This was on the corporate ethics list that I thought would be of interest here. > -----Original Message----- > From: MichaelP <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > To: unlikely suspects: ; <unlikely suspects: ;> > Date: Wednesday, January 05, 2000 11:35 AM > Subject: Independent media and the survival of democracy > > > > > In Seattle's Aftermath: Linux, Independent Media, and the Survival of > >Democracy > > > > by Bryan Pfaffenberger <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > >Bryan Pfaffenberger is Associate Professor of Technology, > >Culture, and Communication at the University of Virginia. > > > > > > > > LinuxJournal, 13-Dec-1999 > > <http://www2.linuxjournal.com/articles/currents/013.html> > >-------------------------------------------------------------- > >Independent digital media can't survive without an Operating System (OS) > >and an Internet that are free from corporate control. > > > >At a 1996 Media and Democracy conference in San Francisco, CA, Andy > >Sharpless, Vice President of Progressive Networks of Seattle, told his > >audience that independent, Internet-based media outlets had just five > >years to compete against large, corporate sites (Beacham, 1996). The five > >years are almost up, and it's abundantly clear that Sharpless' prediction > >was right on the money. Corporations are well on their way to transforming > >the Internet into a computerized version of broadcast television, replete > >with mind-numbing consumerism, an aversion to reporting of news that > >corporations dislike, and using all the tricks of broadcast TV (including > >fast-changing images, gratuitous sex, and subtle psychological > >manipulation) to keep your eyes glued to the screen. > > > >But it's not merely the dumbing-down of Internet content that worries > >independent media activists. Within the next five years, the > >transformation of Internet content will be coupled with intrusive, > >surreptitious content monitoring, akin to having your every move in a > >public bookstore or newsstand exhaustively catalogued and monitored, and > >then put up for sale to any interested party. In contrast to today's > >monitoring, which is ostensibly done without associating individuals' > >names with the collected data, tomorrow's will be more personal -- and far > >more damaging. Employers, after all, will doubtless be very keen to > >knowing whether job applicants have (say) visited sites discussing such > >matters as worker's compensation, alcoholism, depression, or (horror of > >horrors) trade unionism. If you've accessed the "wrong" site and some > >other, equally capable applicant hasn't, perhaps you won't get that job, > >but you'll never know why. ("Your credentials did not fit our needs at > >this time.") Skeptical? American workers are already terrified of making > >worker's compensation claims or seeking treatment for anxiety or > >depression, knowing full well that doing so may ruin their chances for > >future employment. > > > >In the corporate-shaped Internet to come, one may feel a powerful prior > >constraint concerning the mere seeking of any information -- the mere > >reading of any content -- that would displease an employer. This is > >repression on a scale as horrifying as anything envisioned in dystopian > >science fiction novels such as Brave New World ; perhaps even more > >horrifying, because it's all too clear that the needed technology is > >available right now. You'll find out soon enough that, in fact, it's > >already in use. For a time, there will be a big public outcry, and the > >first company that's caught will have to back off. After the furor dies > >down, though, the practice will become commonplace and unremarkable -- > >until, that is, it ruins your career. > > > >Make no mistake about it: there's a battle to come, and it's not really > >about "consumers" and "privacy" and the rest of the meaningless > >terminology you've heard. Fundamentally, it's about democracy : > >specifically, the right of the people to obtain the information and > >knowledge they need to govern themselves in freedom. And, as you'll see, > >Linux and the Open Source software movement promise to play a key role in > >this battle. > > > > > . > > > >WHY MAINSTREAM MEDIA WON'T TELL YOU THE TRUTH > > > >You don't have to be a genius or a conspiracy theorist to figure this one > >out. A few global media giants dominate the market; they have huge and > >growing holdings in virtually every means by which information is > >disseminated -- films, books, TV channels, radio stations, newspapers, and > >magazines (Herman and McChesney, 1998). And they pressure, whether overtly > >or not, authors and reporters to put a slant on the news -- specifically, > >a centrist to right-wing slant that favors the interests of the media's > >corporate owners. <http://www.fair.org/extra/9511/nbc.html> That's the > >reason you hear, over and over, why development matters more than > >preserving the environment, why free trade matters more than worker's > >rights, and why the U.S. has the right to impose its military power > >wherever it pleases. > > > >Apart from the general pressure to slant the news