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I n f o r m a t i o n, C o m m u n i c a t i o n, S u p p l y
E L E C T R O Z I N E
Established in 1993 by Deva Winblood
Information Communication Supply 3/29/93 Vol.1:Issue9-1
Email To: ORG_ZINE@WSC.COLORADO.EDU
E D I T O R S: Local Alias: Email: ICS Positions:
============== ============ ====== ==============
Jeremy Bek rApIeR STU521279258 Technical Director,Layout,
Writer, Editing,
Subscriptions, Letters,
Fragment Design
Steven Peterson Rufus Firefly STU388801940 Editing, Writer
Russel Hutchinson Burnout Writer, Subscriptions,
Editing
Jason Manczur GReY KnYgHT STU523356717 Writer,Poet,Editing
Stephan Manzcur RaVaNa Writer, Editing
Deva Winblood MeTaL MaSTeR, ADP_DEVA Ask Deva, Tales of the
Ephemeral Unknown, Editing
Presence
George Sibley MAC_FAC FAC_SIBLEY Editing, Supervisor
_________________________________________
/=========================================\
|"Art helps us accept the human condition; |
| technology changes it." |
\ - D.B. Smith /
\***************************************/
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
_____________________________________________________________________________
/ \
| ICS is an Electrozine distributed by students of Western State |
| College in Gunnison, Colorado. We are here to gather information about |
| topics that are important to us all as human beings. If you would like |
| to send in a submission please type it into an ASCII format and mail it |
| to us. We operate on the assumption that if you mail us something you |
| want it to be published. We will do our best to make sure it is |
| distributed and will always inform you when or if it is used. |
| See the end of this issue for submission information. |
\_____________________________________________________________________________/
REDISTRIBUTION: If any part of this issue is copied or used elsewhere
you must give credit to the author and indicate that the information
came from ICS Electrozine ORG_ZINE@WSC.COLORADO.EDU.
DISCLAIMER: The views represented herein do not necessarily represent the
views of the editors of ICS. contributors to ICS assume all
responsibilities for ensuring that articles/submissions are not violating
copyright laws and protections.
|\__________________________________________________/|
| \ / |
| \ T A B L E O F C O N T E N T S / |
| / \ |
| /________________________________________________\ |
|/ \|
| Included in the table of contents you will see some|
| generic symbols to help you in making your |
| decisions on whether an article is something that |
| may use ideas, and/or language that could be |
| offensive to some. S = Sexual Content |
| AL = Adult Language V = Violence O = Opinions |
|____________________________________________________|
-----------------------------------------------------------
| |
| 1) First Word ......................Steven Peterson |
| |
| 2) Closing the "Values-Gap" [O].....Vigdor Schreibman |
| |
| 3) New Prejudices [O]...............Steven Peterson |
| |
| 4) To You, i Leave My Heart ........Jason Manzscur |
| |
| 5) The Concern About Sports |
| in the Nineties [O] ............Stefan Manzscur |
| |
| 6) Computer-Mediated Communication .Steven Peterson |
| |
-----------------------------------------------------------
_____________________
#=\ \=#
| First Word |
| by Steven Peterson |
#=\____________________\=#
Well, we're back after our spring break here in the Gunnison high
country. Unfortunately, we only had a week for our official break, so
the staff extended it unofficially by delaying production of ICS -
sorry, folks. Anyway, we are leading off this issue with a reprint of a
thought provoking article which examines V.P. Gore's pseudo-vision of
cyber-space (piercing the rhetoric - a distinctly American habit).
Then I check in with the latest installment in my "New Prejudices" brand
of editorial palaver (this time I take on human rights). Jason, our
resident mystic, checks in with yet another poem (it's a deep well he
draws from). Stephen Manczur, Jason's brother, has hopped onboard -
submitting a piece on the world of sports. Finally, I wind up the issue
with the first part of a series on computer-mediated communication.
