Lawrence Peter Ampofo
The Internet, the Web and Society
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The Internet, the Web and SocietyThis particular chapter maps the various determinants that explain the development of the internet and the World Wide Web, setting out the different ways in which each actor influences the eventual development of these technologies. As such, Chapter One - and the eventual thesis – will untangle what Latour calls the “sociotechnical mess” through a study of the understandings of the relationships between technology, terrorism and counter-terrorism in Spain. It is also important to consider the role played by new Web technologies in affecting the extent to which the availability of new technologies increases the capacities of terrorist and counter-terrorist agencies to achieve their communication objectives. This thesis, and Chapter One in particular, considers the ways in which technologies that comprise Web 3.0 will affect general online users’ perceptions of how terrorist or counter-terrorist organisations use communication technologies and investigates ways in which counter-terrorism practitioners can act upon this. This chapter will also contend that national governments exert significant influence over the development of the internet and the Web, something that is exemplified by the raft of official legislation that has been implemented with the intent of wresting greater control over the social and technical development of the Web and the internet. These laws place controls on the unregulated development of the internet and the Web, particularly since the terrorist attacks on the United States of America (US) on 11 September 2001, the Madrid terrorist attacks on 11 March 2004 and the London bombings on 7 July 2005. Technology-focused legislation, such as the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act and the Ley de Economía Sostenible, as will be elaborated upon further, has a palpable and direct effect on the nature of the underlying technical constructs inherent within the internet and the Web. Chapter One will posit, therefore, that a social constructivist approach should be adopted when conceptualising the development of the internet and the Web, as socio-technical constructs where social and cultural artefacts are both embedded in their technical architecture, as well as the content that is subsequently created by their users. For the purpose of this thesis, the referent term “constructivism” or “constructivist” refers to that defined within the framework of the theories comprising the social construction of technology. Therefore, this thesis will utilise the definition offered by the scholar Langdon Winner (1993) as a framework in which ‘to look carefully at the inner workings of real technologies and their histories to see what is actually taking place. It recommends that rather than employ such broad-gauged notions as technological determinism or technological imperatives, scholars need to talk more precisely about the dynamics of technological change. Rather than try to explain things through such loosely conceived notions as the trajectory of a technical field or technical momentum, we need to look very closely at the artefacts and varieties of technical knowledge in question and at the social actors whose activities affect their development’ (Winner, 1993: 365). It is crucial that a definition of social constructivism, as it pertains to science and technology studies, be made in order to avoid misinterpretation between the social constructivist framework as it applies to International Relations (Wendt, 1992). As such, it is analytically pertinent to consider these technologies as figurative and physical spaces where the attitudes and behaviours of users can and are influenced by the strategic objectives of other actors, since other actors not only communicate within these spaces, but can also impact how these spaces are made. For instance, the formation of the internet and the Web are shaped, in part, by regulation, monitoring and the actual adaption of information spaces by state counter-terrorism organisations and private sector actors in response to terrorist organisations’ use of these spaces. The internet does not emerge from a vacuum or technical exercise but through social and political interactions. In addition to this chapter outlining the ways in which various actors shape the development of the internet and the Web, the wider thesis will also demonstrate how these technologies are in turn used by certain groups and organisations to influence the attitudes and behaviours of online users to ensure the success of their own communication objectives. This will be investigated in greater depth in chapters Four, Five, Six and Seven. It is the author’s intention in this chapter to demonstrate the notion that social, political, economic and civil society actors influence the development of the internet and the Web. It seeks to explain the nature of their influence using a number of complimentary theoretical frameworks. The subsequent development of the internet and the Web brought about by the collective influence of the identified actors will highlight how these actors use the pre-determined technology to achieve their own objectives and, finally, contend that the advent of new technology such as Web 3.0 will be influential in shaping understandings on the relationships between technology, terrorism and counter-terrorism in Spain. The ongoing commercial development of the World Wide Web and the internet has done much to encourage their widespread adoption by a great number of people. The facility to send and store electronic information quickly and safely has bequeathed innumerable benefits for billions of people. The demand for general access to a cost-effective, reliable internet connection has facilitated the adoption of these technologies in an increasing number of countries (Rice, 2008). It is clear, however, that some countries have greater access to this technology than others. Internet penetration4 as a percentage of regional populations is lowest in Africa and Asia at 11.4 per cent and 23.8 per cent respectively, in comparison to significantly higher measures in other regions such as Europe, which stands at 58.3 per cent (Internet World Stats, 2011). The strong increase in the number of internet users in the period 2000 to 2011 has led an expanding number of supranational organisations to proclaim that unrestricted internet access is an incontrovertible human right (Global Network Initiative, 2008, La Rue, 2011). Societal-level changes have been enabled by the continued evolution and development of the internet and the Web. The path of this development, which will be documented in subsequent sections of this chapter in stages, has been denoted Web 1.0 and Web 2.0 for analytical clarity. Indeed, their development has progressed to the point of the emergence of a radically different iteration of the Web, controversially termed Web 3.0 (Markoff, 2006, Mitra, 2006, Anderson & Raine, 2006, Spivack, 2006, Bratt, 2006, Provost & Bornier 2009). The use of the title Web 3.0 has generated contention amongst information technology experts because, it is argued, the term is an oversimplification of the technologies, similar to the term ‘Web 2.0’, and there is in fact no new version of the Web. The influential information technology entrepreneur Tim O’Reilly argued; ‘[a]las, I find the Web 3.0 arguments as clear evidence that the proponents don’t understand Web 2.0 at all’ (O’Reilly, 2007: 1). However, champions of Web 3.0 believe the term neatly encapsulates the emergence of a markedly different iteration of previous and current versions of the Web, most saliently in the various technological developments currently underway at the core level of the Web. These developments enable Web 3.0, amongst other things, to connect a greater number of people and devices to its architecture and simultaneously make available a vastly greater amount of data for individual users in a more intuitive fashion, based on a history of their online behaviour and other users displaying similar preferences. This development, an umbrella term for a number of different technological innovations, collectively comprises the Semantic Web and the internet of things5 (Berners-Lee, 1999), enabling the Web to effectively understand meaning and context after interacting with a particular user and fitting within the more macro-level conceptual definition of Web 3.0. Currently, the most effective way of sourcing relevant information on the Web for a general user is to utilise a proprietary search engine to retrieve previously indexed information and Web pages based on keywords inputted by individual users. Directory: portal -> files -> 4733003 files -> Impact case study (ref3b) files -> Ethics and Factual Television: a short history files -> P. O. Box 27, 00014 University of Helsinki, Finland tel. 358-9-191 58080 / 22216; fax 358-9-191 58096 / 23008 files -> The impact of a pledge campaign and the promise of publicity: a randomized controlled trial of charitable donations files -> Diversity and Voice: the Political Participation of Young People in the European Union files -> Chapter 15 a voice in Decision Making: young children in Denmark Stig Broström Introduction Download 1.29 Mb. Share with your friends:
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