to the center and right, > >industry associations overtly pressure media outlets to censor certain > >types of news reporting by threatening to withdraw advertising. For > >example, thanks to pressure from restaurant associations, newspapers are > >reluctant to specify local restaurants which violate health department > >regulations. Even so, overt pressure isn't often needed. When you're in > >the media business, you know darned well you'd better not run stories that > >businesses won't like. You tone it down. You run it by them. And if > >they're not comfortable and you're not comfortable, you don't run it. > > > >In sum, you don't hear the truth because corporations don't want you to > >hear it and mainstream media are too cowardly to report it. Had you known > >the truth about Seattle (including substantive discussion of the specific > >issues concerning WTO policies), you might have thought more deeply about > >what's at stake. But that doesn't sell beer; why ask why, after all, when > >doing so is virtually unmarketable? Instead of providing the tools needed > >to think seriously about national policies, the media would much prefer to > >socialize viewers into becoming "neurotic in their need to buy advertised > >commodities", generating "mass spending on goods such as cosmetics, > >cigarettes, beer, soft drinks, and patent medicines completely out of > >proportion to the rational use of national income..." and diverting > >attention from "society's central needs, including public education, > >health care, [and] democratic economics" (Bagdikian, 1996:10). > > > > > >THE COMING ATTACK ON THE INTERNET'S COMMON CARRIER STATUS > > > >The Internet is giving corporate media companies the fits; it's just so > >darned hard to make the mainstream media model apply. If you can't bring > >billions of eyeballs to your site, how are you going to make money? Right > >now, the Internet is like a phone system, a common carrier operated in the > >public's interest, in which anyone can access anything and have a pretty > >good chance of getting it. Horrifying! Media corporations aren't content, > >of course, to sit back and let this intolerable situation endure, this > >unendurable situation in which some college kid can put up a page that, in > >principle, is just as accessible as Dot Com's. With the aid of U.S. > >legislatures that are essentially up for sale to the highest bidder, > >they're well on their way to transforming the Internet into something far > >more to their liking. Here's just some of what they're doing: > > > >- Pressuring Internet designers to build in bandwidth-reservation schemes > >and "quality of service" (QoS) guarantees that will funnel users to a few > >high-performance sites. If you don't want to visit the sites that have > >paid for QoS guarantees, that's just fine, but you may have to wait quite > >a while to get through. > > > >- Adapting to the Internet the known techniques used by broadcast > >television; namely, "endless scenes of violence and other aggressive > >melodrama, gratuitous sex, split-second cuts... [which] keep a viewer > >glued to the channel" (Bagdikian, 1997:11). > > > >- Transforming search engines into advertising media in which > >high-retrieval ranking requires a payment to the search engine provider. > > > >- Developing user monitoring and tracking systems that are incapable of > >detection by average users, and associating these systems with proposed > >legislation that defines "copyright management infrastructures" and spells > >out hefty prison terms for anyone who attempts to defeat them. > > > >- Using recently adopted copyright legislation to remove from the Internet > >leaked corporate documents that could inform the public of conspiratorial > >or even illegal corporate actions. > > > >- Pressuring the U.S. Congress to adopt new legal definitions of "facts" > >in digital media that essentially remove all forms of previously > >accessible knowledge from the public domain and transform them into > >commodities that cannot be used without the payment of a fee. > > > >- Pushing for legislation that criminalizes anonymity. > > > >I don't mean to allege some sort of industry-wide conspiracy here. What > >you're seeing is the outgrowth of many very large, very rich companies > >pursuing their short-term interests, without the slightest regard for the > >long-term consequences of their actions -- just as they did at the opening > >of the Industrial Age, when oligopolies and monopolies brought on > >widespread misery on such a shocking scale that even those partial to > >business saw the need for regulatory measures. > > > > > >LINUX AND OPEN-SOURCE SOFTWARE: A LINE OF DEFENSE AGAINST CORPORATE > >CONTROL OF THE INTERNET > > > >If you'd like just one good reason why Linux is so vital to the survival > >of the Internet as a publicly accessible medium, just take a look at > >Microsoft Windows 98. It's designed in such a way as to further > >Microsoft's market ambitions, as the good Judge Jackson recently affirmed, > >but it's also a dream come true for companies hoping to transform the > >Internet into a corporate-dominated medium. > > > >With Windows 98, you're