Essentially a review-of-research, I am counting on reader response to
provide potential solutions to the myriad difficulties uncovered by
researchers. Feel free to overwhelm me with all the ideas you care
to share.
In other news, ICS is on the cusp of attaining some measure of
legitamacy within the bounds of our institution. We've submitted our
"constitution" and begun the political process of maneuvering for
recognition, and, dare we say it, a budget. So far, ICS has been a pure
"not-for-profit" publication (have no fear, it will remain free of
advertisements and such) produced by students on existing hardware.
Our pleas for money center around the need for Western to give back to
the net community by creating a FTP site. Currently, any research done
on campus is either doomed to obscurity in print journals or relegated
to the academic dust-bin (an utter waste, in my opinion). Creating a
rationale for our request was relatively easy; getting the administration
to understand it has been difficult. If anyone out there on the net has
any practical advice or examples from similar "institutional" campaigns,
please send them to us at org_zine. Thanks all, and enjoy the issue.
{Next Time - Stories!}
-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/-/
FINS: Communicating the Emerging Philosophy of The Information Age
FEDERAL INFORMATION NEWS SYNDICATE
VOL II, ISSUE NO. 2 (121 lines) JANUARY 17, 1994
CLOSING THE "VALUES-GAP":
Gore's Television Model for Cyberspace
By Vigdor Schreibman
At the Academy of Television in Los Angeles, Jan 11, Al Gore attempted
to once more dramatize his vision for the "information superhighways." He
tried to explain why the necessary telecommunications infrastructure should
be developed under the total ownership and unregulated control of the
monopolist and oligopolist telephone and cable companies. He used the old
"bate-and-shift" scam of television hucksters to warm up public support for
his legislative initiative. On Dec 21, last year, Gore promised a legislative
package that would safeguard the "public needs that outweigh private
interests" in this domain. He said "we shouldn't hesitate to chart a new
course" to avoid the Titanic catastrophe that could result from reliance upon
narrow business self-interest to provide genuine communications, fulfilling
the promise of community that this implies. Then, last Tuesday Gore disclosed
once again that--lost in a web of political propaganda--he is without a valid
perspective on this nation's paramount public needs.
The central message conveyed by Gore and his chorus of well rehearsed
cyberspace supporters (Mitch Kapor, et al), is that "we must put our trust
in the marketplace." This message was delivered in a rigged and lopsided
setting to support his cause blindly in the face of all contrary experience,
and without examination of existing realities or alternative possibilities.
In a bizarre way, the Academy of Television provided a poignant setting
for the torrent of false purposes presented to the viewing and listening
audience. The model of television communications has brought us a "wasteland"
of manipulative infotainment, exploitive sex, and gratuitous violence. Use
of the same model in cyberspace, an infinitely more powerful media that
includes interactive television, as well as voice and data communications,
could be even worse. Gore lost no time in showing us how effectively even
the old electronic media can be used to promote false purposes.
The marketplace morality that Gore now urges us to accept for cyberspace
was relied upon to the maximum by recent administrations that brought us to
the brink of fiscal bankruptcy and pervasive urban despair. Opportunism, out
of which the morality of the marketplace is derived, has turned our politics
into a boiling cauldron of anger and frustration bringing disapproval ratings
of Congress to their highest level in history. This primitive morality has
made our business enterprises into organs of greed and avarice that cannot
compete in world markets, and it has subverted our culture into a wretched
squalor culminating in unlimited self-indulgence. In such a society,
historian Christopher Lasch has ominously warned, "reason can impose no
limits on the pursuit of pleasure--on the immediate gratification of every
desire no matter how perverse, insane, criminal, or merely immoral." These
conditions underscore the belief by six out of ten people that there needs
to be "fundamental changes in the system of government and politics in the
United States" and about a quarter think it needs to be "completely rebuilt."
[CBS News Poll, June 1992].
