Interface - June 2013

INTERFACE

INTERFACE Vol. XXXI No. 1

June 2013

ISSN 2231-0274

Cyber Media CYBER MEDIA JUNE 2013

Department of Communication & Journalism (Centre for Advanced Studies in Journalism) UCASS, Osmania University Hyderabad 500 007 Tel. 040-27682258, 27098422 Email: interface.ou@gmail.com

Half-yearly Research Journal Department of Communication & Journalism (Centre for Advanced Studies in Journalism) OSMANIA UNIVERSITY

Vol. XXXI No. 1

January – June 2013

INTERFACE Half-yearly Research Journal Department of Communication & Journalism, Osmania University

Cyber Media

Department of Communication & Journalism (Centre for Advanced Studies in Journalism) UCASS, Osmania University Hyderabad 500 007

INTERFACE ISSN 2231-0274 June 2013 Special Issue: Cyber Media

Editor Prof. M. Srinath Reddy Associate Editor Prof. K. Stevenson Design B. Ramakrishna Publisher Department of Communication & Journalism UCASS, Osmania University.

Typeset in Baskerville and Helvetica Neue Printed at Karshak Printers, Vidyanagar, Hyderabad.

Contact: Department of Communication & Journalism, UCASS, Osmania University.

Email: interface.ou@gmail.com

Contents

Preface

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2. Egypt: The ‘Great Refusal’ that promised a new dawn Prof. Padmaja Shaw … … … …

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3. Beyond Books: Cyber Media and School Education: An Evaluation of Teachers’ Perspectives in Schools of New Delhi Rizwan Wadood … … … … …

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1. Freedom of Expression of Online Communities and the State Power to Regulate Prof. Madabhushi Sridhar … … …

4. New Socialities …

Pramod K. Nayar

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5. Gleanings from the Press

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Preface

FROM personal communication to processes of administration to mass media and education, there is hardly any aspect of life left untouched by the new, computer-based communication technologies. The ubiquity of the mobile phone and the sheer power of the Internet as an information resource – the two technologies that are generally understood to constitute the ‘new media’ or the ‘cyber media’ – are transforming society.

As evidence, the events of the last one year in India’s collective life are sufficient testimony: the use of online social networks to mobilise people on ground; Communications ministry’s attempts to regulate social networks; Prime Minister’s Office taking to YouTube, Facebook and Twitter; and more recently, the rumours on the ‘new media’ leading to an exodus of Northeasterners from Bangalore are each a landmark.

Though the possibility of these events was theoretically known, the actual experience has thrown up a range of issues and needs to be analysed. This edition of Interface is an attempt in that direction.

Prof. Madabhushi Sridhar’s paper discusses the Constitutional principles and other statutory rules in the context of government’s attempts at regulation of social networks to curb hate speech online.

He underscores the value of the freedom of expression in a democracy and argues for self-regulation by the networks coupled with tough criminal laws to punish communally provocative postings.

In the next paper, Prof. Padmaja Shaw examines the role of media in the political change that swept through West Asia from the pespectives of Herbert Marcuse’s conception of ‘the Great Refusal’ and Marshall McLuhan’s formulations on technological change.

Rizwan Wadood looks at the nature and extent of the use of Internet in Delhi classrooms. It points to the need for integrating Internet input into teaching modules and customising the materials to suit Indian school syllabi.

Mobility, connectivity and conviviality have emerged as the determinants of the (e)quality of life, says Pramod K. Nayar in his paper, ‘New Socialities’, formulating a new meaning for Einstein’s E=mc2. He surveys the range of uses to which New Media is being put and attempts to identify the characteristics that makes it ‘cool’.

While the above papers provide insights into specific aspects of new media as experienced or observed at a given juncture, it is useful to have a picture of its ongoing evolution too. To this end, we have provided a selection of news reports and articles on the issue.

We hope this edition of Interface contributes to the evolving understanding of the subject.

M. Srinath Reddy, Editor

Freedom of Expression of Online Communities and the State Power to Regulate Prof Madabhushi Sridhar1

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The Executive, Judiciary and Legislature, considered the Three Estates, control the people under Constitutional Governance. The Fourth Estate- the Media contributes to dynamic thinking of people rather than controlling their minds. But when even the Fourth Estate develops interests to regulate the minds, the concerned civil society has a role to awaken the masses. That emerging estate is the Fifth Estate. As a parallel to Fifth Estate of physical world, the Blog world, netizen journalists, social network groups constitute this Fifth Estate in virtual space voicing their divergent thoughts and circulating their critical remarks. These virtual vocal voices on-line as part of the social networking group are now facing the possibility of censorship of one kind or the other or regulation from the rulers of the When even the real world. For example, recently the United States Fourth Estate government, following the foot-steps of Iran and China, develops is attempting to stifle voices by imprisoning offenders interests to for five years for violating copyright by linking to a regulate the copyrighted site. In fact, social networking sites enliven minds, the the online community and improve the quality of concerned civil democracy in real world. The virtual space with the society has a names like www.facebook.com, www.google.com, role to awaken www.myspace.com, www.linkedin.com, the masses. www.twitter.com, www.youtube.com, www.yahoo.com is a wonderful place where people can connect to people across the world at no cost instantly.

Doctrines of police powers pose an imminent danger from the State to impose reasonable restrictions on Constitutional guaranty of freedom of expression. Is this power being properly used to prevent online onslaught of obscenity, hate speech, terrorism and secure lives of the

1 Coordinator, Centre for Media and Public Policy, NALSAR University of Law, Hyderabad.

Madabhushi Sridhar

people from communal attacks? Or Is this power being used to curb the online communication of free political discourse?

Spreading Internet: Indian Scenario Currenlty, though internet penetration in India is considered less than 10 percent low, India is home to tens of millions of users, thus emerging as an important leader in the high-tech industry. In spite of infrastructure limitations and cost considerations restricting the access to the internet and other ICTs in India, both infrastructure and bandwidth have improved in the last two years. The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) reported 61.3 million users as of 20092. As per the Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) about 77 million Indians have used the internet at least once in their lifetimes3. A 2010 survey by the New Delhi–based research and marketing firm Juxt resulted in an estimate of 51 million “active” internet users, who had used the internet at least once in the past year.

(40 million urban and 11 million rural)4. Several studies put the overall internet penetration rate at a rather low 5 to 8 percent of the population, but there are signs that this figure will increase. One recent study predicted that the number of Indian users would reach 237 million in 2015, from a current estimate of 80 million5.

India today has over 10 crore Internet users, third largest in the world after China and the U.S., which is likely to more than double by 2015. India also has over 2.8-crore Facebook users and is the fifth largest Facebook user base in the world and is expected to become second largest by the end of 2012.Internet usage in India India today has is growing at a very healthy rate and is close to a 100 over 10 crore million active users. This is just about 8.5% of the total Internet users, population of India. About a decade ago, one would not third largest in believe these numbers to be at just about 25,000 the world after Internet users. The forecast also comes with findings China and the associated with Google properties. For e.g., Google’s U.S., which is video sharing site YouTube has around 20 million likely to more unique users across India and the same is believed to than double by grow to 30 million by end of 2011 itself. As far as the 2015.

2International Telecommunication Union (ITU), “ICT Statistics 2009—Internet,” http://www.itu.int/ITU-D/icteye/Indicators/Indicators.aspx#.

3http://www.iamai.in/Upload/Research/icube_new_curve_lowres_39.pdf 4 http://www.juxtconsult.com/Reports/Snapshot-of-Juxt-India-Online-Landscape-2010Press.ppt 5Tripti Lahiri, “India to Have 237 Million Web Surfers in 2015,” India Real Time (Wall Street Journal blog), September 1, 2010, http://blogs.wsj.com/indiarealtime/2010/09/01/india-to-have-237-million-web-surfersin-2015/.

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growth is concerned, Internet users will even surpass the 300 million users by 2014.6 Mobile Penetration There is a dramatic increase in proliferation of mobile users, and the penetration almost touched 60 percent of the population. The Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) reveals that the total mobile subscriber base as almost 730 million in December 20107, more than double the 347 million users recorded by the ITU for 20088.

Access to the internet through mobile phones has risen as well, apparently due to a series of inexpensive rate plans that service providers introduced in early 2010. Still, only a small percentage of mobile-phone users access the web on their devices. According to IAMAI, an estimated 20 million people had such access in late 2010, up from 12 million in 20099.

Information Technology Law and Objectionable Content During December 2011 the Union Minister of India for Information Technology directed some social networking sites to remove the ‘objectionable content’. During 2010 between July and December, Google received 282 requests from different law enforcement agencies in India to delete content. The increasing flow of such requests continued. A single agency even asked Google to A single agency remove 236 communities and profiles from social even asked networking site Orkut as they were "critical of a local Google to politician." The extent of post screening can be gauged remove 236 by a simple fact - Google was asked for "user data communities and profiles request" of 2,439 users in only the six months from from January to June, this year. This is nearly a 1,000 more social than those asked in the preceding six months. networking site Google claims that the transparency is their core Orkut value. It said: “As a company we feel it is our responsibility to ensure that we maximize transparency around the flow of information related to our tools and services. We believe that more information means more choice, more freedom and ultimately more power for the individual”. The "Transparency Report” prepared by Google says that in the last half of 2009, it received 142 requests from 6http://www.imediaconnection.in/article/439/Digital/Internet/google-internet-users-inindia-to-reach-300-million-by-2014.html 8.12.2011 7http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/news-by-industry/telecom/indias-mobilephone-users-grow-to-72957-million/articleshow/7361931.cms 8http://www.itu.int/ITU-D/icteye/Indicators/Indicators.aspx 9 http://www.indianexpress.com/news/more-people-are-logging-on-to-internet-viacellphones/658375/0 INTERFACE | JUNE 2013 3

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law enforcement agencies to remove content. "The majority of Indian requests for removal of content from Orkut related to alleged impersonation or defamation," says the report10. While Google is blamed for supplying users’ private information to the governments, the search engine giant also attempts to balance out by releasing a Transparency Report. According to this report India ranks third in the list based on the number of requests. India made 1430 data requests to the search engine with 30 removal requests. While many requests are over alleged defamation, hate speech or pornography. It is United States that topped the list with over 4000 requests.11 During July and December 2010, Google reportedly “received requests from different law enforcement agencies to remove a blog and YouTube videos that were critical of Chief Ministers and senior officials of different states.” It did not comply with those requests.

According to Transparency Report of Google for January to June 2011, the Indian Government requested for removal of 358 items. Of these, 255 items were classified under the “government criticism” category. Interestingly, the biggest chunk of this is accounted for by a single “request from a local law enforcement agency to remove 236 communities and profiles from [social networking site] Orkut that were critical of a local politician.” Requests on impersonation and pornography totaled only 19. Google did not identify this politician, but it did state: “we did not comply with this request, since According to the content did not violate our Community Standards or Transparency local law.”12 Earlier, in 2009, the Google report Report of Google for January to complied with 77% of the requests. But in the last half of June 2011, the 2010, they agreed to remove only 22% as the company Indian felt that content in most cases requested did not violate Government the community standards or local laws13. requested for India is one of four countries which, during the first removal of 358 half of 2011, requested Google to remove content items. critical of the government. Google did not comply with the request, whereas Google restricted local users from accessing the offending content in Thailand and Turkey. Also, Google refused to comply with the request of the US Government. http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/ 8.12.2011 http://www.ndtv.com/article/technology/india-third-snoopiest-country-googletransparency-report-116783 8.12.2011 12 The Hindu, India wanted 358 items removed, December 8, 2011, http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/article2696027.ece 13 http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech/news/internet/Code-of-conduct-for-socialmedia-Indian-politicians-way-too-touchy-about-online-image/articleshow/11012153.cms 7.12.2011 10 11

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The furnished data indicated that only eight items were requested to be removed under the category of hate speech. Thirty nine items were sought to be removed on the grounds of defamation, 20 for privacy and security, 14 for impersonation, 3 as pornographic items and one for national security reasons. The fact that the single largest category is government criticism; apart from the 236 items on Orkut, the government also asked for 19 items on YouTube to be removed on these grounds, raises the question whether state could seek removal of such content because it was critical of the Government?

It is not only India, several other countries do object to political criticism. The Thailand's Ministry of Information, Communication and Technology made two requests to “remove 225 YouTube videos for allegedly insulting the monarchy in violation of Thailand's lèse-majesté law.” The Google chose to follow the directions and complied with the request, restricting Thai users from accessing 90% of the videos. In Turkey, Google received court orders and requests from the Telecom authority “to remove YouTube videos and blogs that documented details about the private lives of political officials.” Google says it “restricted Turkish users from accessing YouTube videos that appeared to violate local laws and removed the blogs for violating Blogger's Terms of Service.”14 In China during the period that Google's joint 39 items were venture operated google.cn, its search results were sought to be subject to censorship pursuant to requests from removed on the government agencies responsible for Internet grounds of regulation. for the two reporting periods from July 2009 defamation, 20 to June 2010 Chinese officials did nt disclose for privacy and information despite content removal requests as they security, 14 for considered censorship demands to be state secrets. impersonation, YouTube was completely inaccessible during this 3 as pornoperiod of transparency study15.

YouTube graphic items was inaccessible in Pakistan for 6 days during this reporting period due to concerns around the "Everyone Draw Mohammad Day" competition organized by a Facebook user.

Indian Union Minister and Constitutional Expert, Mr. Kapil Sibal clarified the Government’s intent to strongly oppose the uploading of disparaging and defamatory content on some social networking sites. A regulatory order was issued seeking the removal of such objectionable content or face the action16. Facebook, Google, YouTube and Yahoo, 14 15 16

ibid http://www.google.com/transparencyreport/governmentrequests/ 8.12.2011 The Hindu, New Delhi, “Hate speech must be blocked, says Sibal”, December 6, 2011 INTERFACE | JUNE 2013

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were asked to evolve a mechanism to filter such “inflammatory” and “defamatory” content that could create social tension. Besides referring to uploading of pictures and videos having morphed images of popular leaders, he mentioned the use of material that could hurt people's religious sentiments.

Street and Social Network There is a need to look at the issue of ‘objectionable matters’ being posted in websites whether it is about celebrities like Sonia Gandhi, the President of All India Congress Party or Manmohan Singh, Prime Minister of India or about any middleclass person. The nature of social network websites is not on par with the media. In spite of its ills and increasing irresponsible behavior, the media has people with some professional discipline and contractual binding to perform certain duties. The group using Social networking sites is not comparable to the people on street though both could speak whatever they want. Street talk is not visible and stable while the conversion of the same content into writing in permanent form could be accessed to by any one from anywhere. Its repetition and replicaiton or possibility of visiting it any number of times distinguishes street talk and social network. The impact of the ‘matter’ on the rest of the society depends on the nature of the content. If that impact is harmful and in violation of the rights of the people against whom postings were made, what is The group using the responsibility of the state? social networkIf the ‘content’ is objectionable because it breaches ing sites is not the right to reputation as part of recognized right to life, comparable to the people on the victims should have, and they have, legal remedy. street though Defamation is a problem of individual against the both could speak wrong-doer. Obscenity is another damaging content whatever they that could be objected by law. But obscene content want. becomes penal or removable depending upon the harmful impact on the society. Wrongs of this nature invite consequential penal actions. But when the content is hate speech and highly inflammable triggerring violence leading to loss of life in communal riots, the State has responsibility to prevent such loss of life.

Thus more than defamatory and obscene material it is this hate speech that has to be removed to protect lives. The likely impact of the content empowers the state to deal with it.

However this power cannot be used to remove political criticism and analysis of Governance issues because that is the purpose of freedom of speech and expression guaranteed by the Constitution of India.

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The liberty of thought flourishes by the freedom of speech and expression (guaranteed by Article 19(1)(a) of Constitution of India), is largely exercised by the media and writers. The Constitution permitted the reasonable restrictions against irresponsible writing in newspapers, screenplay over movies, broadcasting or telecasting in radio and television or posting in blogs, websites and social network groups.

Any action to delete critical political comment is unconstitutional and violative of freedom of speech. At the same time not preventing the communally inflammable content is also unconstitutional and violative of right to live. Like any other freedom, the freedom of speech is not absolute. When right to life is also not absolute there is no point in expecting expression right to be absolute.

The Internet Service Providers Association of India (ISPAI) president Rajesh Chharia reportedly opposed control of the Internet … but at the same time he said that the ISPs should cooperate with the government when it came to matter of national security and law and order problems. “ISPs should follow the law of the land and help create a safe and secure Internet. To begin with, they should end all Internet telephony services being offered by them illegally, which is also causing revenue loss to the exchequer,” he said, referring to services like Google Talk and Skype17.

