The Net can greatly expand the “idea space” in which public discourse happens. Instead of watching a few talking heads on TV, citizens can sit at their computers and engage in two-way conversations with each other and with government officials.
Predictor: Gill, Jock
Prediction, in context:In a 1994 article for Wired magazine, Evan Schwartz writes about ways networked communciations may change the way people get information, quoting Jock Gill, formerly a manager at Lotus Development Corp, and then working in the White House Office of Media Affairs. Schwartz writes: ”Jonathan ‘Jock’ Gill, a former Lotus Development Corp. manager who now works in the Office of Media Affairs, is hepped up about using technology to cut through the thick fog of cynicism in America. He believes that the Net can greatly expand the ‘idea space’ in which public discourse happens. Instead of watching a few talking heads on TV, citizens can sit at their computers and engage in two-way conversations with each other and with government officials. By encouraging the creation of these home pages, Gill’s goal is to ‘give everyone in government a name, a face, and a contact point.’ The reason the public seems disconnected from government in recent years, he says, is that it has grown beyond the reach of the ordinary citizen. ‘How do you participate with something you can’t find and can’t know?’ says Gill. ‘Building relationships this way is conducive to building community.'”
Date of prediction: January 1, 1994
Topic of prediction: Global Relationships/Politics
Subtopic: Democracy
Name of publication: Wired
Title, headline, chapter name: Power to the People: The Clinton Administration is Using the Net in a Pitched Effort to Perform an End Run Around the Media
Quote Type: Partial quote
Page number or URL of document at time of study:
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/2.12/whitehouse_pr.html
This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Anderson, Janna Quitney