The morality of the marketplace in cyberspace is a gross contradiction
in terms. The extraordinary success of the Internet during the past decade
was predicated upon the cooperative spirit of networkers all over the world,
guided by the communitarian purposes and values that drive our library,
research, and educational institutions. The NREN model for development of
cyberspace that was approved by Congress in 1991, and the stunning success
story it tells was emphatically value-driven and not market-centered.
Contrary to these realities Al Gore, along with Mitch Kapor and others, are now
trying to sell us the notion that we are compelled to "put our trust in the
marketplace." This assertion, which is being advanced with the double speak
images of television and despicable groupthink techniques--is absolutely
unjustified.
The administration's telecommunications policy reform initiative,
released by the White House Jan 11, states "It is a goal of this
Administration that by the year 2000, all of the classrooms, libraries,
hospitals, and clinics in the United States will be connected to the NII."
Nevertheless, that connection may be of dubious benefit to public service
institutions if the NII is designed to maximize the manipulative commercial
purposes of the communications content. On the contrary, a major portion of
cyberspace must be free from profit pressures, and operated under the
independent direction of people who are committed to serving the public
good. Gore also promised antitrust protection against the likely abusive
conduct of the monopolists and oligopolists who were offered a transitional
scheme for deregulation of the telecommunications infrastructure. However,
no sane and reasonable person can possibly rely upon such regulatory
protection in cyberspace when the political leaders who are now making these
promises are at the same time attempting to shape a role for the monopolists
in the information infrastructure that is manifestly subversive of the
paramount human, social, and ecological interests that must be served by this
system. Moreover, the colossal telecommunications industry has proven
themselves to be largely impossible to regulate even in narrow economic terms
during these early periods of the new electronic media, according to Judge
Harold Greene, a jurist who knows them better than anyone.
Nevertheless, for all their wealth and coercive power telecommunications
companies cannot vote. This is the exclusive right of individual citizens
who can personally inform members of Congress about the basics of cyberspace.
An electronic preview of my article, "The Politics of Cyberspace," will
open Jan 19 at the FINS InfoAge Library: Telnet inforM.umd.edu /Educational_
Resources/Computers_and_Society/Information_Infrastructure/Fins-II-15. This
work examines industry dictated visions of a market-centered cyberspace, and
value-directed alternatives that can best serve the public good. Get a copy
and talk it over with your family and community. Then make sure you all
inform policy makers in Congress (listed in the above FINS InfoAge Library
at: Congress-Dir), what you think should be the preferred choice for the
future of the Information Age.
----------
Federal Information News Syndicate, Vigdor Schreibman, Editor & Publisher,
18 - 9th Street NE #206, Washington, DC 20002-6042. Copyright 1994 FINS.
Internet: fins@access.digex.net. FINS is archived at the inforM (Information
for Maryland) system. CapAccess, "All the Gopher Servers in the World" or
Telnet inforM.umd.edu /Educational_Resources/United_States/Government/FINS.
/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\
_______--------------_______
( )
> New Prejudices <
( )
> by Steven Peterson <
( )
-----__________________-----
Control. That's what everything seems to be about these days.
In personal terms, or at the sociological level, a pathological desire to
maintain physical and psychological control of others lies at the foundation
of our basest acts. Last week, I caught the television interview with
Jeffery Dahmer, who is perhaps America's most notorious and frightening
criminal. The one reason he offered to explain his desire to commit
grotesque and brutal acts was "an obsessive need to control others;
to make them do whatever I wanted them to do." Absolutely terrifying in
its simplicity, Dahmer's rationalization is hardly new or original.
Last week, I kept running into this "logic of control" as I began to
read the Human Rights Country Reports (prepared by our U.S. Department of
State). Released last month, these reports are drawn from a variety of sources
and cover the state of internationally recognized individual, political, civil,
and worker rights as set forth in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
This grim review of armed conflicts, torture, and arbitrary detention reveals
a lowest common denominator of human behavior: an obsessive drive in
individuals to use political organizations to maintain power over individuals.
