Perhaps Networld will not be the salvation of democracy and will not bring on the millennium for the First Amendment’s promise of an uninhibited “marketplace of ideas.” The flow of information is not free financially, nor is it immune to other constraints … Not everyone will have the time, money, equipment, or skills to engage in a worldwide dialogue on the Networld of the future.
Predictor: Branscomb, Anne Wells
Prediction, in context:In her 1995 paper “Anonymity, Autonomy and Accountability,” published in the Yale Law Journal, Anne Wells Branscomb writes: ”More choice and control in the hands of individual users seem assured, and lower transmission costs with faster delivery and greater scope of coverage seem reasonably attainable … Perhaps Networld will not be the salvation of democracy and will not bring on the millennium for the First Amendment’s promise of an uninhibited ‘marketplace of ideas.’ The flow of information is not free financially, nor is it immune to other constraints. There are costs to building transmission systems, to buying equipment for access to those systems, and to learning how to manipulate the software that makes it possible to engage in electronic discourse. There are also costs to finding the time to search for and download the information that is made available by sources prepared to underwrite their own costs of processing and uploading information. Not everyone will have the time, money, equipment, or skills to engage in a worldwide dialogue on the Networld of the future.”
Biography:Anne Wells Branscomb, an expert in technology and the law, was the author of “Who Owns Information? From Privacy to Public Access” (Basic Books, 1994), and the 1995 Yale Law Journal article “Anonymity, Autonomy, and Accountability as Challenges to the First Amendment in Cyberspaces.” (Legislator/Politician/Lawyer.)
Date of prediction: January 1, 1995
Topic of prediction: Controversial Issues
Subtopic: Digital Divide
Name of publication: The Yale Law Journal
Title, headline, chapter name: Anonymity, Autonomy, and Accountability: Challenges to the First Amendment in Cyberspaces
Quote Type: Direct quote
Page number or URL of document at time of study:
http://web5.infotrac.galegroup.com/itw/infomark/25/937/33272584w5/purl=rc2_EAIM_1_Anonymity,+autonomy,+and+accountability_________________________________________________________&dyn=sig!1?sw_aep=ncliveec
This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Bricker, Erin E.