[Air-l] re:-my first post(reply to Ulla)

[Ulla Bunz]

Eero,

I don't want to reiterate some of the responses to your posts though
much of what others have posted since your reply to me are arguments
that I would agree with. However, I wanted to add the following.

I'm not entirely sure what you mean by "hallucinating about cyberspace,"
but *because* my official affiliation is that of a Communication Scholar
I would agree that communication is about "speaking/writing clearly"
though that is not always the same as "simply." Even more so I would say
that communication is about creating meaning, shared meaning if
possible, and to me, this thread is about exactly that. 

As a matter of fact, you initiation of this discussion shows a desire to
talk about questions like, "What is the Internet? Where does it come
from? Where is it going?" So, that apparently makes you the only one
among your fellow graduate students who is interested in these issues.
You expressed a vision about the future of the Internet. Would that then
qualify as "hallucinating about cyberspace" with a futuristic rather
than a past orientation?

Ulla
----------------------------------------------------
Ulla Bunz
Assistant Professor
Department of Communication
Rutgers University
4 Huntington Street
New Brunswick, NJ 08901
Email: bunz at scils.rutgers.edu
----------------------------------------------------

-----Original Message-----
From: air-l-admin at aoir.org [mailto:air-l-admin at aoir.org] On Behalf Of
Eero Tarik
Sent: Monday, February 09, 2004 12:40 AM
To: air-l at aoir.org
Subject: [Air-l] re:-my first post(reply to Ulla)

Hi Ulla,

you wrote...

"Michele (and others) - out of curiosity, do you have an alternative 
suggestion? You
reject "space" and "place" and much of the terminology and research that
is
connected to those meanings."

Ulla, I note you are an Assistant Professor in the Dept of
Communications.

We are talking about the internet.Six hundred million people, 
apparently, use it regularly these days.
It is possible that only a few percent of those people have any idea 
what the term cyberspace means.

When they go on the internet they "do things". They sit in the real 
world, have real world problems running through
their heads and bang away on their keyboards. They send emails, lurk or 
thrash around in a few forums,
look at some porn, have a bet on tomorrows NBA game or communicate with 
friends and relatives anywhere around
the world.
Their experiences are simple - and we can describe them in simple terms 
that ALL of those internet users can understand,
and by doing so we are communicating effectively. And there is a very 
good chance that non internet users can also understand
our description of those simple internet experiences.
If we want to study the internet and, therefore, all the activities of 
internet users, we can study how/why and when these
people use the internet. We can study people from different groups and 
cultures. The opportunities to study internet habits are endless.
Apart from this we can also study "social" problems connected with the 
internet - the so called Digital Divide as well as other social issues.

Doesnt this give us enough to research and study without hallucinating 
about cyberspace?
Must we have so much "cyber jargon" to describe what are very simple 
processes and for most users merely a convenient communications tool?

Communication is all about speaking/writing clearly and simply. The 
greater the number of people who can understand you, the greater your 
ability to communicate.
I dont understand how "cyber jargon" and hallucinating about cyberspace 
makes the world a better place or enriches humankind - or how it makes 
one a greater communicator.
:-)

see ya

Eero Tarik
Adelaide



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