This drive typically expresses itself in the overt mechanisms of "laws"
written and designed to grant a select few absolute control over the lives
of a population.
For purposes of illustration, the two Koreas (North and South) provide
an excellent portrait of two nations moving in opposite directions on the
road to a more humane, civilized world. According to the report, the
"Democratic People's Republic of Korea" (North Korea) continues to suffer
under the absolute rule of the Korean Workers' Party (KWP), a political
organization which exercises power on behalf of Kim Il Sung, a self-styled
dictator. In order to maintain his position, Sung has constructed a form of
government predicated on repression, rigid control of the citizenry (there's
that word again), and a general prohibition on individual rights. According
to Amnesty International, entire families are imprisoned together in forced
"reeducation through labor" camps for various crimes. While scant information
on North Korea's criminal justice process is known, portions of their Criminal
Law are pretty revealing: Article 52, for instance, mandates the death penalty
for crimes such as "ideological divergence", "counter-revolutionary crimes",
and "collusion with imperialists".
The North Korean report goes on to detail a spectrum of insults to the
human spirit: detention centers described by defectors as "concentration
camps", routine denial of Fair Public Trials to political offenders, strictly
curtailed rights of freedom of expression and association, travel restrictions
(internal and external), and a total lack of worker's rights - most of the
population seems to exist in a state of servitude resembling slavery. In a
passage which would fit right into "1984", the report states "Citizens in all
age groups and occupations are subject to indoctrination designed to shape and
control individual consciousness. This effort is aimed at ensuring reverence
for Kim Il Sung and his family, as well as conformity to the State's ideology
and authority." About the only missing ingredient in this perverse life-
imitating-art tale of anguish and despair is the "Two-Minutes Hate".
On the other side of the 38th parallel, the Republic of Korea (South)
has taken several long strides toward reforming their nation. Last year,
the South Korean people inaugurated Kim Young Sam of the Democratic
Liberal Party as their President. According to the report, Kim, the first
civilian chief executive to take office in the last thirty years, has
"instituted sweeping political reforms to reduce corruption, further
institutionalize democracy, and improve human rights" during his first
year in office. These reforms are designed to curb, eliminate, or make
reparations for the previous administration's excesses and violations of
basic human rights. Aside from releasing hundreds of political prisoners,
the South Korean government has "mandated disclosure of financial and real
estate assets by government officials, first in March, and then in June
[of 93], the latter of which led to the resignation of many judicial
officials, including the Supreme Court Chief Justice, the Prosecutor General,
and the national police chief in September." The ensuing personnel shuffle
has replaced these draconian law-givers with individuals "generally
considered committed to the independence and integrity of the judiciary."
This shuffle has had immediate consequences: violent student unrest has
declined radically, political dissidents are being allowed to stage peaceful
protests (May Day march), and arrests for political crimes have decreased
dramatically (from 305 in 1992 to around 80 in '93). These developments
underscore the potential for rapid change in a society committed to the
erstwhile values represented by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
Although the South Korean report paints a pretty rosy picture of
progress, it also points out an Achille's heel - the long-standing fear of
invasion or domination from the north supports certain sanctions against
travel across the border and free speech deemed "pro-North Korean" or
socialist. Given the North's recent escalation of the nuclear threat and
the continued cold-war style military stand-off, their fears and sanctions
seem reasonable.
In comparing the two Koreas, it's tempting to reduce the situation to
an archtypical face-off between socialism and capitalism. To some extent,
there are characteristics which lend themselves to that sort of analysis,
but the gory details presented in these reports bring the reality of
people's pain right into your face. The dispassionate tone of a government
document, with its statistics and legalistic language, usually allows me the
distance to gain some measure of "objectivity" - not so in this case. So far,
I've only read a handful of the more than two hundred reports released last
February ... and every one of them can pierce right into my soul.