basically forced to use Internet Explorer. You > >can't delete it, and you're in for a "jolting experience" should you try > >to run another browser. For this reason, there's a uniform, predictable > >platform that's in daily use by millions of Internet surfers. Tightly > >integrated with the operating system and Microsoft mail utilities, > >Internet Explorer ideally suits the interests of corporate intruders as > >well as virus authors. You can exploit the tight, internal connections in > >all sorts of creative ways. And if you're using this very dynamic duo, you > >can't shield yourself; you don't even know what's going on. Sure, Internet > >Explorer gives you the apparent means to defeat cookies, but this feature > >borders on deception. It amounts to an all-or-nothing proposition; > >essentially, either you accept all cookies without scrutiny, or you turn > >them off -- and then you can't visit any site that requires them. It's > >only when you escape from the world of corporate-controlled media that you > >see other options. For example, the KDE browser enables you to specify > >which domains you're willing to accept cookies from -- it's a simple, > >straightforward means to assure that you're tracked by only those sites > >you've chosen to trust. > > > >The privacy-busting possibilities built into the Windows 98/Internet > >Explorer duo are perfectly exemplified by Comet Systems' > ><http://www.cometsystems.com/> cute and freely downloadable cursors. The > >products take full advantage of the tight, opaque integration between > >Windows and Internet Explorer to track your movements through some 60,000 > >web sites. > ><http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/19991130/tc/internet_privacy_3.html> Of > >course, Comet and other companies playing variations on the same trick > >deny that they're collecting information on specific individuals. Still, > >the technology to accomplish such a privacy-busting association is already > >here, and it will someday be used (if it hasn't already). And the day will > >soon be upon us (perhaps two to five years) when your would-be employer > >consults databases of web-surfing profiles to determine whether you, the > >eager job applicant, just might have expressed an interest in subjects > >that make employers uncomfortable. Sure, such screening will almost > >certainly diminish the employability of people who innocently accessed > >questionable sites, but the claim will be made that the rights of these > >innocent victims mean nothing when placed against the savings employers > >expect to realize by avoiding the occasional freeloader, the Commie, the > >drunk. It won't occur to these employers, or their defenders, that there's > >a more fundamental violation of rights at stake here: namely, the right of > >free citizens in a democracy to acquire knowledge without fear that the > >topic of their inquiry will expose them to adverse consequences. > > > >So where do Linux and the Open Source movement come in? It's simple. We're > >talking about software that's created outside the corporate system -- and > >as a consequence, software that's insulated from the pressures > >corporations exert to destroy the Internet's inherent democracy. Linux > >rejects the tight coupling between the browser and the operating system. > >What's more, it enables users to look under the hood to find out what's > >going on; users astute in programming can analyze the source code, if > >necessary, to determine how the software operates. If there's anything > >funny, word will go out like lightning. A new generation of open-source > >software may emerge that, like the KDE browser, is specifically and > >pro-actively designed to protect users from intrusive monitoring. > > > >I wish I could say that these measures alone could help preserve the > >Internet's capacity to function democratically. Sure, they're a step in > >the right direction, but the forces arrayed against information democracy > >are powerful, wealthy, and determined to win. What will decide the > >outcome, in the end, is the much broader question of whether the > >Internet-using public pulls itself out of its apathy, realizes what's > >going on, and joins a mass movement to regain our freedom. In the > >meantime, of course, there's your daily, media-supplied apathy regimen, > >consisting quite possibly of beer and the boys and babes on Baywatch -- > >but maybe, just maybe, you'll take a look at the bibliography I've > >appended and learn what's at stake. > > > >------------------------------------------------------------------- > >Media Studies 101: Understanding the Consequences of Corporate Media > >Control > > > >Alger, Dean. Megamedia: How Giant Corporations Dominate Mass Media, > >Distort Competition, and Endanger Democracy. Rowman & Littlefield, 1998. > > > >Beacham, Frank. "The Internet in Transition", > ><http://www.beacham.com/net_transition.html>, 1996. > > > >Bagdikian, Ben. "Brave New World Minus 400", in G. Gerbner, H. Mowlana, > >and H. Schiller (eds.), Invisible Crises: What Conglomerate Control of > >Media Means for America and the World. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, pp. > >7-14. 