The danger … is that people will withdraw within their walled communities and never again venture into the Internet’s public spaces. It’s a process similar to the one that created the suburbs and replaced the great cities with shopping malls and urban sprawl. The magic of the Net is that it thrusts people together in a strange, new world, one in which they get to rub virtual shoulders with characters they might otherwise never meet. The challenge for the citizens of cyberspace – as the battles to control the Internet are joined and waged – will be to carve out safe, pleasant places to work, play and raise their kids without losing touch with the freewheeling, untamable soul that attracted them to the Net in the first place.
Predictor: Elmer-Dewitt, Philip
Prediction, in context:In a 1994 article for Time Magazine, Philip Elmer-Dewitt writes about conflicting views about the development and uses of the Internet: ”Now, just when it seems almost ready for prime time, the Net is being buffeted by forces that threaten to destroy the very qualities that fueled its growth. It’s being pulled from all sides: by commercial interests eager to make money on it, by veteran users who want to protect it, by pornographers who want to exploit its freedoms, by parents and teachers who want to make it a safe and useful place for kids … [Some say the Internet should be broken into smaller groups appropriate to their users] San Francisco’s Whole Earth ‘Lectronic Link (WELL) is perhaps the most famous of these new virtual communities. It is connected to the Net, but protected by a ‘gate’ that won’t open without a password or a credit card … The danger, if this trend continues, is that people will withdraw within their walled communities and never again venture into the Internet’s public spaces. It’s a process similar to the one that created the suburbs and replaced the great cities with shopping malls and urban sprawl. The magic of the Net is that it thrusts people together in a strange, new world, one in which they get to rub virtual shoulders with characters they might otherwise never meet. The challenge for the citizens of cyberspace – as the battles to control the Internet are joined and waged – will be to carve out safe, pleasant places to work, play and raise their kids without losing touch with the freewheeling, untamable soul that attracted them to the Net in the first place.”
Date of prediction: July 15, 1994
Topic of prediction: Community/Culture
Subtopic: Virtual Communities
Name of publication: Time
Title, headline, chapter name: Battle for the Soul of the Internet
Quote Type: Direct quote
Page number or URL of document at time of study:
gopher://insight.mcmaster.ca/00/org/efc/media/time.25jul94
This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Fedders, Peter J.