For myself, awareness has been the first step toward attaining a
personal sense of "world citizenship". Becoming part of the larger community
of *humanity* carries with it certain responsibilities: acquiring personal
knowledge of and about the condition of your fellow man and woman, wherever
they may be; a desire to do what you can to improve the lives of individuals;
and finding the courage to *feel* the pain, the anguish, and the terrible
weight of the injustices we would rather not contemplate. It is our outrage,
our conscious refusal to accept the status quo, which fuels the collective
human drive toward moral evolution.
It's up to us, people. On the personal level, we can use our economic
power to boycott the products of repressive regimes, we can use our
power of the vote in democratic societies to support candidates who will
lean on other heads of state to bring their people the rights and
guarantees which are the birthright of all humans, and finally, we can
pledge our support to human rights groups like Amnesty International.
Start in your homes and bring the battle to the larger world.
Send letters, attend meetings, be loud, get nasty, whatever it takes -
don't let our silence support the despots.
I began this column talking about control - the obsessive drive for
it we all feel at some point, in some way, in our lives. For me, it's my
dog - I go a little nuts when my "training" fails (I never use violence,
tho', it simply confuses and scares animals - people too). As Don Quixote
discovered in his mythical forays into the "world-as-it-is" of medieval
Spain, individual control is illusory; it fails as an instrument for changing
the "world-as-it-should-be". It is the collective spirit and drive of a
people which ultimately brings change to a society - the days of the
benevolent dictator have passed. I, for one, do not mourn their passing.
"Every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under."
- H.L. Mencken
][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][][
To You, i Leave My Heart
To be the one that you love,
For this what would i do?
I would prove my love daily,
And show that i am true.
This poem, in itself,
Falls far short of the mark,
Of telling you the feelings
My heart has made me hark.
How then shall i inform you
Of the love i feel inside?
My shyness will not let me,
So i guess love will have to hide.
But though for now, and not forever
My love, for you, may be hiding,
These feelings in my heart,
Fore'er will be residing.
And if you find out who this is,
And say you can not love me,
I will say, only these words,
"If we are ne'er meant to be,
Than how can you hope to explain,
The joy and love i feel?"
Lest of course you do not believe,
Or doubt these things are real.
Until the day that i should die,
I will love you for my part.
But on that day you'll here these words,
"To you, i leave my heart."
/\_
KNYGHT 0#####|JM>=========================>
\/-
:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+:+
_____ ______
/xxxxx\ / \
|xxxxxxx| __________________________________________ / \_____ \
|xxxxxxx| \The Concern about Sports in the Nineties/ \ \/
\xxxxx/ \ / \~~~~~\/
~\_/~ \ by Stefan Manczur / ~~~~~~
|=| \__________________________________/
|=|
|=|
|=|
\0/
Spectators of most sports enjoy seeing their home team win. That
is hardly an unreasonable desire, but recent events have brought many people
to a fundamental question: Are the sports worth the hype?
The first international incidents involving sports were the world-
famous (or infamous) spectator brawls at World Cup soccer games. Fans would
literally fight supporters of the other team. Nothing was done. The stadium
fights of hockey are better than the fights on the ice. Nothing was done. Last
year, tennis superstar Monica Seles was assaulted by a fan of Steffi Graf to
ensure a victory for Ms. Graf. Legal charges were brought upon the assailant
and the security of tennis was improved, but nothing was done to demonstrate
the inappropriate behavior of the assailant. This year's Olympics were marred
with the now-famous Tonya Harding-Nancy Kerrigan incident. Still, nothing was
done.
The values of sports have been changed to something grotesque. Win at all
costs. This sentiment is rooted down to the primary school level, winners are
better, regardless of the cost. Nobody cares about how you play the game
anymore, just that your team wins.
Who are the victims? The athletes are obviously unaffected, otherwise,
why would Charles Barkley inform the world that his only reason for going to
Barcelona, Spain, in 1990 was to win himself a gold? The fans still love the
competition, so they must have been spared the loss of sports integrity. How
about the children who look to superstars as role models? Yes, they suffer,
and they suffer for everyone.