The Union Minister, in an interview to The Any action to Hindu, has defended his demand that global delete critical internet companies block some content from sites political they operate, saying he had been left with no comment is choice after the companies refused to delete unconstitutional incendiary hate-speech published on their socialand violative of networking websites. “People have been asking the freedom of why can't we just prosecute individuals who post speech hate-speech instead of blocking sites,” Mr. Sibal and expression. said, “but there are three reasons why that's not workable. First, many of the individuals posting inflammatory material online are overseas, beyond the reach of our laws. Second, the Internet companies citied laws in the countries where the servers are located.” Finally, “each time material of this kind becomes the subject of legal proceedings in open court, you will have protests, mobs, perhaps violence — even if the media is responsible, and doesn't report the details.” He further said, “It gives me no pleasure, to restrict social media, but the fact is there's a problem. These companies are in essence saying that they publish content in accordance with standards in the West. That's not good enough. I will, however, call all 17 The Hindu, ‘Sibal warns social websites over objectionable content’, December 6, 2011, New Delhi INTERFACE | JUNE 2013 7

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stakeholders to the table, and evolve agreed standards for what kinds of content are acceptable, before a final decision.18” Constitutional Freedom & Prosecution of Online Expression Crimes It is not the case that Internet users are free and post whatever information they wish to. There are instances where Internet users faced prosecution for their irresponsible online postings, and even private companies hosting the content were obliged by law to hand over user information to the authorities. In September 2007, after Google and a major ISP cooperated with the police leading to incarceration of information-technology worker Lakshmana Kailash K for 50 days for allegedly defaming Chatrapathi Shivajee online. It later emerged that another person had posted the material, and Kailash was arrested based on the wrong IP address. In May 2008, two men were arrested and charged for posting derogatory comments about Congress party Chief Sonia Gandhi on Orkut; the case is still pending. In July 2010, a magazine editor in the southern city of Kerala was arrested on defamation charges for an article posted on the magazine’s website about an Indian businessman residing in Abu Dhabi In 2009, the Supreme Court of India has ruled that both bloggers and moderators can face libel suits and even criminal prosecution for comments posted by other users on their websites. A 19 There are year old youngster from Kerala, Ajith D moderated a instances where blog wherein several anonymous comments criticized Internet users the right-wing party Shiv Sena. That party’s youth wing faced prosefiled a criminal complaint against Ajith, who cution for their approached the Supreme Court to quash the irresponsible prosecution, but the court rejected his request. online postings, The Indian Constitution, particularly Article 19, and even private protects freedom of speech and expression. Along with companies must the right to life and liberty under Article 21, Article hand over info 19(1)(a) has also been held to apply to the privacy of telephone conversations, though established guidelines regulate the ability of state officials to intercept communications. Removing content or denying access on grounds of security and obscenity is one facet of power of regulator or administrator while securing the information on privacy is another important facet of it.

Information and Communication Technology usage is governed primarily by the Telegraph Act, the Indian Penal Code, the Code of Criminal Procedure, and the Information Technology Act (ITA), 2000.

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The Hindu’s Interview with Minister Kapil Sibal, December 6, 2011, New Delhi INTERFACE | JUNE 2013 8

Freedom of Expression of Online Communities and the State Power to Regulate

The 2008 amendments to the ITA raised concerns about an expansion of state surveillance capacity, including interception of SMS and e-mail messages. Several provisions of the revised law entail possible restrictions on users’ rights.

The IT law defined new Information Technology related crimes such as sending offensive messages, dishonestly receiving stolen computer resources or communication devices, identity theft, impersonation, violation of bodily privacy, cyber-terrorism, and the publication or transmission of sexually explicit material. The prescribed punishments vary, but many offenses carry up to three years in prison.

Under the revised Section 80, lower-ranking police officers are permitted to conduct personal searches and arrests without a warrant in public spaces and private businesses that are accessible to the public, provided there is a reasonable suspicion that a crime covered under the Act has been or is about to be committed. Section 69 has expanded the circumstances under which communications could be monitored, intercepted, and decrypted. Earlier this power was used only in emergency situations. Such surveillance was governed by the 1885 Telegraph Act, which allowed it in the “interests of the sovereignty and integrity of India.”

There are two important questions to be answered in this context.

First question: When freedom is not absolute and the state has a constitutional duty to protect the lives from possible When freedom is riots fanned by irresponsible writings, is it justified to not absolute take any action? No. Speech or writing can be restricted and the state by the Government, but not using an executive or has a individual order. It can be done only under the constitutional legislation to impose reasonable restriction as permitted duty to protect

by Article 19(2) of the Constitution of India. There is a the lives, is it law to impose ‘censorship’ on Cinematographic Films justified in depicting fictitious stories – the Cinematography Act. taking any Its constitutionality is upheld by the Supreme Court in action? several cases. There is no law to impose censorship on Television. The Government cannot also make such law because the impact of TV is not comparable to severe impact of cinema on the viewers. Though the word ‘expression’ under Article 19(1)(a) include the ‘press’, ‘cinema’, ‘broadcasting’, ‘telecasting’ and Internet, the censorship on Cinema cannot be extended to other media, because, the democracy needs free flow of ideas and discussions on governing aspects. The communication of ideas throughout the society is like blood circulation for a living person.

Next question: Whether limited jurisdictions of an Indian police or law reach the unlimited reach of Internet? When the wrongdoers are beyond the control, what is the use of making ‘law’? That issue came INTERFACE | JUNE 2013

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out when the functionaries of social networking websites have expressed their helplessness on pre-screening of content due to the large amount of content being uploaded, besides the server being located in foreign locations, particularly the U.S. They are also averse to the government's attempt to monitor and control the Internet. The US Constitution and society’s democratic character allows the free flow of any amount of critical content through any medium. First Amendment freedom was further expanded by the strong judicial protection offered through series of judgments of Supreme Court.

While communications & IT minister said that the government was against censorship, he said that the US laws and community standards could not be applied in India. "We have to take care of the sensibilities of our people. Cultural ethos is very important to us," Minister said on 6th December 2011. The Minister indicated that the legal process being developed the code of conduct may contain provisions that stipulate heavy penalty for websites that put out "offensive" material.

For a society in India, which is a union of different religions, regions, castes and languages but also divided by the same factors, any small provocation is enough to disturb the harmony and public order.

In such a state of affairs, the state cannot give up responsibility of securing the society. Even US freedom is restricted on the basis of doctrine of police powers and doctrine of present and imminent danger.

The location of server or internet service provider Even US freedom gives jurisdiction to enforce the law of the land even is restricted on though the objectionable matter is introduced the basis of somewhere beyond the control of a domestic doctrine of jurisdiction. That is where the Government wants to police powers make use to enforce the norms. and doctrine As the UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of of present Opinion and Expression noted recently “[Internet] and imminent Intermediaries play a fundamental role in enabling danger Internet users to enjoy their right to freedom of expression and access to information. Given their unprecedented influence over how and what is circulated on the Internet, States have increasingly sought to exert control over them and to hold them legally liable for failing to prevent access to content deemed to be illegal.”

Internet intermediaries—Internet Service Providers (ISPs), online service providers like Twitter and Google, and even Internet cafes—are thus increasingly subject to legal demands by private citizens and governments worldwide for infringing or illegal content to be removed, filtered or blocked, and for mandatory collection and disclosure of Internet users' personal data. It remained unsettled in most of the 10

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countries as to whether Internet intermediaries have liability for content posted by their users, and in what circumstances.

As the usage of internet is fast growing in developing countries like India, risks are also evidently increasing and demanding the liability of internet intermediaries. After a particularly notorious case holding the managing director of a popular online marketplace, Banzee.com, personally liable for a user's offer to sell an obscene video, the Indian Parliament amended the Information Technology Act in 2008, ostensibly to curb the liability of intermediaries for user content.

To a great extent the EU E-Commerce Directive was in the back of mind when it amended the Act, which extended safe harbor protection to services that 1) are merely transmission conduits, 2) temporarily cache content, or 3) host content and exercise "due diligence" in complying with the Act and other government regulations. It is very difficult for the law to spell out the scope of safe harbor immunity. Thus there is a possibility that some courts held them responsible while others relieve them. Some courts argued that secondary liability for copyright infringement is not precluded.

Earlier this year also, the government of India circulated rules which made it incumbent on internet intermediaries — like Facebook and Yahoo — to exercise due diligence to block material deemed, “threatening, abusive, harassing, blasphemous, objectionable, defamatory, … or otherwise unlawful in any manner whatever.”

As the usage of The Privacy angle and Power to Intercept internet is fast The amended IT Act drops these and other limitations. growing, risks For instance Section 69B, allows the Central are increasing and demanding Government to collect traffic data from any computer the liability of source without a warrant, whether the data are in internet transit or in storage. These provisions enormously intermediaries increase the power of State to regulate the content of internet which affects the right to privacy On the other hand the law is criticized as lacking in enough provisions to protect personal information held by private corporations. These inadequacies need to be addressed. The changed law provided the power to require corporations handling sensitive personal data to maintain “reasonable security practices and procedures.” This provision has to be further expanded by clear definition of rules and guidelines for better clarity and enforceability.

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Cyber Technology which facilitates to record every transactional communication is a big boost to investigation efficiency to trace the conspirators of crimes including terrorist attacks. The State certainly has power to intercept the telephone conversations by following certain guidelines prescribed by Supreme Court of India. The evidence obtained by such interception is admissible. The Ministry of Home Affairs intercepted mobile-phone communications between the gunmen and their Pakistan-based handlers during the Mumbai terrorist attacks in 2008. These communications were then rightly used as evidence in court of law. In May 2010, the news magazine Outlook published transcripts of phone tapping that recorded individuals including lawmakers from the ruling party. These calls, made on mobile phones at different times and locations were intercepted and recorded using a new GSM monitoring device. In 2010, another major scandal had erupted after the leaking of hundreds of intercepted 2009 phone conversations between lobbyist Ms. Niira Radia and several politicians, bureaucrats, and journalists. These taped records revealed incriminating evidence of political corruption and other abuses which led to arrest of former Ministers and MPs. Meanwhile, noted industrialist Mr. Ratan Tata, employer of Radia, filed a lawsuit against the government claiming that his privacy rights had been breached. The Government appropriately responded with the claim that Radia was being monitored as a suspected agent of foreign intelligence services. In the interest of public order, where security is involved Under certain and crime is a possible result, the Government assumes compelling power to monitor the content of communication, circumstances which operates as a major restriction on right to the phone privacy and also freedom of expression19. tapping and Under certain compelling circumstances the phone using the tapping and using the outcome as incriminating outcome as evidence is inevitable. In the context of a corruption incriminating investigation related to a former telecommunications evidence is minister, the mobile-phone provider Reliance inevitable Communications reported to the Supreme Court that the authorities had submitted over 150,000 phone tapping requests from early 2006 to the end of 2010, an average of 30,000 requests per year.

These scandals generated a lot of public response resulting in imposing obligation on private companies to respect the wiretap requests from authorities. Privacy has to be relegated to secondary level as it is prime need to secure the order and arrest the crime of corruption.

19 This matter is still pending before the Supreme Court, which might set the principles of privacy and security in the context of communication technology.

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Either under Telegraph Act or the Information Technology Act, there is no requirement of prior judicial approval for communications interception. The amended IT Act grants both central and state governments the power to issue directives on interception, monitoring, and decryption. All licensed ISPs are obliged by this law to sign an agreement that allows Indian government authorities to access user data, though the providers may lack the technical capacity to respond to some requests. Recently, for instance in September 2010, the ISPs claimed that they would be unable to comply with a Department of Telecommunications notice requiring them to enable the interception of BlackBerry messages for national security reasons.

The concern for security is the constitutional duty of the Government. The Government of India has warned to shut down BlackBerry services in 2010. The government demanded the device’s manufacturer, Research in Motion (RIM), to provide it with the capacity to read encrypted e-mail and instant messages sent via BlackBerry. It is the Constitutional obligation of the Government that prompted it to scrutinize BlackBerry services apprehending that the devices may be used by terrorists or for other illegal activities because the device’s encryption prevents intelligence agencies from monitoring mail traffic. The RIM claimed that it genuinely tries to be as cooperative as possible with governments in the spirit of supporting legal and national security requirements. The company claimed that strong encryption is a fundamental commercial requirement In September for any country to attract and maintain international 2010, the ISPs business. The company also said that it adopts a claimed that they “consistent global standard” in setting access would be unable requirements and won’t do “special deals” for to comply with a individual countries. It is reported that RIM has about Dept of Telecom 1.1 million users in India, 1.2 million subscribers in notice to enable Indonesia and a combined 1.2 million in the U.A.E. the interception and Saudi Arabia and it had 46 million subscribers of BlackBerry globally. The dispute remained unresolved for a long messages time after authorities rejected RIM’s proposed solutions to the decryption problem.In September 2010, India’s Home Secretary warned that RIM, Google, and Skype could be required to operate their services from locally based servers, enabling closer monitoring by security agencies. In this context the Government has warned to block the introduction and expansion of 3G mobile service across the country until operators provide sufficient means for security-related interception20.

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The companies were still negotiating with the authorities.

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New Regulatory Rules in 2011 The Information Technology Ministry introduced the Information Technology (Intermediaries guidelines) Rules, 2011, under the Information Technology Act, 2000 during February 2011. The new rules grant exemption to internet intermediaries, such as telecommunication companies, e-commerce websites, internet service providers (ISPs) and blogging sites, among others, from liability in certain cases. The rules are significant, especially because of the increasing litigations against online service providers, who are being indicted as co-accused in cases of unlawful conduct by end-users. These rules have emphasized thewebsite hosts’ obligations to perform "due diligence.”

These rules require intermediaries to adopt terms of service that prohibit users from hosting, displaying, publishing, sending or sharing any proscribed content, including not just obscene or infringing content, but also any material that threatens national "unity" or "integrity," "public order," or is that "grossly offensive or menacing in nature," "disparaging," or "otherwise unlawful in any manner whatever." It is criticized that such a broad standard lacks clear limits on what kinds of content may be taken down and invites abuse.

The law thus imposes a duty that once an intermediary discovers, or is notified of proscribed content, it must "disable" the content within 36 hours. Under the rules, intermediaries are also Intermediaries authorized to immediately terminate access or usage are authorized to rights. They must also preserve related user records for immediately 90 days for investigatory purposes. This is not a terminate access or usage rights. flexible, discretionary standard: under the rules, They must also intermediaries must "strictly follow the provisions of preserve related the Act or any other laws." user records for In addition to new content regulations, the 90 days Government also issued regulations pertaining to data security, Internet cafes and the electronic provision of Government services. As an example, part of the regulations stipulates that cyber cafes be registered with a unique registration number with an agency called as registration agency. Besides, the Government has declared to introduce regulations to restrict the ‘objectionable material’ also.

Criticism against making of the Rules What is the remedy if some content is wrongfully removed? Such remedy was available under the rules of the 1998 United States' Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). It is criticized that the users in India do not have any recourse if their content is removed wrongfully.

Nor are there any safeguards against abuse: the rules do not require that 14

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the party lodging the complaint have any rights or even have a good faith basis for believing that the content is illegal.

Though the Government called for comments on the rules, it was still criticized that the drafting process was not very open or inclusive. It was alleged that the Government has not given sufficient time. The Government responded: "these due diligence practices are the best practices followed internationally by well-known mega corporations operating on the Internet." One lesson for other developing democracies is that the process matters, not just for legitimacy, but also for purposes of producing satisfactory substantive provisions.

Intermediaries Burdens and Benefits Indian media criticized that the new rules facilitate the internet intermediaries by granting exemptions to them such as telecommunication companies, e-commerce websites, internet service providers (ISPs) and blogging sites, among others, from liability in certain cases. Facebook said in a statement, "We want Facebook to be a place where people can discuss things freely, while respecting the rights and feelings of others, which is why we already have policies and on-site features in place that enable people to report abusive content. We will remove any content that violates our terms, which are What is the designed to keep material that is hateful, threatening, remedy if some incites violence or contains nudity off the service. We content is wrongrecognize the government's interest in minimizing the fully removed? amount of abusive content that is available online and Such remedy was will continue to engage with the Indian authorities as available under they debate this important issue." When media US Digital contacted the Microsoft and Yahoo refused to Millennium comment, but Google spokesman said: "We work really Copyright Act hard to make sure that people have as much access to information as possible, while also following the law. This means that when content is illegal, we abide by local law and take it down. And even where content is legal, but violates our own terms and conditions, we take that down too, once we've been notified. But when content is legal and doesn't violate our policies, we won't remove it just because it's controversial, as we believe that people's differing views, so long as they're legal, should be respected and protected." Google also owns social networking site Orkut and video-sharing site YouTube21.

According to cybercrime experts, the rules make intermediaries additionally responsible in the pre-crime scenario, in terms of keeping a 21 http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/tech/news/internet/Kapil-Sibal-snaps-at-socialnetworks-says-code-of-conduct-coming/articleshow/11012467.cms December 7, 2011, Times of India, New Delhi.

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close watch over the kind of content that is put on the website by the end-user. At the same time, these rules exempt intermediaries in postcrime scenario if steps are taken to curb the illegal activity of the enduser or disable access to the illegal content. The rules stipulate the intermediaries to publish the terms and conditions of use of their websites, user agreement, privacy policy, apart from notifying its users not to use, display, upload, transmit and share illegal or 'objectionable' content22. Among other things, such content may include harmful, threatening, blasphemous, defamatory, vulgar, pornographic content, content invasive of another's privacy, is hateful, or racially or otherwise objectionable.

Cyber security expert Anshul Abhang said, "The rules say the intermediaries will not be liable as long as they do not host or publish any such content. Furthermore, the intermediaries will not be liable if they have taken steps to remove the illegal content, thus observing due diligence, as is mentioned in the rules." "For instance, if a blogging website has a blogger posting defamatory content about somebody, the latter may ultimately file a defamatory suit against the blogging website and not the blogger who actually defamed him. In the light of these rules, if intermediaries know of such a content being published on their blogs, they can follow due diligence by removing the content and blocking the user's access," said Abhang23.

The draft rules The rules have definitely increased the proposed under responsibility of intermediaries in a pre-crime scenario, the IT Rules 2011 where they would have to keep a constant vigil over the included the activities of the numerous users using their portals or definition of blogs. The intermediaries will only be liable if they fail 'Blog', but the to remove the content or disable the user's access after actual rules in the being notified about the existence of such objectionable gazette did not content on their website by the government or its mention these. agency. These provisions made the Rules reasonable.

The Government armed with a set of detailed laws to deal with user generated content on websites, isssued notices but some of the foreign social networking sites refused to comply with and that has necessitated the Government to seek removal of the content. It can’t be ignored that under the IT Act, an intermediary is duty-bound to act on a complaint relating to content (including user generated content) within 36 hours of receiving a complaint. Some of the foreign sites have been taking the position that they will not remove the allegedly offensive content unless

22 Neha Madaan, New IT rules grant relief to internet intermediaries, TNN , Times of India, Jun 6, 2011 23 Ibid.

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they receive a court order - as any content removal by them has to be in line with their global policy and US laws.

