052/obama-will-deliver-weekly-youtube-fireside-chats

Blog 6: Identity and AIM

When I was in elementary school and first started exploring the internet I mainly used AOL Instant Messenger. My parents were weary of me communicating with potential strangers via this new technology, but understood that I was interested in talking to my friends online, so allowed me to do so with somewhat close monitoring. They imposed regulations on my screen name choice after hearing that my cousin had chosen a rather provocative name for a 12 year-old: “bikinibabe02”. The rules were that I could not use any part of my name in my screen name, nor was I allowed to use any suggestive language, like that of my cousin’s. After many shot-down requests, I finally settled on “beachball66,” which didn’t give strangers or 10 year-old boys for that matter any images, but still had the word, “beach” in it.
Being that this was my first experience with online identities, I totally ate it up. Kids were judged by the cleverness of their screen names and their online personas formed based on their interactions. Another rule by which I had to abide in order to talk online was the amount of time I spent doing so. I had one hour per day to chat online, which at the time seemed like minutes compared to some of my friends who would never sign off. Those who spent more time online developed a better sense of one another’s online identities. Eventually, the distinctions between people’s online and in-person identities began to corrode. People’s online reputations developed based on a number of different factors: their popularity in school, the name they chose to represent themselves by, the types of interactions they had, and with whom they interacted.
The day that a new online popularity measure was developed became a nightmare for any popularity-conscious pre-teenage girl. AIM Fight measured people’s online popularity by calculating how many different people’s buddy lists an individual was on. In addition, your score would depend on the people’s buddy lists you were on, for three degrees. So, your popularity would be greatly affected by being on the buddy list of a person who was on many other people’s buddy lists, but not affected much by being on an un-popular person’s buddy list. For a better explanation, see http://aimfight.com/whatisaimfight.php. With AIM Fight, my online reputation was no longer only known to me; anyone who knew my screen name could see my popularity score. Obviously, as a competitive pre-teen I became obsessed with checking my ranking against my friends’. Our reputations had been degraded from being formed based on character judgment to being formed by a silly computer-generated popularity-ranking technology.

After the trauma caused by AIM Fight had eventually dissipated, incidents occurred where my friends were getting a hold of each other’s AIM passwords. As many mischievous, curiosity seeking teenagers might do, kids were getting together at one house and posing as another person. All sorts of likely inaccurate information was exchanged, and we used this as a means to finding out all of the latest classroom juice: who was crushing on who, and so forth. The potential reputation damage this behavior could have and probably at times did cause, was extreme. What is astounding is that despite the fact that kids were assuming others’ identities to gossip, we still trusted one another’s online personas. I know that personally, I was more guarded about who I spoke to and what about after I was made aware these activities, but the fact that we all still trusted these identities is unbelievable to me now. We were young, but we had no way of knowing for sure whether or not people were being truthful. I imagine that this is the reason many people trust strangers: they want them to be who they say they are, and there is no way of knowing for sure.

Source:

AIM Fight. (1998). [Graphic representation of three degrees of AIM Fight]. Retrieved from http://aimfight.com/whatisaimfight.php

COM 125 Assignment 2: Netscape Navigator's Contributions to the History of the Internet

In September of 1994 we were introduced to a web browser that set the stage for future internet browsing advances. Then called Mosaic, what we now know as Netscape Navigator was a significant development in internet history that has molded the ways in which people use the internet today. Originally a mere web browser, Netscape evolved into an internet suite, transforming the internet’s uses and opening the door to competition. The competition between the two major web browsers at the time—Netscape Navigator and Microsoft’s Internet Explorer—drove remarkable internet advances that continue to be built upon today.

While in Beta, Netscape Navigator was called Mosaic after its parent company’s name, Mosaic Communications Corporation, which was renamed Netscape Communications Corporation after a name dispute with a competitor. Netscape Navigator was an immediate success because it was the most advanced browser on the web. Netscape built upon their success by evolving from solely a web browser into an internet suite (initially called Netscape Navigator but now named Netscape Communicator). In addition to having a browsing capacity, Netscape Navigator incorporated a full e-mail client, expanding their web capabilities into an internet suite. This was an important transition in internet history because people gained the ability to do more things on the internet than just browse the web.

In August of 1996, Netscape released version 3.0; around the same time, Microsoft released Internet Explorer 3.0, which was the first significant source of competition for Netscape. The companies set the bar high for one another each time a new version of the suites were released. Nonetheless, until the release of Internet Explorer 5.0 challenged Netscape Communicator version 4, Netscape was still the preferred web browser. However, when Internet Explorer 5.0 was released in 1998, Netscape had unresolved issues, like an outdated browser core, that led to its eventual downfall. Internet Explorer became the preferred browser, and AOL (who now owns Netscape) announced that it would not release a fifth version.

Netscape Navigator was the first web browser, and introduced the internet to everyday consumers. Because of its success, Netscape attracted competition that as a result has improved today’s internet browsing experience. The advances that Netscape contributed to the web’s progression, like the creation of an internet suite, were points of paramount significance in the history of the internet.

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Netscape_(browser)