Summary (Presentation)

Political Power

-For some people meeting face-to-face, talking on the telephone, or sending letters to friends and family is forbidden due to the politics that living in another country sometimes has. There was an example of this in the book from a man who lived on an island that was divided into Turkish and Greek sectors. He was unable to reach his family in the neighboring country by face-to-face, telephone, or writing letters due to the politics.

-CMC has afforded some dramatic opportunities to connect with others in politically charged situations. CMC has provided us with the opportunity to use things such as Skype, email, and chat rooms to visit with ones close to us.

The Internet

-CMC in repressive governments sometimes allows people to express their views much easier. Also allows them to reach a wider audience across the world. It helps people speaking for an underrepresented group, or challenging authority. Certain websites are provided to discuss these topics. A lot of websites are provided so that people can communicate about certain topics some concerning politics. It also helps them confront these issues much easier.

CMC

-It is both political and politicizing this is because it can be used to confront the authority of government powers, resist dominant social, cultural and political ideologies. It also allows us to view current events from more than one perspective. News groups exist to confront certain authorities of government powers. It is common to see issue concerning politics being discussed online.

Participation and Resistance

-Some politicians set up information sites, CMC can be used to subvert and resist government authority. These information sites that politicians set up give many the opportunity to confront certain issues that they may want to reveal.

-E-democracy is when governments, elected officials, media, political organizations and citizens use the Internet to engage in debates about the processes and practices of governance.

Cyberactivism

-Cyberactivists use CMC by contacting a larger audience with the use of email, listservs, newsgroups, IRC and the web to communicate with their network of supporters. These ways of communication are helpful for cyberactivists to get their opinion out to a wider audience.

-Some cyberactivists have chosen to take direct action to shut down dominant discourse and organizations. A good example of this is within the first week of the war in Iraq in 2003, around 1,000 websites (including military sites) in the U.S were allegedly hacked by anti-war activists.

Online Libel

-Flaming is not only aggressive but can sometimes be libelous. With the increase in online publication, it follows that there will be an increase in online libel charges. It is important to know that some CMC can land you in court with the recent legislation in the area of cyberlibel. A lawsuit by Wal-Mart, for example, demonstrated that you can make general critical remarks about rival major retailers on our website, but mentioning a specific company could get you in legal trouble.

Cyber-Crime

-An email was sent out in the 1990’s that claimed to give the people who assisted to free a huge amount of money being held by an undemocratic regime in Africa a percentage of the money (an amount that could reach millions)

-It was a email scam and most had never dealt with email scam because of how uncommon it used to be. This scam drained many bank accounts. By 2001, the Internet Fraud Complaint Center reported that 2,600 people had filed complaints about the scam – of those, 16 reported losses totaling US$345,000. This is still a huge issue today and people are stilling falling for this scam. Many have even traveled to Nigeria in Africa and attempted to get their money back. After many were nearly killed they did not get their money back.

Cyber Squatting

-This is when people buy domain names using well-known brand or celebrity names in the hope of subsequently selling them to the companies or people who probably should have secured them in the first place.

-In most cases of cyber squatting with high-profile domain names such as harrypotterbooks.org, bccnews.org, and madonna.com were transferred back to those who had pursued them through courts.