THREE
THEORIES OF CYBERSOCIETY
Cyberspace
Throughout October 1999, concerts were held in London, New York and
Geneva to launch ‘NetAid’, the Internet equivalent to the ‘Live Aid’
movement of the mid-1980s. The ‘Live Aid’ movement was comprised of
a series of globally broadcast rolling concerts sponsored by corporations
who received a moral injection to their advertising profile, as well as
patrons at the gates who felt that they were doing something for needy
people they had seen on TV.
The later version of empathy-at-a-distance is one in which, by sitting
at Internet terminals, those people living in economically and informa-
tionally rich countries can do ‘something to help’. The Secretary-General
of the United Nations was on hand at the concert, to explain: ‘Most people
in needy countries have to get by on less that two US dollars per day; now,
with the click of a mouse, everyone can help. There are no more excuses,
let’s bring on a new day.’^1
The heralding of the Internet as universalist and redemptive has, at
the turn of the millennium, become a widespread discourse, in which the
rhetoric of salvation through an electronic assembly has attained theologi-
cal proportions. Whether by rhetoric or by clever marketing, the rate of
growth of connection to the Internet network is astonishing.Cyberspace and virtual reality
As suggested in the Introduction, the distinction between the first and
second media age is a relative one, and is founded on a heightened con-
trast between the new network mediums and the structures of broadcast
mediums. In this chapter we will explore this contrast by examining
‘second media age’ thinkers who contend that the growth of the Internet
is a reaction to the restricted and unequal possibilities of broadcast. As we
will see, there is a surprising degree of agreement from thinkers liberal,
Marxist and postmodernist over the emancipatory qualities of the Internet.
But before presenting this analysis, it is necessary to explain some of the
technical and structural characteristics of new interactive media and
assess the claims made for a second media age.Holmes-03.qxd 2/15/2005 10:31 AM Page 44