1996. > > > >Bagdikian, Ben. The Media Monopoly . Beacon Press, 1997. > > > >Barnouw, Erik, and Todd Gitlin. Conglomerates and the Media . New Press, > >1998. > > > >Carey, Alex, Andrew Lohrey, and Noam Chomsky (eds.), Taking the Risk Out > >of Democracy: Corporate Propaganda Versus Freedom and Liberty . University > >of Illinois Press. > > > >Hazen, Don, and Julie Winokur (eds.), We the Media: A Citizen's Guide to > >Fighting for Media Democracy . New Press. > > > >Herman, Edward, and Robert W. McChesney, The Global Media: The > >Missionaries of Global Capitalism . > > > >Ritzer, George. The McDonaldization of Society . Pine Forge Press 1993. > > > >Solomon, Norman, and Jeff Cohen. Wizards of Media Oz: Behind the Curtain > >of Mainstream News . Common Courage Press, 1997. > > > >Solomon, Norman. The Habits of Highly Deceptive Media: Decoding Spin and > >Lies in Mainstream News . Common Courage Press, 1998. > > > > > > > > > >================================= > > > > > >*** NOTICE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material > >is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest > >in receiving the included information for research and educational > >purposes. *** > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ > Want to send money instantly to anyone, anywhere, anytime? > > You can today at X.com - and we'll give you $20 to try it! Sign > > up today at X.com. It's quick, free, & there's no obligation! > http://click.egroups.com/1/332/2/_/23111/_/947287356/ > > -- Check out your group's private Chat room > -- http://www.egroups.com/ChatPage?listName=corp-ethics&m=1
-----Original Message----- From: MichaelP <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: unlikely suspects: ; <unlikely suspects: ;> Date: Wednesday, January 05, 2000 11:35 AM Subject: Independent media and the survival of democracy > > In Seattle's Aftermath: Linux, Independent Media, and the Survival of >Democracy > > by Bryan Pfaffenberger <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> >Bryan Pfaffenberger is Associate Professor of Technology, >Culture, and Communication at the University of Virginia. > > > > LinuxJournal, 13-Dec-1999 > <http://www2.linuxjournal.com/articles/currents/013.html> >-------------------------------------------------------------- >Independent digital media can't survive without an Operating System (OS) >and an Internet that are free from corporate control. > >At a 1996 Media and Democracy conference in San Francisco, CA, Andy >Sharpless, Vice President of Progressive Networks of Seattle, told his >audience that independent, Internet-based media outlets had just five >years to compete against large, corporate sites (Beacham, 1996). The five >years are almost up, and it's abundantly clear that Sharpless' prediction >was right on the money. Corporations are well on their way to transforming >the Internet into a computerized version of broadcast television, replete >with mind-numbing consumerism, an aversion to reporting of news that >corporations dislike, and using all the tricks of broadcast TV (including >fast-changing images, gratuitous sex, and subtle psychological >manipulation) to keep your eyes glued to the screen. > >But it's not merely the dumbing-down of Internet content that worries >independent media activists. Within the next five years, the >transformation of Internet content will be coupled with intrusive, >surreptitious content monitoring, akin to having your every move in a >public bookstore or newsstand exhaustively catalogued and monitored, and >then put up for sale to any interested party. In contrast to today's >monitoring, which is ostensibly done without associating individuals' >names with the collected data, tomorrow's will be more personal -- and far >more damaging. Employers, after all, will doubtless be very keen to >knowing whether job applicants have (say) visited sites discussing such >matters as worker's compensation, alcoholism, depression, or (horror of >horrors) trade unionism. If you've accessed the "wrong" site and some >other, equally capable applicant hasn't, perhaps you won't get that job, >but you'll never know why. ("Your credentials did not fit our needs at >this time.") Skeptical? American workers are already terrified of making >worker's compensation claims or seeking treatment for anxiety or >depression, knowing full well that doing so may ruin their chances for >future employment. > >In the corporate-shaped Internet to come, one may feel a powerful prior >constraint concerning the mere seeking of any information -- the mere >reading of any content -- that would displease an employer. This is >repression on a scale as horrifying as anything envisioned in dystopian >science fiction novels such as Brave New World ; perhaps even more >horrifying, because it's all too clear that the needed technology is >available right now. You'll find out soon enough that, in fact, it's >already in use. For a time, there will be a big public outcry, and the >first company that's caught will have to back off. After the furor dies >down, though, the practice will become commonplace and unremarkable -- >until, that is, it ruins your