Though the draft rules earlier proposed under the Information Technology Rules 2011 (due diligence observed by intermediaries guidelines), included the definition of 'Blog' and 'Blogger' for the first time under the IT Act, the actual rules in the gazette did not mention these terms. Still the rules will apply to blogs also. A techno-legal consultant and faculty at the Asian School of Cyber Law, Mr. Sagar Rahurkar, agreed that 'observing due diligence' will apply to blog service providers as well. The bloggers are also expected to remove objectionable content uploaded by a blogger and terminate access. The rules and the instructions mentioned therein do not violate the freedom of speech or expression. Another expert on Information security and blog owner Kaustubh Kumbhar explained the physical impossibility of responsibility for content. "It is impossible to keep a track of the content being published on one's blog. Whenever we post an article on the blog, it is backed with a disclaimer stating that the company is not liable for the damages or claims that may follow as bloggers' comments. A good article usually has hundreds of comments and it is The rules have impossible to go through all of them. It is because increased the of this reason that each response posted has a responsibility of 'report abuse' link. As soon as one comes across any intermediaries in objectionable post or comment, he/she can click a pre-crime on the link and the owner of the blog can then scenario. They remove the post within 24 hours.24" The rule did would have to take note of this impossibility and prescribed the keep a constant duty of post-publication removal of objectionable vigil over users content.

Expression Crimes, State Prosecution Giving the power to Government to proscribe some content and direct its removal will be a reasonable justification with reference to religious hate speech. Criminal law imposed enough restrictions on freedom of expression in any kind of media. Internet is no exception. Indian Penal Code, 1860 Section 153-A penalizes the expressions promoting enmity between classes, Section 153-B punishes any assertion prejudicial to national integration, Section 295-A prescribed imprisonment for insulting religion or religious belief of any class. Any conspiracy for committing these offences is punishable under section 120-B (criminal conspiracy to commit such offences) of the Indian Penal Code. However 24 http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2011-0606/pune/29624972_1_objectionable-content-intermediaries-websites, June 6, 2011

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for prosecuting the media (or any other person) for these expression crimes, the Center or State has to sanction. Section 196 of Criminal Procedure Code prohibits courts from taking cognizance of these crimes unless state or center sanctions the prosecution. The Department of Information Technology (DIT) has given its sanction to prosecute internet companies such as Facebook, Google, Youtube, Yahoo, Microsoft and Orkut on a private complaint by journalist Vijay Ray, against them for allegedly allowing objectionable contents on their websites. In all 21 accused firms were named by Delhi Metropolitan Magistrate during January 2012. The allegations against the companies include “instigating enmity between different groups of people as well as doing acts prejudicial to the maintenance of harmony and to national integration.”

The companies named also include the Indian arms of Facebook, Google, Yahoo and Microsoft apart from Blogspot, Zombie Time, Exboii, Boardreader, IMC India, My Lot, Shyni Blog and Topix25. It is also alleged that they are “doing acts prejudicial to the maintenance of harmony” and hosting content that is “provocative, assertive and propagates prejudicial to national integration (sic)”.

Section 196 of Cr. The court also observed that offences punishable Procedure Code under Sections 292 (sale of obscene books, etc.), 293 prohibits courts (sale of obscene objects to young person, etc.) and 120from taking B (criminal conspiracy) of the IPC could be made out cognizance of against the accused. these crimes Earlier the Delhi High Court, while hearing a unless state or petition to stay the prosecution of websites, warned center sanctions Facebook India and Google India that their portals the prosecution could be blocked if they preferred not to filter out objectionable content. Justice Suresh Kait made a specific direction to keep check and remove offensive and objectionable material or face blockade of all such websites as that happened in China26.

Incitement to offence, dividing people by spreading enmity, posting obscenity, hate speech, anti-national speech are some of the criminal offences that limit the freedom of expression. It is not new, but time tested democratic law all over the world for centuries. These crimes either lead to kill or damage the civilians.

Blocking access on obscenity grounds

25 http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/industry-and-economy/infotech/article2798879.ece 17.1.2012 26 Delhi HC to Facebook, google: Remove Obscene content or face blocking, PTI Jan 12, 2012 INTERFACE | JUNE 2013 18

Freedom of Expression of Online Communities and the State Power to Regulate

In June 2009 using this power, the authorities blocked a adult cartoon site called Savitabhabhi, which was criticized for not granting the website creators an opportunity to defend their right to free expression, raising concerns about the arbitrary nature and broad scope of the government’s power in this area.

It is an adult cartoon strip launched in March 2008 in the name of www.Savitabhabhi.com featuring a married Indian woman’s sexual adventures. Bhabhi is Hindi word for sister-in-law. It became very popular soon. According to Alexa.com, Savitabhabhi is the 82nd-mostvisited Indian website, attracting more visitors than Bseindia.com, the website of the Bombay Stock Exchange. In February, when Mint interviewed the anonymous creator of the strip, the site ranked 45th in India.

Mr. N. Vijayashankar, techno-legal information security consultant from Bangalore, waged a sustained campaign against Savitabhabhi, complaining to the government’s Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-IN) as well as the Director General of Police in Karnataka. “Cartoons are a more participative medium. Videos don’t do as much damage. When a child is watching a According to cartoon, he imagines himself as the character. This has Alexa.com, a deeply corrupting influence on our youngsters. This, Savitabhabhi is apart from the fact that an Indian name was being used the 82nd-mostvisited Indian in such an obscene cartoon, is what prompted me to website, lodge the complaint,” Vijayashankar said. attracting more According to Pawan Duggal, cyber law expert and visitors than an advocate at the Supreme Court of India, “Under bseindia.com Section 67 of the IT Act of 2000, publishing or transmitting obscene electronic information is punishable with up to five years’ imprisonment and Rs1 lakh in fine.

The creators of Savitabhabhi can challenge the ban, arguing that it is an expression of their thoughts and what is expressed is not lascivious.

When there is so much of explicit pornographic content easily available, why should they be singled out?. It is a cultural cum legal issue. The courts will have to decide whether Savitabhabhi is a lascivious site or not. Kamasutra and the sculptures of Khajuraho are far more explicit but not considered obscene. So they do have an argument,” Duggal said.

So far this power of internet censorship is not used to ban the political websites. After amending the Information Technology Act in 2008, pressure on private intermediaries to remove certain information has increased since late 2009. The amended law grants the Ministry of Communication and Information Technology, authority to block internet material on the ground that it will endanger public order or national security. It is mandatory for the companies to have a INTERFACE | JUNE 2013

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designated employee to receive government blocking requests, and provided up to seven years’ imprisonment for representatives of a wide range of private service providers—including ISPs, search engines, and cybercafes—if they fail to comply with government blocking requests.

With frequent communal riots and terrorist attacks posing danger to the security, such a power is felt needed to protect the peace and avoid provocations. At the same time there is a very strong criticism from civil liberty activists who apprehend possibility of abuse of this power curbing press freedom and might even use to suppress political speech.

Terrorism & Controlling the Internet Content Many a time the Google has removed content in response to requests from various government authorities. In January 2007 the company agreed to an arrangement allowing police forces to directly report objectionable content to Google and ask it for details regarding internet protocol (IP) addresses and service providers. By May 2007, Google had cooperated with the Mumbai police regarding online communities and comments directed against the Indian historical figure Shivaji, rightwing leader Bal Thackeray, and Father of the Indian In the backdrop Constitution Dr. B. R. Ambedkar. of terrorist In the back drop of terrorist attacks, the attacks, the Government preferred to assume power to control the Government online content. After the November 2008 terrorist preferred to attacks in Mumbai killing 171 people Indian assume the power Government felt the need for controlling the to control communication technologies and for censoring the online undesirable content. As the people feel security of the content. nation is threatened, most of them favoured content monitoring by the government. According to a survey by Times of India, 53% said the government should be allowed to monitor phone calls, bank accounts and e-mail accounts and a further 19% said this should be allowed for a suspect person. That left a mere 28% of Indians holding the opinion that such monitoring was an unacceptable intrusion into personal privacy. The Parliament passed amendments to the Information Technology Act (ITA) in 2008, which came into effect in 2009. The amendments expanded the government’s censorship and monitoring capabilities.

In August 2010 the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) had asked the Department of Telecommunications to suspend the newly introduced 3G mobile service and halt providers’ ongoing rollout of the technology, particularly in Jammu and Kashmir. This was because the authorities wanted more time to develop the ability to intercept 3G communications. Short-message service (SMS), or text messaging, has 20

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been blocked periodically in Jammu and Kashmir. Expecting violence in Ayodhya in the wake of judgment on the dispute, the Government blocked mass text messages across India on September 23, 2010, which was later extended as the verdict was deferred.

The Government started seeking data removal since 2010. Then it was assessed that India ranked third in the world for removal requests and fourth for data requests. Between July 1, 2009, and December 31, 2009, India had submitted 142 removal requests, of which 77.5 percent were fully or partially complied with.

The requests related to the Blogger blog-hosting service, Book Search, Geo, SMS channels, web searches, YouTube, and especially Orkut. Google , in September 2009 pulled out an Orkut group on which users had reportedly posted offensive comments about the chief minister of Andhra Pradesh, who had been killed in a helicopter crash.

Indian officials were apparently concerned that the comments could spark communal violence.

However, except during crisis or war like situations, the Government has not imposed any restrictions on the content of internet nor did it formulate any policy to block the access to IT on a large scale. Only once during the Kargil war with Pakistan in 1999 such a direction was issued.

On the other hand the State Governments directed many a time to filter the content through court cases. In recent years, Except during apprehending the violence, the state administrative crisis or war-like directions to remove certain content from the web are situations, the increasing.

Govt has not In 2003, the Indian Computer Emergency imposed any Response Team (CERT-IN) was created in 2003 within restrictions on the content of the MCIT’(Ministry of Communication and internet, nor did Information Technology)s Department of Information it make a policy Technology. Since then the institutional structure of to block access internet censorship and filtering in India has begun through CERT-IN serving as a nodal agency for accepting and reviewing requests from a designated pool of government officials to block access to specific websites.

When it decides to block a site, it directs the Department of Telecommunications to order all licensed Indian ISPs to comply with the decision. No review or appeals can be made. The Controller of Certifying Authorities (CCA), a government agency under the Department of Information Technology, is the agency that blocks websites under the IT Act.

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Internet Censorship Bill in US The United States government is debating a Bill currently attempting to imprison people for five years for linking to a copyrighted site. The bill claims that it is for protecting “prosperity, creativity, entrepreneurship, and innovation.” The US Congress is debating the PROTECT-IP Act and its House version, the Stop Internet Piracy Act (SOPA)28, concerning censorship of the internet that intends to leave legal windows open to prosecute regular users. It’ll give the government new powers to block Americans’ access to websites. The bill would criminalize posting all sorts of standard web content — music playing in the background of videos, footage of people dancing, kids playing video games, and posting video of people playing cover songs.

It becomes a felony with a potential 5 year sentence to stream a copyrighted work that would cost more than $2,500 to license, even if it is done by a totally noncommercial user, e.g. singing a pop song on Facebook. But with the passage of this bill, there would be nothing to stop corporations from finding someone with a high-quality, DIY tribute video on YouTube and bringing them to court, where the government will tell that person: “Under PROTECT-IP and SOPA, you are a criminal for using this content without permission. And now, you will be sentenced for your crime, which you can’t really deny, because it was on the internet and seen by all these other users.”29 The US has started its history of censorship in 1864 when a postmaster The US Congress general discovered a large amount of nude pictures is debating the were being sent to the Civil War troops. Laws were Protect-IP Act quickly passed to ban sending any obscene book, and its House pamphlet, picture, print or other publication of vulgar version, the Stop and indecent character through the US Mail.

Internet Piracy There are proposals to have a law on the lines of Act (SOPA)27, the Communication Assistance for Law Enforcement concerning Act (CALEA), 1994, of the US, though it’s in a nascent censorship of the phase. Section 103 of the CALEA defines the telecom Internet service providers’ obligations in the event of phone tapping ordered by the authorities. It provides that the service providers should expeditiously isolate all wire and electronic communications of a target transmitted by the carrier within its own service area. The operators are expected to isolate call-identifying information of a target 27 http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/right-turn/post/overkill-on-internetpiracy/2011/12/11/gIQA9TK6nO_blog.html 28 http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/right-turn/post/overkill-on-internetpiracy/2011/12/11/gIQA9TK6nO_blog.html 29 http://www.themarysue.com/censorship-bills-protect-ip/ 9.12.2011 1.1.1

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and provide intercepted communications and call-identifying information to the law enforcing agencies. The US law also makes it obligatory for the operators to carry out intercepts unobtrusively so that the targets are not made aware of the electronic surveillance, and in a manner that does not compromise the privacy and security of other communications.

Conclusion In a strict sense no government in any democratic country can impose censorship against the media. The flow of vast information at a rapid pace makes it difficult to censor contents The Government is also not contemplating total censorship of the Internet content, which is physically impossible. But it announced, only to retract later, that there will be regulation to curb the social media network from resorting to hate speech leading to riots and threatens lives.

The powers that want social networking media to be under their control should go back to the basics of democratic governance and understand why the free expression is accorded a prime position in the Constitution. The protection of free speech is essential for people to communicate on political matters, which in turn enables them to fully participate in democratic affairs including exercising their franchise in elections.

Justice Brandeis of the U.S. Supreme Court in Whitney v. California30 has explained this as primary rationale for freedom of speech and expression. Justice Holmes of the U.S. Supreme Court said in Abrams v.

United States: “The best test of truth is the power of the In a strict sense thought to get itself accepted in the competition of the no government market�31. in any Instead of judging the negative or destructive democratic aspects of the speech it should be left to the market country can assessment and if the idea floated fails the test, it will be impose discarded automatically. censorship While commenting on Indian Constitution famous against the author, Professor Glanville Austin32, in his book Working media.

A Democratic Constitution, The Indian Experience, explained how these fundamental aspects of free speech were incorporated in the Indian Constitution aiming at securing spirit of democracy, unity of nation and fostering social revolution for the welfare of the people. In a vibrant democracy the space for criticism

274 U.S. 357 (1927) Abrams v. United States, 250 U.S. 616 (1919) 32 Glanville Austin, Working A Democratic Constitution, The Indian Experience, Oxford University Press, 2000 INTERFACE | JUNE 2013 23 30 31

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has increased over a period of time, while the law remained static but rendered useless unless some autocratic ruler wanted to misuse it.

Technology is facilitating freedom of expression in abundance beyond what freedom laws and democratic government could grant.

Social media networks like facebook, twitter, yahoo, youtube, etc are causing enough of embarrassment to autocratic rulers by openly discussing their performance, whether they are artistes or political leaders or star sports persons. It is difficult to stop them both legally and technically.

Any attempt to impose ‘pre-censorship’ is physically not possible, because content generated online is phenomenally very high and immeasurable. Legally speaking a democratic constitution cannot permit Government to take over the control over the minds of people by regulating what they are watching or reading.

However, the obscenity and defamation are post-publication issues and any aggrieved person has right to agitate for violation of his rights.

At the same time, political criticism cannot be intercepted on the Internet as it is the core area of free speech protection. The power under IT Act cannot be used to remove the political criticism however hostile it is to the persons in power.

The only place where the government could exercise its authority is in seeking the removal of communally provocative content under public order provisions and police powers, if not, prosecute them. Equally, it is the duty of the educated citizen not to post reckless comments causing loss of lives for meaningless communal reasons.

Any attempt to Online community and cyber technology should impose ‘precome to rescue of this time-tested freedom of speech censorship’ is and expression by evolving alternatives for protecting physically not the public interest from onslaught of online destructive possible, because content. They have to evolve Internet Filtering Systems content generated and assign ratings to websites to advise parents to filter online is websites to protect the young minds from porn attacks. phenomenally This will work to prevent obscenity in online very high and community. immeasurable Hate speech is something which the internet service providing intermediaries should prevent as a matter of selfregulation or face the wrath of tough criminal laws punishing communally provocative postings. When person’s reputation is affected by defamation on cyberspace, there are adequate laws to secure the rights of those individuals where there is not much left for the state to intervene.

If the state properly uses its power under IT laws and other antiterrorism laws to curb hate speech and terrorism, there is nothing illegal 24

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or unconstitutional. It is only when the political power is abused to control voices and indulge in political criticism, the civil society is expected to resist those attempts on the strength of constitutional guarantee of freedom of expression.

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Centre for Advanced Studies in Journalism The Department of Communication & Journalism was conferred the status of Centre for Advanced Studies in Journalism (CAS-I) by the University Grants Commission (UGC). This is the only Department to be accorded such recognition in the country after having implemented the UGC’s Special Assistance Programme in three phases (1989-2007).

The funding for the Centre has facilitated strengthening of infrastructure. Leveraging the technology available, students continue to gain hands-on training.

The Centre has been in the forefront in undertaking research in media and allied subjects and has provided crucial policy inputs to various government wings on media usage and impact. It has embarked on major State government research projects. Precisely, the Centre undertook an Evaluation Study of the programmes by the State Institute of Educational Technology, Outreach programmes of the Information and Public Relations Department, Government of Andhra Pradesh and synergised with the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan to empower teachers using technology. This is in addition to ongoing research undertaken by about 50 research scholars registered with the Centre.

Centre’s role in UPE Currently, the Centre is working closely with Earth Sciences, Bio Sciences and Engineering departments involved in Materials Research – the focus area of research of Osmania University which has been awarded the ‘University with Potential for Excellence’ status by the UGC recently. As a part of this interdisciplinary research, the Centre will engage in extension activities and further bolster the University-media linkage with the larger objective of popularising science.

