Widespread and fairly allocated computerized resources can offer: increased citizen participation in and oversight of government affairs; assembly, organizing and debate unrestricted by geographical distances or boundaries; decentralized decision making; a challenge to news and publishing monopolies; rapid international exchange of information; and individually-tailored, focused information to combat the information glut that interferes with communication … It is important that those concerned with civil liberties enter the electronic forum with a mixture of optimism and vigilance and take part in the debate on its future while that debate is still open.
Predictor: Levinson, Nan
Prediction, in context:In a 1992 paper about the Internet that is posted on the Electronic Frontier Foundation Internet site, Nan Levinson writes: ”The dangers of assuming that because a technology is value-free and neutral, the uses to which it is put will also be benign are well-documented and real. But for all the new or magnified threats to individual liberties arising from computer-assisted communication, the electronic forum also offers the means to increase those liberties by expanding the possibilities for talking and working together and for building political and social alliances. Widespread and fairly allocated computerized resources can offer: increased citizen participation in and oversight of government affairs; assembly, organizing and debate unrestricted by geographical distances or boundaries; decentralized decision making; a challenge to news and publishing monopolies; rapid international exchange of information; and individually-tailored, focused information to combat the information glut that interferes with communication. Stewart Brand has said that information wants to be free, and this may be nowhere more true than in electronic communication, which, by its very design, abhors censorship and monopolies (though history has proven that technology does not outsmart repression for long). It is important that those concerned with civil liberties enter the electronic forum with a mixture of optimism and vigilance and take part in the debate on its future while that debate is still open.”
Date of prediction: January 1, 1992
Topic of prediction: General, Overarching Remarks
Subtopic: General
Name of publication: Electronic Frontier Foundation
Title, headline, chapter name: Electrifying Speech: New Communications Technologies and Traditional Civil Liberties
Quote Type: Direct quote
Page number or URL of document at time of study:
http://www.eff.org/Legal/electrifying_speech.paper
This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Anderson, Janna Quitney