career. > >Make no mistake about it: there's a battle to come, and it's not really >about "consumers" and "privacy" and the rest of the meaningless >terminology you've heard. Fundamentally, it's about democracy : >specifically, the right of the people to obtain the information and >knowledge they need to govern themselves in freedom. And, as you'll see, >Linux and the Open Source software movement promise to play a key role in >this battle. > > >WHY INDEPENDENT MEDIA MATTER > >If you get your news only from mainstream media, you'd think a "guerilla >army of anti-trade activists" disrupted the WTO's recent Seattle >conference ( Washington Post , 12/1/99) and what's more, that the Seattle >police responded with force only after a "small band of self-described >anarchists" started smashing downtown merchants' windows (CNN, 12/1/99). >Animating the protesters, as stressed repeatedly by the media, was a grab >bag of ill-formed, far-fetched ideas. To explain the protesters' concerns, >a CNN reporter sought out the president of the National Association of >Manufacturers (certainly a highly objective commentator) who could discern >only "a lot of crazy different messages" from the "loopy protesters". A >New York Times columnist summed up the demonstrators as a "Noah's ark of >flat-earth advocates, protectionist trade unions, and yuppies looking for >their 1960s fix" (FAIR Media Advisory, December 7, 1999, ><http://www.fair.org/activism/wto-prattle.html>). > >What you don't know has been reported only by the independent media >movement; a coalition of web sites, progressive radio stations, book >publishers, newspapers, and magazines devoted to providing an alternative >to the world view offered by multinational corporations (Hazen and >Winokur, 1997). Only through such outlets as The Independent Media Center ><http://216.254.6.207/> could you learn the following: > >- In general, the protesters weren't opposed to trade per se , but rather >to WTO policies that place free trade for multinational corporations over >all other concerns. Specifically, they were protesting WTO policies that >force member countries to repeal laws protecting workers, public health, >and the environment; the promotion of new rules restricting member >countries' ability to regulate the actions of multinational corporations; >and rules requiring member countries to adhere to corporate-shaped U.S. >definitions of intellectual property, which would commoditize virtually >every aspect of information that was formerly freely available to the >public, including software algorithms, scientific and news facts, and even >the genetic information contained in the living tissue of plants, animals, >and human beings. > >- To the extent that there was violence in the Seattle demonstrations, an >unbiased and proportional coverage would instead focus on the actions of >the Seattle police, who repeatedly used pepper spray, batons, and rubber >bullets against peaceful demonstrators. > >In short, you weren't told the truth. And believe me, this wasn't the >first time. > >WHY MAINSTREAM MEDIA WON'T TELL YOU THE TRUTH > >You don't have to be a genius or a conspiracy theorist to figure this one >out. A few global media giants dominate the market; they have huge and >growing holdings in virtually every means by which information is >disseminated -- films, books, TV channels, radio stations, newspapers, and >magazines (Herman and McChesney, 1998). And they pressure, whether overtly >or not, authors and reporters to put a slant on the news -- specifically, >a centrist to right-wing slant that favors the interests of the media's >corporate owners. <http://www.fair.org/extra/9511/nbc.html> That's the >reason you hear, over and over, why development matters more than >preserving the environment, why free trade matters more than worker's >rights, and why the U.S. has the right to impose its military power >wherever it pleases. > >Apart from the general pressure to slant the news to the center and right, >industry associations overtly pressure media outlets to censor certain >types of news reporting by threatening to withdraw advertising. For >example, thanks to pressure from restaurant associations, newspapers are >reluctant to specify local restaurants which violate health department >regulations. Even so, overt pressure isn't often needed. When you're in >the media business, you know darned well you'd better not run stories that >businesses won't like. You tone it down. You run it by them. And if >they're not comfortable and you're not comfortable, you don't run it. > >In sum, you don't hear the truth because corporations don't want you to >hear it and mainstream media are too cowardly to report it. Had you known >the truth about Seattle (including substantive discussion of the specific >issues concerning WTO policies), you might have thought more deeply about >what's at stake. But that doesn't sell beer; why ask why, after all, when >doing so is virtually unmarketable? Instead of providing the tools needed >to think seriously about national policies, the media would much prefer to >socialize viewers into becoming "neurotic in their need to buy advertised >commodities", generating "mass spending on goods such as cosmetics, >cigarettes, beer, soft drinks, and patent medicines completely out of >proportion to the rational use of national income..." and diverting >attention from "society's central needs, including public education, >health care, [and] democratic economics" (Bagdikian, 1996:10). > > >THE COMING ATTACK ON THE INTERNET'S COMMON CARRIER STATUS > >The Internet is giving corporate media companies the fits; it's just so >darned hard to make the mainstream media model apply. If you can't bring >billions of eyeballs to your site, how are you going to make money? Right >now, the Internet is like a phone system, a common carrier operated in the >public's interest, in which anyone can access anything and have a pretty >good chance of getting it. Horrifying! Media corporations aren't content, >of course, to sit back and let this intolerable situation endure, this >unendurable situation in which some college kid can put up a page that, in >principle, is just as accessible as Dot Com's. With the aid of U.S. >legislatures that are essentially up for sale to the highest bidder, >they're well on their way to transforming the Internet into something far >more to their liking. Here's just some of what they're doing: > >- Pressuring Internet designers to build in bandwidth-reservation schemes >and "quality of service" (QoS) guarantees that will funnel users to a few >high-performance sites. If you don't want to visit the sites that have >paid for QoS guarantees, that's just fine, but you may have to wait quite >a while to get through. > >- Adapting to the Internet the known techniques used by broadcast >television; namely, "endless scenes of violence and other aggressive >melodrama, gratuitous sex, split-second cuts... [which] keep a viewer >glued to the channel" (Bagdikian, 1997:11). > >- Transforming search engines into advertising media in which >high-retrieval ranking requires a payment to the search engine provider. > >- Developing user monitoring and tracking systems that are incapable of >detection by average users, and associating these systems with proposed >legislation that defines "copyright management infrastructures" and spells >out hefty prison terms for anyone who attempts to defeat them. > >- Using recently adopted copyright legislation to remove from the Internet >leaked corporate documents that could inform the public of conspiratorial >or even illegal corporate actions. > >- Pressuring the U.S. Congress to adopt new legal definitions of "facts" >in digital media that essentially remove all forms of previously >accessible knowledge from the public domain and transform them into >commodities that cannot be used without the payment of a fee. > >- Pushing for legislation that criminalizes anonymity. > >I don't mean to allege some sort of industry-wide conspiracy here. What >you're seeing is the outgrowth of many very large, very rich companies >pursuing their short-term interests, without the slightest regard for the >long-term consequences of their actions -- just as they did at the opening >of the Industrial Age, when oligopolies and monopolies brought on >widespread misery on such a shocking scale that even those partial to >business saw the need for regulatory measures. > > >LINUX AND OPEN-SOURCE SOFTWARE: A LINE OF DEFENSE AGAINST CORPORATE >CONTROL OF THE INTERNET > >If you'd like just one good reason why Linux is so vital to the survival >of the Internet as a publicly accessible medium, just take a look at >Microsoft Windows 98. It's designed in such a way as to further >Microsoft's market ambitions, as the good Judge Jackson recently affirmed, >but it's also a dream come true for companies hoping to transform the >Internet into a corporate-dominated medium. > >With Windows 98, you're basically forced to use Internet Explorer. You >can't delete it, and you're in for a "jolting experience" should you try >to run another browser. For this reason, there's a uniform, predictable >platform that's in daily use by millions of Internet surfers. Tightly >integrated with the operating system and Microsoft mail utilities, >Internet Explorer ideally suits the interests of corporate intruders as >well as virus authors. You can exploit the tight, internal connections in >all sorts of creative ways. And if you're using this very dynamic duo, you >can't shield yourself; you don't even know what's going on. Sure, Internet >Explorer gives you the apparent means to defeat cookies, but this feature >borders on deception. It amounts to an all-or-nothing proposition; >essentially, either you accept all cookies without scrutiny, or you turn >them off -- and then you can't visit any site that requires them. It's >only when you escape from the world of corporate-controlled media that you >see other options. For example, the KDE browser enables you to specify >which domains you're willing to accept cookies from -- it's a simple, >straightforward means to assure that you're tracked by only those sites >you've chosen to trust. > >The privacy-busting possibilities built into the Windows 98/Internet >Explorer duo are perfectly exemplified by Comet Systems' ><http://www.cometsystems.com/> cute