Prof. K. Narender Coordinator Centre for Advanced Studies

Egypt: The ‘Great Refusal’ that promised a new dawn Dr. Padmaja Shaw1 Abstract The Egyptian revolution has fascinating sides to it. There is a general consensus that it is incubated in the cradle of new media and it is widely attributed to the young educated people of Egypt. Herbert Marcuse and Marshall McLuhan have argued the theoretical possibility of just such a political change. This paper attempted to examine the role of media in the political change that is sweeping across the West Asia from the perspective of Marcuse’s conception of “the Great Refusal” and Marshall McLuhan’s formulations on technological change.

The paper finds that it is the liberating influence of the new media technologies that enable freedom of interaction, thinking and acting in response to one’s material conditions without filters. This seems to have played a transformatory role in the events unfolding in the Middle East. The technological transformation has reconfigured the world for the people and triggered ‘the Great Refusal’.

“Ten days ago, I was re-tweeting anti-Mubarak sentiments and signing up for his tongue-in-cheek Farewell Party event on Facebook. I had no idea that the ideas expressed on those sites would ignite a whole country and lead all hell to break loose,” Haisam Abu-Samra (2011), an Egyptian comic writer, tells us on 3 Feb 2011. There is a general consensus that the revolution in Egypt is a revolution incubated in the cradle of new media. It is widely attributed to the young educated

1

Professor, Department of Communication & Journalism, Osmania University, Hyderabad.

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people of Egypt who have inspired a whole nation to stand by them and march in protest.

The revolution has fascinating sides to it. The theoretical possibility of just such political change has been argued by the extraordinary media philosophers of the 20th century like Herbert Marcuse and Marshall McLuhan. This paper will attempt to examine the role of media in the political change that is sweeping across the West Asia from the perspective of Marcuse’s conception of the Great Refusal and Marshall McLuhan’s formulations on technological change.

The Great Refusal Jeffry Ocay (2010: 67) explains: Marcuse understands the Great Refusal as a kind of “negativity” both in thought and action which enables the individuals to transform their personal needs, sensibility, consciousness, values, behaviour into a new radical sensibility, a sensibility that does not tolerate injustice and that which resists and opposes all forms of control and domination. But despite the fact that Marcuse emphasizes individualistic refusal and revolt, the Great Refusal is in the end a “collective refusal and revolt” aimed both at overthrowing the system of domination and oppression and realization of a radical total social change. …. In ‘OneDimensional Man’, Marcuse avers that it is only The Great the Great Refusal that expresses a truly Refusal is a revolutionary mode of opposition.

“collective refusal and revolt” aimed at overthrowing the system of domination and oppression

Marcuse has been one of the early critics of the consumerist societies, where manipulation and indoctrination has resulted in the containment of the individual. Apart from the technological progress and the resultant technological rationality, Marcuse identifies advertising and corporate media as important sources of subjugation of the individual through creation of false needs. (Ocay 2010: 59) Marcuse believes that this is done through mass customization and massive and aggressive advertising. Mass customization efficiently works by producing large quantities of goods and services, most often beyond what is required, and tailoring these goods and services to the specific taste and capability of the masses (Ocay 2010: 62). The products indoctrinate and manipulate; they promote a false consciousness which is immune against its falsehood...

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Egypt and the ‘Great Refusal’

Thus emerges a pattern of one-dimensional thought and behaviour (Bennett 1982: 43).

Moving further from the classical Marxist tradition, Marcuse argues that when politically conscious individuals form alliance with other individuals of the same consciousness, a “collective radical action” ensues. Marcuse calls this alliance the New Left, that includes the numerous minority groups like the students’ movement, women’s movement, labour unions, and other politically inclined groups that struggle for liberation. These forces are the concrete expressions of the Great Refusal because they define the limits of the established societies and signal the impending rupture of history (Ocay 2010: 67).

Media scene and the uprising in Egypt A leader in the Economist (2011: 9) describes the events in Tunisia and Egypt (days before the exit of Mubarak): “A downtrodden region is getting a taste of freedom. In the space of a few miraculous weeks, one Middle Eastern autocrat has fallen, and another, who has kept the Arabs’ mightiest country under his thumb for 30 years, is tottering.

The 350m-strong Arab world is abuzz with Viewers witness expectation; its aging autocrats suddenly looking shaky.” specific political Egypt is bigger and poorer than most other Arab states, with a population of 84.6 million people, out of which 52.3% are under 25.

circumstances unfolding, which are not reflected cohesively in domestic and international broadcasting

Adel Iskandar, author of the book on AlJazeera, speaking at an event organized by the United States-Egypt Friendship Society (2006), identifies three different categories of press in Egypt: media agent organizations that are operated, funded, and sponsored by the government, media agents that are affiliated with political parties and following those ideologies, and lastly, the independent press. He describes the situation prevailing in most Arab countries as, Media Schizophrenia: viewers witness specific political circumstances unfolding which are not reflected cohesively in domestic and international broadcasting. Though, even in 2006, he concedes that there was a greater openness to controversial events and topics, if the information is not available through the INTERFACE | JUNE 2013 | 29

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domestic press it could be accessed though international media agents.

He describes the oppositional press as ‘defanged’ with no impact on political atmosphere, even as the media scene in Egypt witnessed an explosion of oppositional and independent media, varying in type, form, affiliation, denomination, allegiance… (USEF 2006: 2).

Tarik Atia, a leading Egyptian journalist (USEF 2006: 4) says that Al Jazeera has had a fundamental impact on the press in Egypt. Any one with a dish can get the news that government affiliated papers may not publish, and those papers have had to change their editorial policies to deal with the new reality. With a lot of new players entering the market, he predicted that the new players and Al Jazeera will continue to have a profound effect on the media in Egypt. Atia also describes the growing the influence of online-only news players like Fil-Balad and Masrawy, which have become the mainstay for ‘news junkies’ with their immediate updates and their focus on local issues (USEF 2006: 45).

By 2011, Egypt has become one of the leading Internet markets in Africa, in terms of users, international bandwidth, and services offered (SBwire 2011). Egypt has 17 million Internet users and 4 million Facebook users (Internet World Al Jazeera had a Stats 2011). By the middle of 2010, Egypt has fundamental logged up a nationwide subscriber base of more impact on the than 60.8 million mobile phones, taking it to press in Egypt.

76.8% of the population (Wikipedia 2011), which Anyone with a effectively meant an intensely interconnected dish can get the population that is constantly exchanging information and is engaged in conversation. news that govt-

affiliated papers may not publish

It is this connected generation of citizens that responded to the Facebook page created for expressing solidarity with Khalid Said, an Internet aficionado who fell victim to police brutality, by assembling at Tahrir square on 25 February, 2011 to observe a “day of rage”. The page had 3,75,000 followers. Though the peaceful crowds that came out in solidarity at the Tahrir square was not huge, it was the similar turn out across Egypt at several locations that was a shock to the administration… It responded by shutting down mobile, texting, and Internet services (Economist, 2011).

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As Haisam Abu-Samra says (2011), “Instead of expressing pent-up opinions with fists and bullets, as is happening now in the streets of Cairo, people who can express them freely in conversation, even in a virtual one, have a chance to hear one another and deliberate about the future. Never mind the vacant symbolism of “Twitter revolutions” and YouTube activism: losing the Internet at the hand of our own government simply offers us a powerful reminder of why we actually want the Internet to begin with, and why we’re doing any of this.”

In the following days, Egyptians of all classes, thousands of urban professionals, students joined the protests, in the later days bringing in many more people from all walks of life. The peaceful nature of the protests and the instinctive understanding of the values of democratic dissent in Egypt were witnessed globally by new and old media users alike.

After the exit of President Mubarak, the protests have spread to other nations in the region, no doubt triggered by material conditions, but no less aided by the “new media landscape” provided by Internet (Shirky 2011), mobile connectivity and The protests communities built on social media.

According to Amar (2011), in the very recent past, Egypt has reemerged as a manufacturing country, although under the most stressful and dynamic of conditions. Egypt's workers are mobilised because new factories are being built in the context of a flurry of contentious global investment.

have spread to other nations in the region, no doubt triggered by material conditions, but no less aided by the by Internet

Again, to quote Amar (2011), “If you stroll up the staircases into the large working-class apartment buildings in the margins of Cairo or the cement-block constructions of the villages, you’ll see workshops full of women, making purses and shoes - and putting together toys and computer circuit boards for sale in Europe, the Middle East and the Gulf. These shop workers joined with factory workers to found the April 6 movement in 2008. They were the ones who began the organisation and mobilisation process that led to this uprising in 2011, whose eruption was triggered by Asmaa Mahfouz circulating a passionate YouTube video and tens of thousands of INTERFACE | JUNE 2013 | 31

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leaflets by hand in slum areas of Cairo on January 24, 2011. Ms Mahfouz, a political organiser with an MBA from Cairo University, called people to protest the next day…Internet cafes, small workshops, call-centres, video-game cafes, microbuses, washing/ironing shops and small gyms constitute the landscape of micro-enterprises that are the jobs base and social world of Egypt's lower middle classes. The socalled "Facebook revolution" is not about people mobilising in virtual space; it is about Egyptian internet cafes and the youth and women they represent, in real social spaces and communities, utilizing the cyberspace bases they have built and developed to serve their revolt.”

From the description of the processes in Egyptian economy, it seems that the interests of the emerging working class in the newly organized sectors and the interests of the micro-entrepreneurs converged to face the coercive power of the State jointly.

But the tools for organizing their revolt were invariably the social media like YouTube, Facebook and Twitter, and the primary weapon was the mobile phone. Speaking at Columbia Journalism Review on “Information Wars”, Carl Bernstein emphasized The tools for the empowerment of the people that now enables organizing their them to easily broadcast their views without revolt were intermediaries. He says, “the basic equations of invariably power are

the social media like YouTube, Facebook and Twitter

changing as a result of the fact that there is a tool that everybody pretty much starts with the same ability to marshal…” (CJR Panel Discussion 2011). Speaking at the same event, Clay Shirky agrees that access to information is important but the biggest change here is access to each other.

Marcuse and McLuhan In ‘An Essay on Liberation’, Marcuse questions: “Is it necessary to repeat that science and technology are the great vehicles of liberation and that it is only their use and restriction in the repressive society which makes them into vehicle of domination? …Dominance comes to the fore when technology is used for the maintenance of the capitalist system…” (Ocay 2006: 66). Ironically, it is the forces of globalization and capitalism that have accelerated the introduction and rapid spread

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of ICTs across the globe, to rapidly integrate more and more geographies under their economic domination.

Marcuse argues in One Dimensional Man that men and women are no longer conscious of their own oppression (James 2006: 21). And in an age when conventional media like radio and television were becoming increasingly centralized industries, Marcuse was exploring avenues for liberation of the false consciousness of individuals in industrial societies.

Marshall McLuhan foresaw in technology the power to transform by its very presence. Elaborating on his aphorism, “Medium is the Message”, McLuhan declares, “the personal and social consequences of any medium – that is, of any extension of ourselves – result from the new scale that is introduced into our affairs by each extension of ourselves, or by any new technology. … Many people would be disposed to say that it was not the machine, but what one did with the machine, that was its meaning or message. In terms of the ways in which the machine altered our relations to one another and to ourselves, it mattered not in the least whether it turned out cornflakes or Cadillacs. The restructuring of human work and Marshall association was shaped by the technique of McLuhan argues fragmentation that is the essence of machine technology… For the “message” of any medium or that technology technology is the change of scale or pace or pattern transforms time that it introduces into human affairs.” (McLuhan and space and 1994: 8). brings about McLuhan essentially argues that technology fundamental transforms time and space and brings about fundamental changes in social organizations. The changes in social printing press ushered in fragmentation, linearity organizations and democracy while the electric technologies can lead to ‘re-tribalization’ through their instant-ness and completeness of experience. The liberal-democratic framework, with its stress on extreme individualism (fragmentation and isolation) has facilitated the growth and entrenchment of capitalism. It is the new media that are emphasizing connectivity, conversation, and re-integration into new forms of community. All this is happening while retaining the essence of individual freedom and a heady autonomy of action.

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The Internet and the World Wide Web, both ironically children of cold war politics, have put in place a system that is multi-nodal and difficult to obstruct/regulate. The automated digital environment of the Internet and the World Wide Web have provided a landscape of communication that at once addresses the people’s need to know and as well as their need to communicate. The earlier era of one-to-many communication was prone to centralized control, censorship and commercial manipulation. The era of Internet, by its very configuration, has opened up many-to-many mode of communication.

Ideally, the horizontal networks have the potential to be egalitarian.

They have the potential to make the Habermasian critical-rational debate a reality for the new digital democracies.

Kahn & Kellner (2005: 1) say, “the Internet constitutes a dynamic and complex place in which people can construct and experiment with identity, culture, and social practices. It also makes more information available to a greater number of people, more easily, and from a wider array of sources, than any instrument of information and communication in history.” While recognizing the ‘technocapitalist’ nature of Internet (much like the mainstream mass media), Kahn and Kellner say that the under-represented or What made marginal political communities have set up their this possible email lists, websites, blogs and are now a thriving and self-empowered force on the Internet. They is the emphasise that it is important to articulate globalised Internet politics with actually existing political access, through struggles to make technopolitics a major a variety instrument of political action.

of technologies and layers of alternatives

What made this possible is the globalised access, through a variety of technologies and layers of alternatives that can pretty much transcend the controls of nation-states. Describing the phenomenon of Wikileaks, Clay Shirky (2011) quoting Jay Rosen says, “WikiLeaks... is a truly transnational media organization. We have many international media organisations, of course, Havas and the BBC and Al-Jazeera, but all of those are still headquartered in one country. WikiLeaks is headquartered on the web; there is no one set of national laws that can be brought to bear on it, nor is there any one national regime that can shut it down.” Shirky adds, “For half a century, from 1945 to 2005, this use of transnational networks to go around national controls was 34 | JUNE 2013 | INTERFACE

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asymmetric: governments could use this technique to surveil citizens, but not vice-versa. In 2006, Wikileaks launched, holding out the possibility of evening up the odds, however slightly, in favour of the citizens.”

These developments are another point of intersection in the visions of Marcuse and McLuhan, though in slightly different ways. McLuhan describes media (all technologies, in fact) as extensions of human sensorium. It is the nature and intensity of extension of the sensorium that determines the social and global consequences of technologies.

Marcuse’s conception of “liberation of the senses” says, “inasmuch as technological domination exploits the body through reification, and if reification of the senses is the ultimate cause of the subjection of man, then it is the liberation of the senses that would bring rupture with this continuum of control and domination in the advanced industrial society… It is this primary experience of the senses itself which must change radically if social change is to be radical, qualitative change.”

(Ocay 2006). The new media technologies have The new provided the landscape for such a transformation media to germinate.

Conclusion In the end, it is the dramatic deployment of new technologies, access to a free, decentralized cybercommons where citizens can build consensus and community, conjure up alternative visions of future that seems to be proffering a lifeline for global citizens who are so far held in thrall by the onedimensionality that corporate media have created.

technologies have provided the landscape for a transformation to germinate

And it is the liberating influence of this freedom to interact, think and act in response to one’s material conditions that seems to have played a transformatory role in the events unfolding in the Middle East.

In a promo write up for the programme “Empire” titled “Social Networks, Social Revolution”, Al Jazeera (2011) gleefully declares: “Information is power, but 21st century technology has unleashed an information revolution, and now the genie is out of the bottle.

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YouTube, Facebook and Twitter have become the new weapons of mass mobilization; geeks have taken on dictators; bloggers are dissidents; and social networks have become rallying forces for social justice.

As people around the world challenge authorities, from Iran to Tunisia, Egypt to Yemen, entire societies are being transformed as ordinary citizens see the difference, imagine the alternative, and come together to organise for a better future. So, are social networks triggering social revolution? And where will the next domino fall?

Empire finds out.”

The technological transformation has reconfigured the world for the people and triggered “the Great Refusal”, but not all states have the historical circumstances that made the Egyptian army stand aside and refrain from brutal repression. When the ideological hegemony fails to work on an awakened people, many states will not hesitate to use coercive power. 2011 could mark either a new dawn in human history or a slide into medievalism, technology or no 2011 could mark technology. But for now, the ‘Great Refusal’ from either a new Egypt has inspired a whole generation of young dawn in people to try and reclaim their future.

human history or a slide into medievalism, technology or no technology

References Abu-Samra, Haisam (2011). Expulsion and explosion: how leaving the internet fueled our revolution.

Retrieved on 4 February 2011 from http://motherboard.tv/2011/2/3/expulsion-andexplosion-how-leaving-the-internet-fueled-our-

revolution Ocay, Jeffry. V. (2010). ‘Technology, technological domination, and the Great Refusal: Marcuse’s critique of the advanced industrial society’ in Kritike, IV-1, p54-78. Retrieved on 4 February 2011 from http://www.kritike.org/journal/issue_7/ocay_june2010.pdf Bennett, Tony (1982). 'Theories of the media, theories of society'. In Culture, society and media, Gurevitch et al. (Eds). London: Methuen.

Ocay, Jeffry. V. (2010). ‘Technology, technological domination, and the great refusal: Marcuse’s critique of the advanced industrial society’ in Kritike, IV-1, p54-78. Retrieved on 4 February 2011 from http://www.kritike.org/journal/issue_7/ocay_june2010.pdf Egypt rises up (2011, 5 February). In The Economist, p. 9.

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Paradox of the free press in Egypt (2006, 26 July). USEF Expert Panel Discussion Notes. Retrieved on 5 February 2011 from http://www.secid.org/usefsociety/pdf/press.pdf Internet users in Egypt to get doubled by 2012 (2011, 20 January). In Sbwire.

Retrieved on 4 February 201 from http://www.sbwire.com/pressreleases/sbwire-75087.htm Internet world stats (2011). Retrieved on 4 February 2011from http://www.internetworldstats.com/africa.htm#eg List of countries by number of mobile phones in use (2011). In Wikipedia.

