Speech in cyberspace will not be free if we allow big business to control every square inch of the Net. The public needs a place of its own.
Predictor: Shapiro, Andrew L.
Prediction, in context:In a 1995 article for The Nation, contributing editor Andrew Shapiro writes: ”You probably didn’t know the Internet was sold a few months ago. Well, sort of: The federal government has been gradually transferring the backbone of the U.S. portion of the global computer network to companies such as IBM and MCI as part of a larger plan to privatize cyberspace. But the crucial step was taken on April 30, when the National Science Foundation shut down its part of the Internet … Remarkably, this buyout of cyberspace has garnered almost no protest or media attention, in contrast to every other development in cyberspace – particularly Senator James Exon’s proposed Communications Decency Act, which would criminalize ‘obscene, lewd, lascivious, filthy or indecent’ speech on computer networks. Yet issues of ownership and free speech are inextricably linked. Both raise the vexing question of what role – if any – government should play in cyberspace and, consequently, of what this new frontier will become … Speech in cyberspace will not be free if we allow big business to control every square inch of the Net. The public needs a place of its own.”
Date of prediction: January 1, 1995
Topic of prediction: Information Infrastructure
Subtopic: General
Name of publication: The Nation
Title, headline, chapter name: Street Corners in Cyberspace
Quote Type: Direct quote
Page number or URL of document at time of study:
Vol. 261, Issue 1, Page 10 ISSN: 00278378
This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Strickland, Amanda M.