and freely downloadable cursors. The >products take full advantage of the tight, opaque integration between >Windows and Internet Explorer to track your movements through some 60,000 >web sites. ><http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/ap/19991130/tc/internet_privacy_3.html> Of >course, Comet and other companies playing variations on the same trick >deny that they're collecting information on specific individuals. Still, >the technology to accomplish such a privacy-busting association is already >here, and it will someday be used (if it hasn't already). And the day will >soon be upon us (perhaps two to five years) when your would-be employer >consults databases of web-surfing profiles to determine whether you, the >eager job applicant, just might have expressed an interest in subjects >that make employers uncomfortable. Sure, such screening will almost >certainly diminish the employability of people who innocently accessed >questionable sites, but the claim will be made that the rights of these >innocent victims mean nothing when placed against the savings employers >expect to realize by avoiding the occasional freeloader, the Commie, the >drunk. It won't occur to these employers, or their defenders, that there's >a more fundamental violation of rights at stake here: namely, the right of >free citizens in a democracy to acquire knowledge without fear that the >topic of their inquiry will expose them to adverse consequences. > >So where do Linux and the Open Source movement come in? It's simple. We're >talking about software that's created outside the corporate system -- and >as a consequence, software that's insulated from the pressures >corporations exert to destroy the Internet's inherent democracy. Linux >rejects the tight coupling between the browser and the operating system. >What's more, it enables users to look under the hood to find out what's >going on; users astute in programming can analyze the source code, if >necessary, to determine how the software operates. If there's anything >funny, word will go out like lightning. A new generation of open-source >software may emerge that, like the KDE browser, is specifically and >pro-actively designed to protect users from intrusive monitoring. > >I wish I could say that these measures alone could help preserve the >Internet's capacity to function democratically. Sure, they're a step in >the right direction, but the forces arrayed against information democracy >are powerful, wealthy, and determined to win. What will decide the >outcome, in the end, is the much broader question of whether the >Internet-using public pulls itself out of its apathy, realizes what's >going on, and joins a mass movement to regain our freedom. In the >meantime, of course, there's your daily, media-supplied apathy regimen, >consisting quite possibly of beer and the boys and babes on Baywatch -- >but maybe, just maybe, you'll take a look at the bibliography I've >appended and learn what's at stake. > >------------------------------------------------------------------- >Media Studies 101: Understanding the Consequences of Corporate Media >Control > >Alger, Dean. Megamedia: How Giant Corporations Dominate Mass Media, >Distort Competition, and Endanger Democracy. Rowman & Littlefield, 1998. > >Beacham, Frank. "The Internet in Transition", ><http://www.beacham.com/net_transition.html>, 1996. > >Bagdikian, Ben. "Brave New World Minus 400", in G. Gerbner, H. Mowlana, >and H. Schiller (eds.), Invisible Crises: What Conglomerate Control of >Media Means for America and the World. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, pp. >7-14. 1996. > >Bagdikian, Ben. The Media Monopoly . Beacon Press, 1997. > >Barnouw, Erik, and Todd Gitlin. Conglomerates and the Media . New Press, >1998. > >Carey, Alex, Andrew Lohrey, and Noam Chomsky (eds.), Taking the Risk Out >of Democracy: Corporate Propaganda Versus Freedom and Liberty . University >of Illinois Press. > >Hazen, Don, and Julie Winokur (eds.), We the Media: A Citizen's Guide to >Fighting for Media Democracy . New Press. > >Herman, Edward, and Robert W. McChesney, The Global Media: The >Missionaries of Global Capitalism . > >Ritzer, George. The McDonaldization of Society . Pine Forge Press 1993. > >Solomon, Norman, and Jeff Cohen. Wizards of Media Oz: Behind the Curtain >of Mainstream News . Common Courage Press, 1997. > >Solomon, Norman. The Habits of Highly Deceptive Media: Decoding Spin and >Lies in Mainstream News . Common Courage Press, 1998. > > > > >================================= > > >*** NOTICE: In accordance with Title 17 U.S.C. Section 107, this material >is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest >in receiving the included information for research and educational >purposes. *** > > > > > > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Want to send money instantly to anyone, anywhere, anytime? You can today at X.com - and we'll give you $20 to try it! Sign up today at X.com. It's quick, free, & there's no obligation! http://click.egroups.com/1/332/2/_/23111/_/947287356/ -- Check out your group's private Chat room -- http://www.egroups.com/ChatPage?listName=corp-ethics&m=1