Retrieved on 5 February 2011 from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_number_of_mobile_phon es_in_use Shirky, Clay (2011, 4 February). WikiLeaks has created a new media landscape. In The Guardian. Retrieved on 4 February 2011 from http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/feb/04/wikileaks-creatednew-media-landscape Amar, Paul (2011, 10 February). Why Egypt's progressives win. In Al Jazeera.

Retrieved on 12 February 2011 from http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/opinion/2011/02/20112101030726228. html “Information Wars” on Al Jazeera English (2011). Columbia Journalism Review panel discussion. Retrieved on 16 February 2011 from http://www.cjr.org/the_news_frontier/information_wars_on_al_jazeera.php James, Beverly (2006). Teaching Marcuse. In javnost-the public, XIII-3, p 1728. Retrieved on 14 February 2011 from http://www.javnostthepublic.org/media/datoteke/13-3-james.pdf McLuhan, Marshall (1994). Understanding media: the extensions of man.

(First print 1964). Cambridge, Massachusetts: MIT Press.

Kahn, Richard & Kellner, Douglas (2005). Oppositional politics and the Internet: A critical/reconstructive approach. Retrieved on 14 February 2011 from gseis.ucla.edu/faculty/kellner/essays/oppositionalpoliticstechnology.pdf Shirky, Clay (2011, 4 February). WikiLeaks created new media landscape. In The Guardian. Retrieved on 12 February 2011 from http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/feb/04/wikileaks-creatednew-media-landscape Ocay, Jeffry. V. (2010). ‘Technology, technological domination, and the great refusal: Marcuse’s critique of the advanced industrial society’ in Kritike, IV-1, p54-78. Retrieved on 4 February 2011 from http://www.kritike.org/journal/issue_7/ocay_june2010.pdf Social networks, social revolution (2011). In Al Jazeera. Retrieved on 16 February 2011 from http://english.aljazeera.net/programmes/empire/2011/02/20112161453211 6986.html

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Beyond Books: Cyber Media and School Education An evaluation of teachers’ perspectives in schools of New Delhi Rizwan Wadood

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Abstract With the advent of cyber media technologies, teaching is thought to have moved from the age of chalk and talk method in classrooms. In this backdrop, this study aimed to gain insight into the strengths and weaknesses of the Internet in the school classrooms and beyond them. Exploratory in nature, the study sought to analyze internet as a teaching aid from two approaches; assessing the use of internet in leveraging learning and teaching, and understanding the integration of Internet with the conventional methods of teaching. The findings of the study make a case for strengthening Internet infrastructure among schools, widespread training of teachers to integrate internet inputs in teaching modules, customizing the materials to Indian school syllabi. The study also throws some warning signals regarding various ill effects among students resulting from excessive but unsupervised access to internet.

Keywords: Cyber/ New Media, Internet, schools, Cut n Paste, Plagiarism

Introduction Teaching is thought to have moved from the age of chalk and talk method in classrooms. With the advent of new media technologies, the process of learning and teaching is believed to have gone a substantive transformation. Newer media technologies like Internet seem to be impacting teacher and the taught alike. Internet is not only leveraging

"

!Rizwan Wadood works with the Ministry of Higher Education, Oman, and teaches at the Department of Communication Studies at the College of Applied Sciences- Nizwa. Email: rizwan.wadood@gmail.com!

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learning for the students but also increasingly coming handy as an aid to teaching.

The Internet has emerged as a defining new resource for learners and educators both. It not only helps in knowledge accumulation by the learners but also helps greatly in information dissemination. The Internet’s role, thus, stretches from providing up-to-date information on a variety of classroom-related topics to supplementing that knowledge with the unending repository of educational sources available on the web, thus enhancing the learning-teaching process a more enriched one The Internet’s rapid growth, and its ever-increasing presence in academia, hence, has necessitated a scientific understanding of its role in imparting and facilitating education. This study aimed to gain insight into the strengths and weaknesses of the Internet in the classrooms and beyond them. The proposed study is exploratory in nature and strived to empirically understand the widely claimed understanding of Internet as a teaching aid. The study, therefore, tried to gather data in order to substantiate the greater role of Internet in empowering teachers to empower students through the new vistas of new media technologies.

The vast resources on Internet while is a boon, at times, the unsupervised access may result in not leading to the full and proper utilization of what it has to offer. In such a case, proper The Internet’s guidance to the learners becomes imperative. While, increasing students and learners at a senior level or in colleges may presence in academia have the maturity to scout for the relevant information, it necessitates a is the school students who need to be guided to scientific appropriate and maximum usage of the educational understanding resources available on the web. In the given scenario, the of its role in role of a teacher becomes paramount in best utilizing education Internet as a teaching aid directing students towards empowered learning.

It is in this context that this exploratory study was proposed, seeking empirical data to find out the significant role internet plays as a teaching aid, especially to the school teachers. The study was based in New Delhi and the nursery was the select senior secondary schools in the union territory of New Delhi. The schools covered in the study imparted teaching in English language. The study sought to ascertain the access, usage and availability of Internet in schools, the nature and quantum of Internet aided teaching and the subsequent effect on teaching and resultant impact and benefits of utilizing the Internet. The study also sought to seek teachers’ suggestions on how Internet could be better used for teaching.

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Rationale for the study The research study assumes greater importance given the scarcity of empirical data profiling the use of new media technology, especially Internet, in education for teaching and imparting knowledge. This requires analysis of internet as a teaching aid from two approaches; accessing the use of internet in leveraging learning and teaching, and understanding the integration of Internet with the conventional methods of teaching. At another level, the study also looks at the possible ill effects, intentional or unintentional, like over dependence on the web, unsupervised and undirected uses etc. given the increasingly easy accessibility and excessive use of internet.

The primary purpose of the proposed study was to independently add to the knowledge on understanding the role of internet in teaching.

Besides that, the study was intended to assess the availability access of Internet at schools to students. This becomes crucial when learning and teaching is becoming cyber directed and multi-directional. Other reasons for undertaking the study was to add empirical research to a thin body of resources profiling new media technologies like internet and its impact, especially from the point of view of the teaching community.

The study also reflects the users-trend in terms of responses of the teachers, who are directly responsible and are best suited to assess the current importance and the prospective relevance of Within a Internet as a teaching aid. Their responses are indicative decade, of a larger usage pattern across the country. Also, the fact internet that the findings of the study go a long way in providing penetration empirical data identifying strengths and weaknesses of the has been so current use of Internet in school teaching. This would rapid as to help rectify the shortcoming and identify the future impact direction of uses and practices of internet aided teaching. different The outcome would be of importance to other aspects of civic stakeholders in the cyber directed knowledge life dissemination like Internet content providers and policy makers. The study, hence, is of immense benefit to various stakeholders like teachers, students, content providers, educators and the policymakers.

Literature Review The history of Internet in India dates back to the introduction of Internet in India in 1995. Within a span of over a decade, internet penetration has been rapid and today it has an impact on different aspects of civic life especially education . This fact has not been profiled 40

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adequately. Literature search has revealed a very thin array of empirical studies in this area assessing the role of Internet as a teaching aid.

Indian studies mainly focused, among others, on the following broader areas: consumption of the Internet; Internet usage by the youngsters and the Internet’s social and psychological impact. In educational arena, studies have mainly looked at Internet from students’ perspective. Studies looking at Internet as teaching aids are far and few.

Following few studies looked at Internet from the perspective of a teaching aid. B.T. Sampath Kumar, G.T. Kumar, (2010), in his study Perception and usage of e-resources and the internet by Indian academics, profiled how academics are using the new technology of Internet, while Geetha B. J.., Subramani R. (2009), in their study, A Plea for the Use of Language Portals in Imparting Communication Skills, as the name suggests, made a case for the use for Internet in promoting language portals in India. Another study by Revathi Viswanathan (2008), Recent Impacts of Internet on English Language Training in India, focused on the effects Internet had on the English language training in India. While other studies profiling Internet usage and effects on different aspects of life included Kalyanaraman, Sriram and Sundar, S. Shyam (2003). The Psychological appeal of Personalized Online Content: An experimental Investigation of Customized Web Portals.

Krishnamurthy, Sundari (2003) came up with their Indian studies study Communication Across Borders: Experiences of mainly focus on Rural Indian Women in Using Cyber Cafes. Internet consumption of behavior of the students has been studied by Nalwa the Internet; Kanwal, Anand Archana Preet (2003), Internet usage CyberPsychology & Behavior Internet Addiction in by youngsters Students: A Cause of Concern. Similarly, Sumitra and its social & dutta, (2009) studied cyber presence of youth in his psychological study, Internet Vs TV – 77% online youth say impact Internet!!. The internet uses by the students in particular have been studied by scores of researchers. Some of these studies include: Bulu Maharana, Bipin Bihari Sethi* and Subedita Behera (2010), Use of internet and e-resources by the students of business management: A survey of P. G. students of business administration, Sambalpur University, while another researcher Dillip K. Swain, (2010) looked at the students’ eagerness to engage with electronic resources available in his study, Students' keenness on use of e-resources; the use of Internet in higher education was explored by Margam Madhusudhan, (2007), Internet Use by Research Scholars in University of Delhi, India; Similarly, another study by Purnima Devi, Y. INTERFACE | JUNE 2013!

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Herojit Singh analyzed the usage pattern of students in a research called Internet Users : A Study of Manipur University Library while Rajeev Kumar, Amritpal Kaur (2005), looked at Internet consumption by engineering students in their study namely, Internet and Its Use in the Engineering Colleges of Punjab, India: A Case Study.

Methodological Framework Aim of the study The aim of the study was two-fold. Firstly, to analyze the use of Internet as a teaching aid, and secondly, to examine how it is used and how it could be integrated with the conventional classroom teaching to make the learning and teaching both interesting and more productive.

Objectives: The study sought to explore the following objectives.

1. To ascertain the availability of Internet infrastructure in the schools 2. To find out the ratio of computers to students 3. To find out if the teachers were trained in integrating Internet into classroom teaching.

4. To gauge the teachers perceptions towards using Internet for instruction 5. To identify the subjects generally taught through The aim of the Internet study was to 6. To know to what extent students are allowed to bank analyze on Internet for assignments/ tests etc. the use of 7. To find out if Internet leads to critical thinking among Internet as a students teaching aid, 8. To find out if adequate numbers of educational portals and to examine for different subjects exist how it was 9. To know if the content on these portals are being used customized to Indian syllabi 10. To seek teachers opinion if Internet has led to Cut n Paste culture 11. To identify if Internet has led to increased plagiarism 12. To seek suggestions how Internet has made a difference in teaching and how it could be used better utilized.

13. To ascertain the perception towards and importance of internet as a teaching aid.

Methodology

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Keeping with the exploratory nature of the probe, the study employed the quantitative research approach with survey method.

The Universe comprised teachers from select senior secondary schools in New Delhi. The sample size was 75. The respondents were chosen by the random sampling method. The break up of the total respondents was as following: Ten respondents from St. Marks Senior Secondary School, an equal number of respondents participated from Queen Mary’s school. Another participating school in the survey Kulachi Hansraj Model School too had ten respondents. While New Horizon School contributed 15 teacher respondents to the survey, Hamdard public school had fifteen participants, and finally fifteen more teachers responded to the survey from St. Anthony’s public school. The respondents were chosen from among the teachers teaching junior, middle and higher/senior secondary classes. And also, the survey sought to have a healthy mix of teachers from Humanities, languages, social sciences and natural sciences so as to have a holistic picture.

The sample had the representation of 8 male and 67 female teachers. The greater share of female teachers was explained by the presence of greater number of female teachers across the surveyed schools. Data was collected during the months of October and November 2011.

Data gathering tool The sample had The data gathering instrument was a semi structured 8 male and 67 questionnaire with - multiple choice, open and close female teachers. ended questions. Different types of questions provided The greater the respondents with the options to choose from and share of female express their views in descriptive way wherever needed. teachers is due The questions were broadly divided in the following to larger number subheads: Access, usage and availability, Internet aided of female teaching and effects, benefits and suggestions. To test teachers the reliability of the data gathering tool, the questionnaire was pre-tested on a small size of the same set of teachers.

Once the responses were found free from any type of discrepancy; the questionnaires were administered in volume among the target population with the help of field investigators and subsequently collected back.

Hypotheses The following hypotheses were formulated for this research 1. Null Hypothesis (HO1) That yet adequate internet infrastructure are not available in schools for the students and teachers in terms of access to students and online use in classes.

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Alternative Hypothesis (H1) That adequate internet infrastructure are available in schools for the students and teachers in terms of access to students and online use in classes 2. Null hypothesis (HO2): Internet has not led to reduced dependency on books among students and encouraged the “Cut n Paste” culture and increased plagiarism.

Alternative Hypothesis (H2) That Internet has led to reduced dependency on books among students and encouraged the “Cut n Paste” culture and increased plagiarism.

Operational Definitions: Terms used in the research have been operationally defined as follows: • Cyber/ New media technology- Internet • Gender- Males and Females • Cut n paste Culture- the tendency among students to copy things from the Internet without using it analytically • Plagiarism- the act of lifting from the internet without attributing sources The Universe includes the teachers of six senior secondary schools in New Delhi. The study surveyed of 75 respondents

Scope The Universe included the teachers of six senior secondary schools in the union territory of New Delhi.

The study surveyed a total of 75 respondents. The respondents constituted 10-15 teachers from each of these schools.

Data Presentation and Analysis The data collected have been presented in the form of tables with frequencies and percentages. The figures in parentheses indicate percentages which have been calculated based on the actual responses. Some responses have been grouped together and presented in combined tables.

Also wherever relevant and necessary, cross tabulations have been used for better comprehension. The data was subjected to chi square test, a non parametric test, to ascertain the association between applicable variables. Also, some open ended questions, data reduction technique has been used to group together responses in a larger bracket.

The distribution of respondents is as follows: 13.3% each from St. Mark's School, Queen Mary’s school and Kulachi Hansraj Model

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School, while respondents’ share of New Horizon School, Hamdard Public School and St. Anthony’s public school were 20% respectively.

The sample had 10.7% males and 89.3% female respondents.

Sixteen percent of the teachers had 2-4 years experience, those with 5-7 years had 17.3%, 8-10 years had 6.7% while the biggest share of respondents, that is, 57.3% had above 10 years of teaching experience.

2.7% respondents did not respond.

A little over 10 percent respondents fell into the 22-25 years category, another 30.7% came from the 26-35 years group, teachers in the age group of 36-45 years had 28% share, while another set of 30.7% respondents came from the age above 45 years.

Over 60 percent of the respondents taught Higher/Senior secondary classes, 10.7 per cent taught Junior Classes, 26.7 engaged Middle Classes Table 1: Subjects/streams taught by the respondents Subjects taught by the respondents

Frequency

Percent

Social Sciences

15

20.0

Natural Sciences

29

38.7

Commerce

6

8.0

Languages

23

30.7

No response

2

2.7

Total

75

100.0

The data shows that 20% teachers taught Social Sciences, 38.7% taught Natural Sciences , eight percent taught Commerce stream 30 per cent taught Languages Access, Usage and Availability Table 2: Internet infrastructure and accessibility at school

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Students’ access to computers

Student to computer ratio

Net facility available at school

Yes - 72 (96%)

1:1 - 5 (6.7%)

Yes - 62 (82.7%)

No - 03 (4%)

2:1 45 (60%)

No - 13 (17.3%)

Library/Computer room- (30.7%)

No - 36 (48%)

-------------

3-4:1 13 (17.3%)

-----------

Classrooms (10.7%)

-----------

More than 5:1 3 (4%)

-----------

Whole campus (37.3%)

-----------

-----------

No response 12 (16%)

-----------

Total - 75 (100%)

Total - 75 (100%)

Total - 75 (100%)

------------

---------

Total - 75 (100%)

No response (12%)

Total – 75 (100%)

Location of Net availability

Staff room-4 (5.3%)

Students’ access to internet

Yes - 39 (52%)

On whether students could access computers at school, 96% respondents said yes, 60% believed the student computer ratio was 2:1, 82.7% respondents said that their school had internet facility, 30.7% said their schools mainly had net connections in the library/computer room, and a good percentage of 37.3% said the whole campus had internet availability, 52% respondents said yes but a close percentage of 48% also said their students could not access internet at schools.

Table 3: Subjects taught using Internet inputs Subjects taught using net Natural Sciences & Maths

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Frequency

Percent

13

17.3

Beyond Books: Cyber Media and School Education

Social Sciences

4

5.3

All subjects

53

70.7

No response

5

6.7

Total

75

100.0

The table indicates the subjects taught using internet inputs- 17.3% did so for Natural Sciences & Maths, 5.3% for Social Sciences, while a huge percentage said they used internet to give inputs while teaching all the above subjects.

Table 4: Using net for online teaching Net for teaching

online

Frequency

Percent

Yes

17

22.7

No

57

76.0

No response

1

1.3

Total

75

100.0

The pattern of respondents’ views on using Internet for online teaching is as follows - 22.7% said they used net for online teaching while 75 percent did not use.

Table 5: Teachers’ opinion on Net based contents Teachers’ opinion on Net based contents

Frequency

Percent

Authentic

30

40.0

Unambiguous

4

5.3

More elaborate

36

48.0

No response

5

6.7

Total

75

100.0

Teachers’ opinion on Net based contents revealed that 40% teachers considered net content was authentic, while close to half the respondents (48%) believed these were more elaborate than the textbook materials.

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Table 6: Percentage of Instructions imparted based on Net Instructions imparted based on Net

Frequency

Percent

10-30 %

34

45.3

30-60%

32

42.7

60% and above

5

6.7

No response

4

5.3

Total

75

100.0

On the extent of Instructions imparted based on Net. 0nly 6.7% teachers believed it was 60% and above another 42.7% said it was 3060%, while 45.3% said 10-30 % instructions were Internet-based.

