The prediction, in brief:

We can’t let the term “community” be limited to its earlier (humanist) meanings … I don’t think the “alienation” of one-way media will evaporate but that a slow cultural transformation is in process, one that is very profound and which we need to comprehend if we are to participate in it in a political way.

Predictor: Poster, Mark

Prediction, in context:

In a 1994 interview, Mark Poster, a member of the humanities faculty at the University of California at Irvine and author of “The Second Media Age,” talks about virtual communities:”We can’t let the term ‘community’ be limited to its earlier (humanist) meanings … When human beings, with or without the significant mediation of machines, interact and exchange symbols, there is community of some sort. The problem is not whether MOOs and bulletin boards are communities, but how they are communities. And this is being studied … A lot of interesting work will begin to appear in 1995. I don’t think the ‘alienation’ of one-way media will evaporate but that a slow cultural transformation is in process, one that is very profound and which we need to comprehend if we are to participate in it in a political way.”

Biography:

Mark Poster wrote the paper “Cyberdemocracy: Internet and the Public Sphere” in 1995 while teaching at the University of California, Irvine. He also wrote about technology for Wired magazine. (Author/Editor/Journalist.)

Date of prediction: October 1, 1994

Topic of prediction: Community/Culture

Subtopic: Virtual Communities

Name of publication: University of Oregon Web site

Title, headline, chapter name: Interview With Mark Poster: Community, New Media; Post-humanism

Quote Type: Partial quote

Page number or URL of document at time of study:
http://www.uoregon.edu/~ucurrent/2-Poster.html

This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Schmidt, Nicholas