Posing the problem is far easier than solving it. Do we expect sports
heroes to play honestly, with integrity, for the simple love of the game? How
unreasonable is that? What would be wrong with a sports union, like the labor
professions. Many people will argue that the true superstars deserve the
money, but why? A chimpanzee can be trained to put a ball in a hoop, and it
won't expect a great reward. A standard salary will reduce contract disputes,
and it would set the game to the basics, playing for the love of the game.
Those who love the game will play competatively regardless of the money they
earn. The best case in point is All-Pro NFL lineman Max Montoya. For years
he was paid far less than other members of his team, but he played with a
million-dollar intensity.
The salary idea is not to try to reduce athletes to paupers. They
can be paid a standard amount of the lower-middle class income with respect
to the area they live in. Obviously, an athlete in Iowa needs less annual
income than one in California, and it should be reflected in the salary
guidelines.
The most adamant against this idea are the athletes, as it could
amount to millions of dollars lost compared to the status quo. But the
winners would be the thousands of children and adults who can see a sports
event played by those who truly love the game.
That's far better than victory at all costs.
$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$
Computer-Mediated Communication
Part 1
By Steven Peterson
ICS is, by design, a 'zine devoted to providing our readers with a
distillation of the best or most interesting thoughts and ideas we come
across. In a sense, we (the humble staff and contributors) are using
technology to present symbolic information to you, our audience, in a
relatively new and different manner. Although we employ a traditional
sort of lay-out, what makes this enterprise unique is the delivery
mechanism (e-mail); it is an example of one of the forms of computer-
mediated communication (CMC) which now offer individuals, small groups,
and larger organizations new and different methods of channelling
information and routing communications.
Most forms of CMC utilize networked or multi-user programming;
this simple fact fundamentally alters the nature of small-group and
mass communications through shifting the focus of interaction from a
one-to-many to a many-to-many distribution architecture (within the
context of the machinery, at least). In this series of articles, I will
survey CMC related research conducted during the 80s and 90s which
examines human responses to this new technology and defines some of
the communication challenges it presents to all who use it.
The proliferation of computer networks and their growing use for
communicative purposes during the 1980s led Kiesler et. al., a research
group from Carnegie Mellon university, to investigate the social and
psychological issues CMC technology presented. Working with the existing
technologies (1984), the team identified five important social and
psychological aspects of CMC: time and information processing pressures,
absence of regulating feedback, dramaturgical weakness, few status and
position cues, and the potential depersonalizing effects of social
anonymity (Kiesler 1125). As many of you are no doubt aware, these five
aspects surface as either benefits or drawbacks to virtually every form
of CMC, depending on the context, the intended purpose, and the degree
of structure imposed by the specific format.
Kiesler's initial study (the first to use modern, fast terminals
and flexible conferencing and mail software) examined the impact of CMC
on group interaction and decision-making processes as compared to
traditional face-to-face methods. The study charted the efforts of
three-person groups to reach group consensus on choice-dilemma problems
in varied conditions: face-to-face conferencing, simultaneous computer
conferencing, anonymous simultaneous computer conferencing, and e-mail.
The first variable (or aspect), communication efficiency, identified
time-consuming information processing problems in the many-to-many
format of CMC. Kiesler noted "CMC groups took longer to reach consensus
than did face-to-face groups, and they exchanged fewer remarks in the
time allowed them" (1128). Apparently, the swift distribution of many
thoughts and ideas taxes the individual's capacity to sort information -
somewhat analogous to putting a two-barrel carburetor on a twelve-cylinder
engine - it fires, but not very efficiently.
At the individual level, attempting to deal with the combined outputs
of multiple listservs can become overwhelming in a hurry. Many of my
peers describe various methods of "editing" on-the-fly as they browse
through subject lines, describing the process as "crude, but effective".