Table 7: Subjects that can be better taught using Internet Subjects that can be better taught using Internet

Frequency

Percent

Social Sciences

12

16.0

Natural Sciences

41

54.7

Commerce

2

2.7

Languages

3

4.0

All subjects

14

18.7

No response

3

4.0

Total

75

100.0

Teachers’ opinions on which subjects can be better taught using Internet is presented in the table above. 16% said Social Sciences, while 54.7% thought Natural Sciences; those advocating Commerce were 2.7%, while percentage in favor of Languages was 4%. 18.7% also believed teaching using Internet can be equally beneficial all subjects.

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Beyond Books: Cyber Media and School Education Table 8: Importance of Internet as a teaching aid Internet as a teaching aid

Frequency

Percent

Not Important

1

1.3

Important

45

60.0

Very important

28

37.3

No response

1

1.3

Total

75

100.0

Sixty percent of the teachers considered Internet as important, 37.3% said it was Very important, while only 1.3% thought it was not important.

Table 9: Availability and authenticity of web-based contents Adequate educational portals

Yes – 54 (72%)

Adequate educational portals for Mathematics and Natural Sciences Yes – 56 (74.7%)

Adequate educational portals for Humanities and Social Sciences Yes – 47 (62.7%)

Educational portals customized to Indian syllabi

Yes – 37 (49.3%)

No – 20 (26.7%)

No – 14 (18.7%)

No – 22 (29.3%)

No – 37 (49.3%)

No response- 1 (1.3%)

No response- 5 (6.7%)

No response- 6 (8%)

No response- 1 (1.3%)

Total – 75 (100%)

Total – 75 (100%)

Total – 75 (100%)

Total – 75 (100%)

On availability and authenticity of web based contents, Column 1 suggests that 72% respondents said that there were adequate numbers of educational portals; column 2 indicates the break up of adequacy in terms of stream - Natural Sciences - 74.6 per cent; Column 3 indicates that 62 per cent said that there were adequate educational portals for INTERFACE | JUNE 2013!

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Social Sciences. Column 4 is on whether educational portals were customized to Indian syllabi. This evoked divided opinion. 49.3% said yes, an equal percentage of 49.3% said no, while 1.3% gave no response.

Table 10: Teachers’ perception on Teacher Vs Internet’s role Technology is the driver, teacher is secondary

Technology and teachers complement each other

Teacher remains primary, technology is supportive

Yes – 8 (10.7)

Yes – 68 (90.7%)

Yes – 73 (97.3%)

No – (89.3%)

No – 7

No - 2 (2.7%)

Total – 75 (100%)

(9.3%)

Total – 75 (100%)

Total – 75 (100%)

The data in column reveals that opinion on the role of technology vs teacher. To the statement, “Technology driver, Teacher secondary”, only 10.7% said yes, a whopping 89.3% said no. Data on the statement “Technology, teacher complimentary” is represented in column 2.

90.7% said yes while 9.3 percent said no. Column 3 has responses to the statement “Teacher primary, Technology supportive” where 97.3% believed yes, and only 2.7% said no.

Table 11: Perceived ill effects of excessive and unsupervised Internet use Internet leading to reduced dependency on books and printed materials

Internet leading to “cut n paste” culture among students

Yes – 52 (69.3)

Yes – 68 (90.7)

Yes – 25 (33.3%)

No – 23 (30.7%)

No – 7 (9.3%)

No – 5 (6.7%)

--------------

--------------

To some extent 45 (60%)

Total – 75 (100%)

Total – 75 (100%)

Internet leading to increased plagiarism

Total – 75 (100%)

Data in three columns in the table above reflect the concerns of perceived ill effects of excessive and unsupervised Internet usage on 50

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students. Column 1 shows that nearly 70 per cent said that Internet reduced the dependency on books and printed materials while 30.7% said no. Teachers’ opinion whether Internet has led to “cut n paste” culture among students is reflected in Column 2. To this 90.7% respondents replied in the affirmative. Figures in column 3 reflect that 60 per cent of the teachers said that Internet allegedly leading to increased plagiarism to some extent while 33.3 agreed Table 12: Internet leads to analytical thinking among students?

Internet leading to analytical thinking among students

Frequency

Percent

Yes

44

58.7

No

31

41.3

Total

75

100.0

The table reveals that 58.7% respondents felt that Internet helped in analytical thinking while 41.3% did not think so.

0

8

10.6%

3

3

1

1

20

26.6%

5

8

4

3

47

62.66%

9 (12%)

14 (18%)

5 (6.7%)

4 (5.3 %)

75

3.441

8

100%

Teachers were asked to cite reasons for accessing Internet. The response pattern is as follows: nearly 60 per cent said they accessed internet to supplement text material, 12% cited provide context, 18.7% to give more examples etc. There is no statistically significant relationship between the teachers from different levels and reasons for

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S/NS

0

P value

3

Df

1

Chi –square

Percent

Total

Total

Senior

12 (16%) 27 (36%) 43 (57.3 %)

No response

Middle

All

4 (5.3%)

Give examples

Supplement text material

Junior

Provide Context

Classes taught

Table 13: Cross tab for Classes taught Vs Reasons for accessing Internet

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accessing Internet with a chi square value of 3.441 with 8 degrees of freedom and a p value of .904.

Class level taught Junior Classes

Yes

No

Total

Percent

Chi – square

df

P value

8.041

2

.018

6 (8%)

2

8

10.6%

Middle Classes

7 (9.3%)

13

20

26.6%

Senior Classes

33 (44%)

14

47

62.66%

Total

46 (61.33%)

29

75

100%

S/NS

Table 14: Classes taught Vs Teachers trained for integrating Internet into teaching

S

In response whether teachers were trained to integrate Internet in teaching modules, over 61.3% said they received training, while 38.7% replied in the negative. There is a statistically significant relationship between the teachers from different levels and training to integrate Internet into teaching with a chi-square value of 8.041 with 2 degrees of freedom and a p value of .018.

3

2

30(40%)

14

3

Total

51 (68%)

18 (24%)

6 (8%)

S/NS

15(20%)

8 (10.6%) 20 (26.6%) 47 (62.66%) 75 (100%)

P value

1

Df

1

Chi –square

No response

6(8%)

Total

Making learning and teaching more interactive

Junior Classes Middle Classes Senior Classes

Classes taught

Supplementing text material

Table 15: Cross tab suggesting better utilization of Internet in teaching

2.550

4

.636

NS

Suggestions provided for effective utilization of Internet for teaching are presented in the above table Nearly 70 per cent felt Internet can and 52

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Beyond Books: Cyber Media and School Education

should be used for supplementing learning, 24% thought for making learning and teaching interactive, while 8% did not respond. There is no statistically significant relationship between the responses of teachers from different levels and their views on better utilization of Internet for teaching purposes with a chi-square value of 2.550 with 4 degrees of freedom and a p value of .636.

Table 16: Teacher’s role remains primary, technology is supportive Class/ level taught Junior Middle Senior Total

Yes

8 (10.6%) 20 (26.6%) 45 (60%) 73 (97.3%)

No

Total

Percent

0

8

0

20

2

47

62.66%

2

75

100%

10.6%

Chi – square

df

P value

1.224

2

.542

26.6%

Data on the statement “Teacher primary, Technology supportive” is given in the above table. An overwhelming 97.3% agreed with the statement. The break up of this figure being: teachers from junior classes (10.6%), middle classes (26.6%) and senior classes (60%).

There is no statistically significant relationship between the teachers from different levels and their understanding of teachers’ role versus technology’s significance with a chi square value of 1.224 with 2 degrees of freedom and a p value of .542.

Findings and Conclusions The study arrived at the following findings at after an analysis and interpretation of the raw data.

The findings have been divided into three broader areasa) Teachers’ perceptions on the access and usage of Internet facilities to students in school b) Internet’s effects and impact as a teaching aid c) Perceptions regarding ill effects of unsupervised Internet access to students The data substantiated the presence of computer based infrastructure in schools as an overwhelming, 96 percent of teachers believed students could use computers at school with the student- tocomputer ratio falling in the healthy zone.

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Two thirds of the respondents said their schools had 2:1(60%) and 1:1(6.7%) student-computer ratio.

A vast majority of respondents said that their school had Internet facility, while 17.3 percent answered in negative. Data also showed that Internet facilities were easily accessible to the students, over 2/3rds of the respondents believed Internet facilities existed where students could access it easily (37.3 percent whole campus, 30.7 percent library/computer rooms, 10.7 percent - Classrooms). Even though the schools had Internet facilities in place, students were not necessarily permitted to use them in schools; close to half the respondents said their students were not allowed to access Internet at schools.

Over half the number of teachers used Internet for supplementing the text materials alone. The remaining ones it for providing context, give more examples, though some also used it for all these reasons. The use of Internet inputs in teaching was prevalent among all streams. Two third of the respondents said they did so for all subjects including Natural Sciences & Maths, Social Sciences and languages.

On which subjects can be better taught using Internet, over half of the respondents believed Natural sciences lend themselves better to teaching through internet inputs, followed by Social Sciences and languages.

Teachers’ opinion on Net based contents A majority of the teachers vouched for the authenticity of Data suggests the materials, close to half of them also thought Net-based that close to contents were more elaborate than the text book 3/4th of the materials. respondents Close to 40 percent had not received any training on think that the how to fuse Internet into teaching modules. cyber media Close to 98 percent validated the growing significance had enough of cyber media with 60 percent vouching for its important content/ status as a teaching aid while another 37.3 percent material. believing it was very important.

Data suggested that close to 3/4th of the respondents thought that the cyber media had enough content/ material. Again 3/4th of the respondents felt the material for Natural Sciences was adequate. For Social Sciences too, over fifty percent, educational portals were satisfactory, though a large chunk it needs improvement. Opinion was divided on whether these educational portals were customized to Indian syllabi.

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Teachers’ perception on Teacher Vs Internet’s role.

Ninety percent of the teachers disagreed with the statement, “Technology driver, Teacher secondary”, while an equal number agreed to the statement of “Technology, teacher complementary”.

Responses solicited on the statement “Teacher primary, Technology supportive” again validated the primary role of the teacher as 98 per cent agreed to it.

The study also focused on the perceived ill effects of excessive and unsupervised use of Internet by students. Close to 2/3rd of the respondents believed in Internet’s alleged role in reducing dependency on books and printed materials. On whether Internet has led to “cut n paste” culture among students, again over 90 percent respondents said yes. The pattern of responses to Internet allegedly leading to increased plagiarism was on similar lines. Cumulatively over 90 percent believed in affirmative though with varying degree of impact. Close to 34 percent believing Internet has led to absolute increase in plagiarism, while another 60 percent said it has encouraged plagiarism to some extent.

Seeking teachers’ suggestions on how to improve and effectively utilize Internet for teaching purposes, responses supported the perception of Internet as a repository of information.

The respondents’ views on Internet’s ability to lead to analytical thinking among students had fractured opinion. While over half of them (58.7 percent) respondents said yes, another close to half (41.3 percent) remained cautious and said no.

To arrive at some qualified findings, the data was also crosstabulated against Teachers’ level of teaching Vs reasons for accessing internet. Data showed that more than half used it for supplementing the text materials alone. The remaining teachers used it for Data showed providing context, giving more examples, though some that more than also used it for all these reasons. The result demonstrated half of the surveyed that there is no statistically significant relationship teachers used between the teachers from different levels and reasons for Internet for accessing Internet. supplementing Cross tabulation of training to integrate Internet in the text teaching modules revealed that 40 percent had not materials received any training for the same though over 60 percent has had some type of training. A statistically significant relationship was found between the teachers from different levels and training to integrate Internet into teaching.

On effective utilisation of Internet for teaching, responses supported the image of Internet as a repository of information. Two thirds of the respondents felt it can and should be used for supplementing learning by adding to the textbook information. There was no statistically significant INTERFACE | JUNE 2013!

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relationship between the teachers at different levels and their views on better utilization of Internet for teaching purposes was found.

Also, there was no statistically significant relationship between teachers at different levels and their views on the statement “Teacher primary, Technology supportive”. Close to 98 percent agreed and validated the primary role of the teacher.

Relationships between variables The study found that schools were found lacking in providing complete Internet infrastructure /access to students on campus and for online teaching. Hence, Null hypothesis (HO1) that adequate Internet infrastructure is not available in schools for the students and teachers in terms of access to students and online use in classes is accepted and the Alternative Hypothesis (H1) is rejected.

The second Null hypothesis (HO2) that Internet has not led to reduced dependency on books among students and encouraged the “Cut n Paste” culture and increased plagiarism was proved to be wrong by the data. Hence it is rejected and the Alternative Hypothesis (H2) is accepted.

Bibliography Bulu Maharana, Bipin Bihari Sethi* and Subedita Behera (2010), Use of internet and e-resources by the students of business management: A survey of P. G. students of business administration, Sambalpur University, India Source:http://www.academicjournals.org/ijlis/PDF/pdf2010/Apr/Maharana %20et%20al.pdf Dillip K. Swain, (2010), Students' keenness on use of e-resources, Electronic Library, The, Vol. 28 Iss: 4, pp.580 – 591. http://www.emeraldinsight.com/journals.htm?articleid=1878370&show=abstr act Geetha B. J.., Subramani R. (2009), A Plea for the Use of Language Portals in Imparting Communication skills. Volume 9 :ISSN 1930-2940. Retrieved from www.languageindia.com Kalyanaraman, Sriram. and Sundar, S. Shyam (2003). The Psychological appeal of Personalized Online Content: An experimental Investigation of Customized Web Portals. International Communication Association. http://www.allacademic.com/meta/p111420_index.html Krishnamurthy, Sundari (2003). Communication Across Borders: Experiences of Rural Indian Women in Using Cyber Cafes. International Communication Association.

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http://www.allacademic.com/meta/p111420_index.html Margam Madhusudhan, (2007), Internet Use by Research Scholars in University of Delhi, India, Library Hi Tech News, Vol. 24 Iss: 8, pp.36– 42 Nalwa Kanwal, Anand Archana Preet (2003). CyberPsychology & Behavior: Internet Addiction in Students: A Cause of Concern. 6(6): 653-656.

Doi:10.1089/109493103322725441. http://www.liebertonline.com New Media Practices in India, Part 4: The Internet http://futuresoflearning.org/index.php/Firda_08/comments/new_media_prac tices_in_india_part_4_the_internet/ Purnima Devi, Th. and Y. Herojit Singh, Internet Users: A Study of Manipur University Library. http://crl.du.ac.in/ical09/papers/index_files/ical94_160_346_1_RV.pdf Rajeev Kumar, Amritpal Kaur (2005), Internet and Its Use in the Engineering Colleges of Punjab, India: A Case Study. Webology, 2(4), Article 21.

Available at: http://www.webology.org/2005/v2n4/a21.html Revathi Viswanathan (2008), Recent Impacts of Internet on English Language Training in India, Electronic Journal for English as a Second Language, December 2008 — Volume 12, Number 3 Sampath Kumar, B.T. and G.T. Kumar, (2010), Perception and usage of eresources and the internet by Indian academics, Electronic Library, The, Vol.28 iss:1, pp.137-156 www.emeraldinsight.com/journals.htm?articleid=1839514&show=pdf State of the Internet in India- June 2011- A Report by ComScore The New 3 E’s of Education (Students leveraging Emerging Technologies for Education), Speak Up National Findings, Project Tomorrow 2011.

White Paper on Information Technology in Education for Development(2009), Global Alliance for ICT and Development, New York

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Notes for Contributors Interface welcomes original research papers in the fields of Mass Communication and Journalism.

• Articles must be no longer than 8,000 words, including notes and references.

• Contributions should be sent preferably by email.

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House style • For the main text, use Times New Roman, 12 point, 1.5 line spacing. For notes, use Times New Roman, 11 point, single-line spacing. Set the alignment as ‘left’.

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• For figures, use Indian system (i.e., lakh, crore) for Indian currency values, and international system (million, billion) for all others including foreign currency.

• All works cited in the text (including sources for tables and figures) should be listed alphabetically under References, on a separate sheet of paper.

• Use endnotes rather than footnotes.

FORM IV INTERFACE 1. Place of Publication: 2. Periodicity of Publication: 3. Printer’s Name: Whether a citizen of India?: (If foreigner, state the country of origin): 4. Publisher’s Name & Address:

Hyderabad Half-yearly Director, Osmania University Press Yes Not Applicable M. Srinath Reddy, Head, Department of Communication & Journalism, Osmania University Whether a citizen of India? : Yes (If foreigner, state the country of origin): Not Applicable 5. Editor’s Name & Address: M. Srinath Reddy Department of Communication & Journalism, Osmania University, Hyderabad 500 007 6. Name(s) and Address(es) of individuals who own the publication and the partners or shareholders holding more than one per cent of the total capital: Osmania University, Hyderabad 500 007.

I, M. Srinath Reddy, hereby declare that the particulars given above are true to the best of my knowledge and belief.

Dated: April 30, 2013 Sd/- M. Srinath Reddy, Editor

New Socialities

New Socialities1 Pramod K. Nayar2

… A new subcategory of Digital Cool is emerging. To be connected and hypervisible, to ‘broadcast yourself’ via Twitter, moblogs or Flickr is Cool. In the age of New Media, Cool is the self writ large upon the world. This hyperlinked, hypervisible self embedded in New Media is the starting point for a new sociality. Self representation online is identity work, presenting aspects of oneself by and from which people can identify us.

Posts, photographs, daily updates are modes of keeping one’s identity and constantly reworking it—and thereby denoting change, growth (perhaps), fluidity and choice. Connectivity and selfSelf representation are embodiments of the Digital Cool representation because they offer the individual a certain amount of online is agency, away from surveillance and control. If voicing is identity work, central to identity formation, New Media is where such presenting voicing can take place. aspects of Cool is connectivity, and Cool is to be networked (Liu oneself by and 2004). To be online and receive email instantly via your from which Blackberry is Cool. To upload your daily activity on the people can blog, fire off a Tweet, or post a scrap on a friend’s pages identify us is Cool. Recall here the Cool formula, E=MC2 with the (e)quality of life drawn from and dependent upon

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

1!This paper is excerpted from the author’s book, Digital Cool: Life in the Age of New Media, Orient BlackSwan (2012). Reprinted with the permission of the publisher.

2 Pramod K. Nayar teaches in the Department of English, University of Hyderabad.

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mobility, connectivity and conviviality. All of these three are embodied in the blogosphere, the webcam and the SNS. The Blogosphere Traditional sociality depends on one’s profile management— how one presents oneself—in F2F (face to face) encounters. The new sociality also relies upon self-representation and cues for the world to ‘see’ us, albeit in cyberspace. A prominent and popular means of putting together a profile in order to get a life (online) is the blog. The Blog is the new folk culture and mass medium.5 Blogs are essentially a form of online diary or life-writing. ... The blog is similar to the diary form, with one crucial difference. The blog, unlike the traditional diary, is multimodal, consisting of textual elements (diary notations, hobbies, quotes), visual graphic elements (photo graphs, icons, weblinks) and interactive elements (online discussion, email IDs).

The multimodal and mass-medium feature of blogging is what makes it one of the most attractive developments in New Media. These are also the reasons why politicians have taken to blogging: with the aim of reaching out to and responding to their constituency. Political blogging from the general public apart, politicians have also discovered the power of the medium.

The Blog is The blog enabled them to put their manifestoes, the new folk views and opinions online and reach people whom they culture and could otherwise not reach: but it also helped them mass listen, via feedback and email, to their audience.6 This medium. It is makes for a more deliberative process in political similar to the culture, all made possible by New Media, though India diary form is still at an early stage of this revolution in political but multiactivism and discourse. modal Blogging allows you to put up your picture and invite people to talk to you. The viewer can click on any link they want and explore any aspect of your life (or rather, what you have chosen to upload). The blog is the space where you can ‘meet’ people, and where visitors can see your life. It is the space of interaction, a new social space, a new conviviality.

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New Socialities

Blogging is Cool because: • it is a form that allows one to constantly change (makeover) oneself in the virtual world • it encourages creativity in this self-reinvention • it allows one to advertise the reinvented self.

The logic and spirit of blogging is the advertisement of perpetual change. The blog allows for regular and repeated reinvention. Here perpetual change refers to the endless construction and reconstruction of the private self for potentially unlimited public consumption. In this blogging is intimately con nected to the culture of self-management, where presentation and re-presentation of the self is central to identity.

Blogging is the newest form of ‘impression management’ through the sharing of tastes, attitudes, ideas and personal details (Miller 2008).

Actually we need to see blogging and SNSes as facilitating the ‘celebration of the self-aware subject’ (Kitzman 2003: 52). This simply means: I am intensely aware of my self, and I believe this self is worth publicising and knowing. Blogging empowers the ordinary individual with a PC and a broadband connection to advertise her/himself.

YouTube’s ‘Broadcast Yourself’ is an excellent YouTube’s slogan for the new Cool of self-advertisement.

‘Broadcast Consumer culture relies upon the desire to constantly Yourself’ is an reinvent oneself through fashion, looks and selfexcellent representations, of demonstrating lifestyles and taste. slogan for Blogging therefore is an extension of the consumer the new cultures where everything caters to my appearance, Cool of selfself-esteem and identity. Just as clothes, devices or advertisement food are personalised and customised in consumer culture, blogging takes personalisation to its logical extent.

Selfrepresentation is yet another index of consumer culture, where self-representation and personalisation are integral to identity. Blogging is a dialogic communication—it may be a personal diary, but it is a diary that is out in the world for the people to read and respond to (unlike in a print diary). Thus the blog can be seen as an introduction or

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a conversation starter, when the viewer clicks, we have an electronic ‘Hello’ and a handshake.

The blog or the Facebook profile is analogous to the homepage. The homepage acts like any other doorknocker or bell which the visitor rings before entering the home. The home being the space of the personal and the private is thus the space where the outsider meets the resident. (‘Press Enter’ to meet me!) The homepage is a means of breaking down the private/public barrier, just like an invitation to the home is. Blogging marks the interesting shift in the very notion of privacy. When in 1996 Jennifer Ringley launched the lifecam trend with her ‘Jennicam’ it announced a new era in the publicisation of the private. Jennifer uploaded her daily life—recorded by a camera—for the world to consume, and ran this till 2003.7 What is the reason for the popularity of the medium with its multiple genres (the blog, the webcam, the profile, the homepage)? The attractions of the personal page/post are many.

• It helps advertise your self. It invites people to look at and connect with your self irrespective of their geographical location. It enables you to publicise your interests, fears and fantasies.

• People come together based on common interests It makes all of discovered through such revelations online—and a us performers community is formed. on the stage • Webcams convert the everyday into a spectacle, which is New as Jennicam did. As we have argued in the case of the Media: we are Reality TV show, the dramatisation of the real is the on somebody’s publicisation of the routine and the ordinary. The screen! new sociality is this telecasting of one’s everyday.

• It makes all of us performers on the stage which is New Media: we are on somebody’s screen! In a sense, the new sociality is this theatre of the everyday. One is free to indulge oneself in recording what nobody else might find worthy of recording.

Unlike the soap operas or the film documentary produced by media conglomerates, webcams have a different relationship with the everyday material world of the individual. The webcam makes a hero/ine of all of us.

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• Webcams and blogs are about selective self-representation (as all self-representation is). In the case of webcams, it has been argued, it alters the stakes in representation and self-representation, especially for women (White 2003). Women have traditionally been ‘objects’ for the males to feast their eyes on. Women have rarely controlled the technologies in and through which they have been represented. When women control the webcam, they determine what the men will see. In other words, with webcam and blogging women assert their control over the technology, self-representation and, most significantly, over the spectators.

The new sociality emerges from this Cool condition of constantly updating of one’s self for the world to consume. In order to understand the necessity, popularity and significance of this process we need to probe the contexts in which New Media and its practices emerge.

Social theorists speak of ‘cool loyalties’ and ‘thin solidarities’ in the late twentieth century (Turner 2000). Such loyalties and solidarities in relationships, groups and communities is what I am calling the ‘new sociality’; electronically mediated, ephemeral, The new simultaneously distant and intimate, fluid and shifting. sociality And even this ‘cool loyalty’ depends on an effective selfrepresentation. emerges from The blog or any form of New Media selfthis Cool representation must be seen as an integral part of condition of identity-making in the fragmented postmodern age…. constantly Bonds and loyalties were once based on family and updating of place ties. But in the fragmented and fluid states— one’s self sociologist Zygmunt Bauman terms it, appositely, ‘liquid modernity’—of the postmodern such ties are never automatic (Bauman 2001). You do not acquire contacts and a social circle automatically by virtue of your family—you build it yourself. They must be worked at, and this requires a continuous advertising of the self and its biography.

That is, in an age when individualisation and atomisation is our dominant existential condition, the onus is on the self to seek and establish bonds. … It is in such a context that there is the onus on the

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self to work the collective through. This demands a continuous process of: • self-representation • the dissemination of this self-representation and • the reinvention of this self-representation to suit shifting contexts.

The new sociality is based on contingency and immediacy, of shifting and altering loyalties. Just as the blog represents a lifestory that is never finalised (unlike print autobiography), the new sociality across continents, cultures and timezones is never finalised. Blogging means the lifestory is not over, is incomplete and necessarily fragmented. With relationships built without F2F communication, the new sociality relies on the webpage, the scrap, the post—all of which can be reloaded differently.

The new sociality is based on, indeed thrives on, the click of the ‘refresh’ icon on MS Word. In other words, reinvention and constant upgrading is the new mobility empowered by the electronic media.

And before conservative-minded people say that all this selfadvertisement indicates narcissism: blogging or To advertise webcams is not entirely about the self. To one’s self, advertise one’s self, home, the personal is to home, the belong to a community. To share photos on Flickr personal is to or upload one’s daily routine is a new mode of belong to a sociality because the community is constructed community. through this sharing of the personal.

Hypervisible and Everywhere to Go The new Cool is to be hypervisible and therefore hyperlinked. New Media technically allows you to broadcast yourself 24x7. The fascinating thing here is, unlike a traditional diary/autobiography, the blog allows you to represent yourself differently everyday. You need not be the same everyday—broadcast yourself, but also reinvent yourself. What New Media allows you to do is to constantly alter the representation of the self. Cool selves are not restricted to one appearance or role.

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The new Cool of hyperlinked and hypervisible selves is a social performance where one can be anything s/he likes. It is the performance of an identity itself. You can change your appearance on an hourly basis, should you be so inclined (and have the time). The blog and the homepage becomes the stage on which we can don any, all, every role. Blogging is a social performance that is constantly reinvented, and to which the audience can respond. Cool is being flexible, inventive, choosing contingency over steadiness, multiples instead of singularities. Cool is the reinvention of the self, of playing many roles and occupying many performances—a type of mobile, shifting self.

So how is this a new sociality?

Sociality is based on social performances, communication and linkages. We present a self to the world, and the world responds to it.

Sociality is the interaction between selves, or, to be more accurate, between the representations of the selves (after all, we only present those aspects of our selves to the world that we want the world to see).

Now, in the world of electronic linkages, the interaction Cool is the is not between faces and bodies, but between mediated reinvention of forms online: facebooks and scraps, photogalleries and the self, of camcorded selves. I write my identity and get it playing many validated when others respond to it. In this manner I roles and create both my self and a community that validates me. occupying Hypervisibility in New Media is a mode of traversing many vast geographical and cultural spaces, unhindered by performances immigration or visas (but definitely by Internet speeds).

Hypervisibility is integral to the new sociality because now social interaction is now primarily a question of online presence and constantly reinvented identities in cyberspace. Think of cyberspace as a large network of linked selves (blogs here stand in for selves). Every individual (homepage) is one node in this proliferating network of blogs and selves. The world of cyberspace is a rhizome, endlessly networked, random and proliferating along newer and newer routes. The individual is not a destination here, and the home page is not a goal.

Every individual is a route to something more or something else.

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The new sociality is a series of proliferating paths rather than destinations. The blog is a temporary halting place, a cybersarai, where you view uploaded material and move on—a mobility unheard of and unthinkable before.

Hyperlinkages and the Making of a Community Moblogs also enable the creation of online campaigns and communities. Like the ‘pink chaddies’ campaign in 2009 India, there have been other instances where online communities have engaged in serious political debates and interventions. I have elsewhere demonstrated how even personal blogs can become the starting points for community formation, and thus a revitalized public sphere (Nayar 2009b).

In 2004 the University of South Carolina distributed camera phones to amateur reporters and designated them as election observers and provided a platform, the Wireless Election Connection Moblog (www.wec-textamerica.com), thus signi ficantly altering the nature of the election and the student community’s role.

There have When US Speaker Trent Lott made some racist been instances remarks in 2003, the main newspapers did only a where online minor coverage. It was the blogging community communities that spread the details and created a public have engaged awareness campaign that eventually led to his in serious removal. political Here personal blogging leads to a political debates and agenda and meeting. I would therefore suggest interventions that blogs are a form of social media where the personal meets (or can meet) the social and the political. Blogs about environmental issues, crime, law and order, political developments serve a very useful social purpose—consciousness raising and campaigns. Many blogs may be more grassroots than mainstream media which are controlled by corporate houses. Workblogs share information about particular professions and have been very successful.

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information about new their pro ducts. (However, India is still, it is claimed at the nascent stage with blogging and other New Media political activism, evidenced by the fact that the youth—the main audience for New Media propaganda in the 2009 elections—remained apathetic to the political process (Krishnan 2009)!)

Blogging is therefore not simply personal. They are an extension and alternative to dominant public discourses. They provide a new platform for propaganda, information-dissemination and publicity. They are tactical in the sense they need not be permanent structures and can come into being only for particular occasions (such as the pink chaddies campaign). While many are personal opinion pieces, they also serve as a mass medium akin to opinion pieces in magazines or a newsletter. In this they serve a crucial purpose: public opinion making. News blogs, one of the fastest expanding and most popular genres in blogging, for example, have effected a wider dissemination of political opinion and debate. Somewhere between ‘traditional’ political action (dharna, rasta rokos, agitations and voting) and mainstream news coverage (TV, periodicals and newspapers), news blogs generate a Mobility, new medium of political expression. connectivity, Here the blogging serves as a personal commentconviviality — page that can link to other such pages in a new the three key political conviviality. If techno-cool is the mix of the elements of the individual and the political, of the consumer citizen.

Digital Thus mobility, connectivity and conviviality—the Everyday that three key elements of the Digital Everyday that enhance the enhance the (E)quality of life—are all visible here.

(E)quality of SNSes and the New Sociality Social Networking life Sites (SNSes) mark the newest form of social interaction. Orkut (popular mainly in India and Brazil), MySpace, Blogger, Facebook are worlds occupied by people—especially youth— for several hours everyday. These are web services where people can host profiles, chat and communicate in a virtual version of public space.

A more comprehensive definition would be: ‘web-based services that allow individuals to (i) construct a public or semi-public profile within a bounded system, (ii) articulate a list of other users with whom they share

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a connection, and (iii) view and traverse their list of connections and those made by others within the system’ (Boyd and Ellison 2007).

SNSes are spaces constructed almost entirely of user-generated content. Exchanges and conversations make up what Facebook is, except of course for the infrastructure.8 As social media with usergenerated content, Facebook and other SNSes have begun to facilitate pedagogy and classroom work in many parts of the world. This includes arranging study groups, learning about course processes, greater selfreliance, and a different model of student-teacher interaction. It was primarily about student collaborative work, according to one study, thus indicating a reinforcement of the community itself.

So what makes this new form such a fascinating world? To begin with there is the sheer ease of uploading, communication and using the technology. Most SNSes are very userfriendly and give a lot of scope for you to do what you want. The convergence of the Internet and the mobile phone, with Twitter and others enabling instant updates, this has become even more simplified. While the architecture of the SNS can determine the codes for friending, most users There is invariably modify the network’s norms to suit their attraction that individual tastes and needs. you can meet Then there is attraction that you can meet likelike-minded minded people irrespective of geographical location.

Fans meet their rock bands, environmentalists meet people other nature-lovers, and even Marxists meet other irrespective of Marxists! Teenagers, research shows, used SNSes to geographical escape the surveillance of their parents (Boyd 2008). It location minimised the power adults had over the lives of the adolescents, and enabled them to develop social relations outside the purview of authority. A study of YouTube captures the freedom of this space well: As intentional and unintentional surveillance becomes more commonplace in contemporary society, people will likely continue to seek ways to carve out privacy in highly visible media environments.

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participants will nevertheless manipulate public systems in ways that preserve, in a fractalized pattern, different desired levels of informational and behavioral publicity and privacy. (Lange 2007) There are, as this study points out, varying degrees of publicness, but the undisputed fact is that the medium and the genre both facilitate a certain degree of privacy beyond surveillance. Incidentally, the very definition of the ‘public’ has come to imply a social space that is exclusively the young individual’s private concern—facilitated in a large measure by FB and the fact that parents are rarely among the ‘friends’ list of individuals on FB (West et al. 2009).

A Cool Third Space One of the most intriguing features of SNSes is the very nature of the space of say, Facebook or Orkut. SNSes are spaces between the private and the public and constitute the newest for of conviviality facilitated by New Media technologies. Social relationships in real life are affected, altered, reinforced by online ‘friending’. The converse—online interaction leading to offline meetings and relationships, as the dating services discovered—is also true. SNSes generate a border 100 Digital Cool territory, a liminal or ‘third space’ that partakes Social of: the private and the public, the real as well as the relationships in virtual worlds. In order to be truly Cool one should be real life are able to display a long list of ‘friends’ and respondents affected, on one’s Facebook profile or blog. The ‘advertisement’ altered, of an individual’s ‘Friends’ on her/his profile enables reinforced by viewers to explore the network of that particular online individual. In other words, one can ‘display’ one’s ‘friending’ connections!

Indeed this ‘display’ is part of the ‘impression management’— to impress people of the number of connections and clicks one’s blog gets. The more connections one displays the more connections one gets. Research has shown that for many Facebook users ‘selective self-presentation in digital media, which leads to intensi fied relationship formation, also influences impressions of the self’ (Gonzales and Hancock 2011: 79). Other empirical studies reveal that

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individuals higher in narcissism and lower in self-esteem are engaged in greater online activity as well as some self-promotional content on FB (Mehdizadeh 2010). In other words, ‘the writing on the wall’ helps my self-esteem, especially if lots of people say ‘like’.

The virtual in the case of the SNSes, in fact, enables the fantasies and realities of the material world to find uninhibited expression. It is a space where your darkest fears, fantasies and ‘dangerous’ relationships can be played out without worries of disease or messy histrionics.

In the new Cool sociality of cyberculture, online life is not a parallel to offline life, but closely aligned with and connected to the real one.

Social realities—gender, class, race—spill over into online interactions.

Prejudices, likes and passions are carried into cyberspace. Personal angst and anxieties find online expression and responses. SNSes are spaces where these can be indulged in, and you can find sympathy (now called ‘cybersolace’) (Beder 2005), affection and support (some have referred to it ‘cyberspirituality’ that ‘enables them to apperceive some sense of connectedness with other like-minded seekers’[Yust et al. 2010: 291]). Online life affects our real one—and actions in cyberspace do impinge upon our real bodies, minds and sensibilities.