Quite often, they confess to "unsubscribing" from one list or another
because they simply do not have time to sort through it all (a message
common in ICS unsub requests). This sort of all-or-nothing response to
the electronic "tower of babel" underscores the human need for context,
organization, and relevance.
To varying degrees, the other four social and psychological aspects
identified by Kiesler affect the efficiency and rate of participation in
CMC environments: the absense of regulating feedback is linked to an
increase in uninhibited verbal behavior ("flaming") and to a greater
rate in decision shifting; dramaturgical weakness (the lack of non-verbal
cues and reinforcement) seems to affect the decision-making process by
masking leadership cues (1129); the status and position cues evident in
face-to-face communication create an inequality of participation which
is reduced in CMC formats; and the social anonymity CMC offers can be
liberating or alienating, depending on the perspective of the individual
and the amount of "embedded structure" in the specific format (1130).
Despite the difficulties and drawbacks Kiesler's team identified,
they somewhat prophetically note the popularity of the medium and
predict "a more permanent effect [of CMC] might be the extension of
participation in group or organizational communication. This is
important because it implies more shared information, more equality of
influence, and, perhaps, a breakdown of social and organizational
barriers" (1131). This breakdown of barriers occasionally surfaces at
Western State (home to ICS); personally, I have exchanged some e-mail
with administrators and professors, and Western has an on-line advising
service which offers same-day e-mail responses to a wide variety of
questions. Although the technology may be in place, the barriers still
have not really fallen: the address may be widely available, but if the
receiver chooses to ignore all messages, no progress is possible (we all
may be aware of president@whitehouse.gov, but it's not quite the same as
getting a message into the man's hands).
Kiesler's ground breaking study provides an excellent base for a
comparative analysis of CMC research - the same social and psychological
aspects surface in many of the studies conducted over the last ten years.
As a reminder, I will lead off installments in this series with a "boxed
set" of the five central issues of CMC research:
______________________________________________________
| Five Aspects of computer-mediated communication (CMC)|
| 1) Time/Information processing pressures |
| 2) Absence of regulating feedback |
| 3) Dramaturgical weakness |
| 4) Few status/position cues |
| 5) Depersonalization of social anonymity |
------------------------------------------------------
As I examine research on electronic bulletin boards (EBBs), electronic
brainstorming programs (EBS), and group decision support software (GDSS)
in future installments, I invite you to e-mail your thoughts and
suggestions concerning possible solutions to the "big 5" to me at
Org_Zine@wsc.colorado.edu - please incorporate "CMC" into the subject
line. I will attempt to append a distillation of the most promising
solutions as something of a public service (guerrilla innovation?).
Part 2 will cover EBS research, so please send in your suggestions for
handling large numbers of ideas on a daily basis.
Work Cited
Kiesler, Sara, et.al. "Social Psychological Aspects of Computer-Mediated
Communication." *American Psychologist*. Vol.39,No.10,1984. 1123-1134.
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ICSICSICSICSICSICSICSICSICSICICS/~~~\
ICSICSICSICSICSICS/~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ICS ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~\
\ INFORMATION COMMUNICATION SUPPLY /
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An Electronic Magazine from Western State College Gunnison, Colorado.
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Information Communication Supply 4/21/94 Vol.1:Issue.9 Frag: 2
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| \ / |
| \ T A B L E O F C O N T E N T S / |
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|/ \|
| Included in the table of contents you will see some|
| generic symbols to help you in making your |
| decisions on whether an article is something that |
| may use ideas, and/or language that could be |
| offensive to some. S = Sexual Content |
| AL = Adult Language V = Violence O = Opinions |
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| 1) A Cautionary Note [O] ...........Steven Peterson|
| 2) What Is Mine ....................Clint Thompson |
| 3) Email Culture 2 [O]..............George Sibley |
| 4) Peak 9 ..........................Steven Peterson|
| 6) Shine ...........................Jason Manzcur |
| 7) Last Word [O]....................Steven Peterson|
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