SNSes are interesting because they re-create for us Social a parallel world that is at once distant and familiar. realities— Inhabiting an entirely new world would be frightening gender, class, race—spill over (think of beginners in World of Warcraft). Viewing photographs of old friends (that you have known in into online interactions. So real life), making new ones based on unreliable profiles constitute two examples of the SNS world’s are prejudices, distant-cum-familiar aspect. It is the simultaneous colikes and existence of the disturbingly new/strange and the passions. comfortingly familiar that characterises the attraction of SNS worlds.

It is Cool to ignore the possibility that somebody’s profile online might be fake (but it is uncool to fake a profile). It is quite Cool to

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correspond with somebody exclusively online in another part of the world, even if one is rooted in the here and now. Cool in the new sociality is this fascinating blend of the private and personal with the public and the collective: you could share your deepest secrets and fantasies online, but you would not do so with the real people who inhabit your flesh-and-blood world. Cool sociality as identifiable with SNSes is the escaping of confines (of spaces and relationships), norms of behaviour into a new space.

Privacy, Publicity and Profiles Yet this charming ‘third space’ is not without its share of problems (worlds created by humans are bound to be marked by human problems!). A commonly expressed anxiety about SNS-related problems is the question of privacy—especially about porn, credit card fraud, paedophilia, and, after Patrawala, safety. It must be kept in mind that the constructions of what is ‘public’ and what is ‘private’ are different online and offline. For example, in physical spaces, there is a restriction on who shares the space with you in the pub, in the classroom, or the multiplex. This restriction is 102 Digital Cool relatively minimal in online worlds—which is why A commonly MySpace and other expressed SNSes began to worry about restricted access. In 2004– 5 MySpace’s role in sexual harassment, stalking and anxiety about other predatory behaviour prompted legal action and SNS-related generated a moral panic (Consumer Affairs 2006). problems is the Reports, such as a recent one about how ‘one in five’ question of teen surfers falls prey to paedophiles ensures that the privacy anxiety about cybersafety remains in the public imaginary (Deccan Chronicle 2009: 3).

Such actions are the climactic moments of an anxiety that the new technologies generate new kinds of problems. Actually problems like paedophilia and stalking aren’t new at all—they have just acquired a new form. This form, of course, is facilitated by the ICTs. A key feature of SNSes is the sharing of personal information. The criteria for membership determines the extent of the public or private

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nature of the network (this varies, for example, from Facebook to the more professional LinkedIn or the exclusive aSmallWorld). Then there is the sharing of information within the network, among members, as well as criteria as to who can access this information. Finally, there is the information environment a member can create within the network—who s/he chooses as friend, etc.12 Research has shown that, like real life, online relationships also rely on factors like trust and authenticity (Dwyer et al. 2007). Sharing information is a way of acquiring trust and the initiation of a relationship even in cyberspace. And this is where the question of safety makes its appearance. Information about physical addresses, finances and even physical appearance beg questions of safety: who is the information going to? To what use can such information be put? What we see here is a close link between online details and networking and offline, real safety issues. The release of information about physical addresses, for example, connect online and offline identities. Identity thefts online are a constant threat when users reveal their identities or create profiles. The ‘third space’ impacts upon the real one, and this impact is not illusory or virtual but real.

Networks now offer greater conditions of security.

Research has Microsoft’s LiveSpaces and aSmallWorld are offering shown that, private networking, open only by invitation and patronised, according to one report, by prosperous like real life, people in the US and UK (Vogt and Knapman 2008). online In some cases, research demonstrates, SNSes and relationships online communities are value additions to an also rely on individual or group’s social capital because it helps factors like secure influence, prestige and power from somebody trust and else on the network (Boase et al. 2006). The larger authenticity posts, scraps, snaps and ‘hits’ one gets, the better is the sense of self. We are in the age of the ‘quantification of popularity’.13 Youth constitute the single largest user demographic of SNSes. The SNS existence is as much a part of their real lives as material cultural practices. It is not possible or desirable to separate the way the youth represent themselves online from their real-life role-playing. Profile 72! INTERFACE | JUNE 2013!

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management and self-representation on SNSs are components of a social identity, even if that identity is only online. These online signs are ‘cultural signs’ and ‘taste statements’ and inform the individual’s social life online (Liu 2007). Therefore, it is imperative for individuals to maintain the kind of profile online as they do in real life in order to ensure both authenticity as well as sustained popularity.

When people meet both online and offline and media practices reflect and affect existing social behaviour, interaction and relations, it becomes impossible to disentangle the roles. Sharing movies, music, books or hobbies online becomes the means to finding or reinforcing existing relations. Thus SNSes support the material practices of youth cultures.

Extensible Relations What exactly is an SNS relationship? The self extends itself into the world, into any geographical, cultural or time zones and meets other selves. SNSes are ‘contact zones’, where selves (or, more accurately, self-portraits) meet others, exchange notes, engage in a relationship.14 The SNS is the site of the extensible, the augmented SNSes are self/relationship. ‘contact zones’, The SNS is a prosthetic device that serves as a supplement to the existing self. It is at once a ‘device’ that where selves completes us because we can speak to and engage with meet others, other like-minded people, and at the same time it is an exchange excess which extends our self into another domain. What notes, engage I am saying is—the SNS relationship is both a necessary in a completion of our self and an excessive extension of it. relationship We can su rvive without an online friendship, but an online friendship can add to our sense of self too.

SNSes help reinforce existing ties and thus revitalise social interaction at a time when we feel that we are more alienated than any of our preceding generations. Facebook, Orkut and others help us get back in touch with those we had lost contact with. In the material world, online interactions help renew friendships and relations. SNSes

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therefore are spaces where the augmentations of existing relations can take place.

For scattered populations and family members, the SNS is a useful meeting place. Distant ties are renewed or reinforced despite the geographical difference. In the case of diasporic and displaced communities or groups, the SNS becomes a substitute homeland—and cyberspace can create a community without a territory. This community or ‘home/space’ is no less significant for its members.15 Space becomes place through social interaction, as geographers and theorists have argued.16 More recent studies suggest that Wikipedia authors also constitute a community, one based on ethos and action (what is called an ethos-community), and where people join by ‘committing themselves to a set of norms, behavioural standards and attitudes’, that is by participating in its ethos (Pentzold 2010: 712). It is less in the structure than in the discourses that the community is formed.

If that is the case, then communities that meet in cyberspace do experience the same, or at least comparable, kind of attachment or bonding among its members as they would have felt In the case of if they were meeting in a material ‘hometown’. diasporic and When there is no territorial home, cyberspace and displaced Usenet sites function as home—and is no less valued communities for that. The network is where the heart is, in other or groups, the words. The SNS therefore is a necessary extra, a Social supplement we cannot do without.

Networking Sites becomes a substitute homeland

Phatic Exchanges Are self-disclosures and expressions of emotions truly affective communications? Commentators suggest that expressive communication has diluted the commitment to the emotion expressed (Miller 2008). Excessive expressions of intimacy or sentiment do not really mean anything— they are phatic because there is no commitment to the emotion expressed on talk shows, email, SMS or SNSes.

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These emoticons, smileys and compressed expressive statements are exchanges that, according to Vincent Miller, merely an act of empty communications. While the self-disclosure and expressive enunciation enable the formation of some trust and authenticity, there seems to be an unwritten norm that these expressions are not to be taken so very seriously.

Further, the problem remains that much of what is tweeted and uploaded amounts to very little useful/useable knowledge. A Pearanalytics study noted that around 40 per cent of tweets was simply ‘pointless babble’ with no ‘pass along’ value.17 Observers noted that if you searched Twitter for keywords ‘eating sandwich’, one would get dozens of hits posted within the past three hours, and even as you looked at those 20 more ‘eating sandwich’ tweets come through (Stevenson and Peck 2011: 57)!

Clearly what we are looking at is communication for the sake of communication—where the process of information exchange rather than the quality of what is exchanged or passed on is a bigger priority.

Occasionally the exchange of information by bystanders and random witnesses might have unforeseen consequences.

To take an extreme case, the Mumbai terrorists Another were able to get ‘situational information’ about the consequence of movement of troops and policemen by monitoring the constant tweets and live media—which were being updated by Indian witnesses to whatever was happening on the flow of ground. The decisions of the terrorists were therefore information modified and adapted to whatever was happening around is the through the remote handler’s constant second-order rise of a greater surveillance of the bystanders.18 awarenessof Another consequence of the constant flow of events and information around is the rise of a greater awareness— news among those who want to be aware!—of events and news unfolding around them. Twitter and microblogging are modes of information-sharing that enable ‘citizens to maintain a mental model of news and events around them’, a condition being described as ‘ambient journalism’ (Hermida 2010). Take www.witness.org as an example.

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Amateur videos and movies of human rights abuse are uploaded on the site, some leading to political and social campaigns and legislation.

‘Ambient journalism’ here is the Awareness we have developed as a result of the information flows, and to which we might contribute as well.

Fans Online Politics demands a shift from the individual to the collective. Online worlds help generate communities irrespective of geographical distance or difference. One of the best examples of the new sociality enabled by digital culture and New Media is fan communities online. www.vluvshahrukhkhan.com is only one of the several fan associations that meets regularly in cyberspace. Its fan members are scattered across the world, follow different professions and live very different lifestyles. If devoid of the focus—SRK—it is improbable that these individuals would ever have a common meeting ground. Yet the associative bonds that hold them together are strong—at least in cyberspace.

This is the new sociality—the cultural intimacy that New Media helps and promotes, with little attention to the differences. Cultural intimacy is possible because the other cues and factors that govern social interaction—looks, lifestyle information, Cultural behaviour—are absent in email exchanges and intimacy is electronic communication. exclusively Cultural intimacy in fan cultures is exclusively generated generated among disparate people through a among common cultural icon—the celebrity. It ignores or disparate erases the differences in favour of a common point of people through attraction and attention. The new sociality a common embodied in online fan groups is built on a cultural icon— simultaneous erasure (of other, differing factors) and the celebrity emphasis (of common taste, affection and admiration for the celebrity or icon).

What does an online fan community do as part of its new sociality?

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streets, meetings and so on. Online fan associations by the very nature cannot do any of this. The new sociality is based on information gathering, dispersal and appropriation. Fan associations compile in cyberspace a prodigious amount of information about their chosen idol.

The entire community thrives on information exchange and sharing.

Thus reports of SRK’s inauguration of the Warwick castle tourist project were offered by his fans on his fan sites. Details of his films, his family and his background are freely available online from his fans. Fan sites constitute a new sociality as informational spaces—where you can go if you are seeking information. While this information may or may not be official (that is authorised by the celebrity), it contributes in major ways to the fan culture and helps generate a cultural intimacy.

The new sociality in the case of fan associations is therefore an informational sociality.

Yet this new sociality is not only about a generous sharing of information. Fans also contribute in significant ways to the consumer culture around the star. Since celebrity culture is intimately linked to consumer culture, as argued elsewhere, fans contribute to this through their glorification of the star, information packaged for consumption and the general aura they promote around every aspect of Fans also alter the star’s life and work (Nayar 2009a). The fans themselves, of course, are consumers of the celebrity: but they also the reception actively promote the celebrity consumption outside the and immediate circle of the fans. Fan activity around a star dissemination promotes curiosity and desire—and these are inseparable of the celebrity from consumer culture. For example, the championing of when they anti-piracy campaigns by fans (though undermined by their move from own illegitimate appropriation of information and images online to offline of the star!) contributes to the public culture of the star, as life well as to the politics of the region or time.

Fans also alter the reception and dissemination of the celebrity when they move from online to offline life. Football club fans or rock band fans, for example, sell and purchase tickets to the games and shows and ensure that they are present in large numbers at the celebrity’s event.

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The new sociality here is facilitated by and facilitates community interaction when they move from online to offline expressions and gatherings. This is a major contribution to the public culture of a place because the gathering of fans, their efforts to promote a star, and their reception of the star/ event is a component of public space and public activity. It is no more just an online expression by random individuals of desire for the celebrity but a visible coming together of individuals.

One more feature of fan sites requires our attention. Fans produce a vast amount of creative work around their chosen idol. Fan writing is a major component of celebrity culture, and contri butes to the aura and consumption of the celebrity (Fiske 1992). The new sociality is constituted of this sharing of creative work by fans. It might be, to some, derivative. Yet what cannot be denied is that Fan productions are an expression of the independent will and power of the fan (what social theorists would term ‘agency’). Fanzines produce fan fictions.

The production of fan fiction shifts the status of the fan from being a passive consumer (of the star) to a producer in her/his own right.

Communities of fans (e.g., www.tintinologist.com) construct parallel The production stories about their favour ite characters and stories.

A film script, Kabhi Na Kabhi Pyar to Hoga, of fan fiction starring SRK and Kajol, is available on his fan site, shifts the as is some poetry. These fan productions are a status of the component of the new sociality because they are fan from being instrumental in forging a community and initiate a a passive form of social interaction. consumer to a

producer

E-Media and the New Community In terms of origins the words ‘community’ and ‘communication’ are derived from the same roots. What this suggests is fairly obvious—a community is formed through acts of communication.

Or, communication through various media enables social interaction and hence the making of a community. This etymological connection inspires media theorist John Thompson to write: ‘the use of communication media involves the creation of new forms of action and interaction in the social world, new kinds of social relationships and 78! INTERFACE | JUNE 2013!

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new ways of relating to others and oneself’ (Thompson 1995: 4). If Thompson is right, and media forms inculcate a spirit of community through acts of communication, then New Media offers an astronomical potential to link individuals and regions into communities.

This potential has indeed been realised in various parts of the world.

In 1989 in Santa Monica the Public Electronic Network was a local government attempt to use the new communications and computer technology for social and political purposes. It became a forum where citizens could talk to public officials and each other about local issues and problems. Local communities have linked together through the Internet and electronic com munication to discuss local matters and issues. Later, Community Technology Centers (CTCs) and Community Computing Networks (CCNs) were set up in various cities to facilitate neighbour hood interaction and debates over civic issues.

SARAI’s Cybermohalla was an attempt to chronicle the daily lives of people in Delhi (www.sarai.net).

The new sociality is more than simply entertainment, fan clubs and blogging. The new sociality as facilitated by New Media constitutes an important step in changed participation in local The new government, in the interventionary role of local bodies sociality is and in citizen participation. New Media produces what more than the fervent propagandist for online life, Howard simply Rheingold has termed ‘communitarian spaces on-line’ entertainment, (Rheingold 1994: 56). fan clubs and Twitter, researchers found, played a significant role blogging during the 2009 H1NI pandemic with information from credible sources being passed along (of course with a large quantum of opinions and experiences).

There is the potential, the researchers concluded, for an ‘infodemiology’ (information-based epidemiology) in the interests of public health (Chew and Eysenbach 2010). Once again we witness the communitarian role of social media where the expert, the lay-person co-produce useful knowledge in public interest.

Wikis, open source and knowledge-sharing are key features of ensuring the proper and complete access to reliable information to

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make up a quality public sphere. Independent media centers (IMCs or indymedia) give underrepresented people space on news channels thus widening and democratising civil society.

Closely paralleling global-justice, media-activism, radicaldemocracy and free-software movements, indymedia’s diversity contributes to the reconfiguration of civil society (Morris 2004)—and this is also a new sociality, one with strong political agendas and overtones. The new sociality is a politically significant coming together of individuals and communities into citizen groups, voluntary organisations, NGOs and welfare bodies. This online communitarianism may not be a substitute for street politics, or even make a dent in the intransigent parliament, but they increasingly alter the nature of public participation and therefore the public space.

What the new sociality enables is a ‘network society’.19 Here populations deliberate and exert pressure on governing bodies and representatives. Civil society is energised through online cam paigns and protests (witness the success of the primarily online anti-Rama Sene protests, 2009). If democracy’s success hinges upon What the new informed consent, then the consent can be shaped sociality through (i) the dissemination of accurate, even enables is a antagonistic information (commonly called ‘both sides ‘network of the issue’) and (ii) deliberations. In this process of society’ where creating informed consent and deliberative populations democracy New Media-driven new sociality plays a deliberate and major role. exert pressure India’s famous Self-employed Women’s Association (SEWA) for instance, has used ICTs to create extensive databases, mailing lists and networks (http://www.sewa.org/). Another women-centered directory, Sigi Women’s Home Business Directory (www.sitagita.com), allows visitors to search for women-friendly services (fashion, finance, children’s needs, sports, entertainment). Such forms of community are crucial not only for the dissemination of useful information but also as means of support to particular sections of society. This new sociality therefore has

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a role in the bonding of social groups and individuals—and this could form the basis of local governments and even democratic campaigns.

The new sociality is politically Cool in the sense it eschews the street politics of yesteryears (especially in metropolises), but is able to muster support and launch campaigns through New Media. Such a goaloriented networking is the augmentation of movements for social justice in the material world. The new sociality can enable alteration of material realities for a greater number of people. http://LoveandRomance.html The new sociality also takes another form—the quest for love, romance and sex in cyberspace. Research has shown that sex is the most searched/queried term and topic on the Internet’s search engines (Griffiths 2001: 333). According to another study, Americans have spent $ 200 million on fee-based adult sites, and some reports account for $ 1 billion in revenues (Ferree 2003: 385). Online Sexual Activities (OSA) constitute a major source of revenue in terms Americans of people subscribing to paid services and have spent $ advertising, and marking the arrival of what I have 200 million on elsewhere termed the ‘sexual internet’ (Nayar fee-based adult 2008d). sites, and some Cyberromance could either be reports account • an extension of real-life romance (where the for $ 1 billion in cyberromance revenues leads to offline relationships) or • an entirely new social relationship restricted to the virtual world.

Internet dating, cyber-flirting, cybersex are all new forms of sexuallyor romantically inclined sociality enabled by New Media. What makes online love affairs and cybersex vastly different from traditional porn is the high degree of interactivity.20 Pornographic writing, a romance novel or an erotic film immerses us into its world, but we remain passive consumers of the images/text that appear before our eyes.

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Further, we have little degree of control over the images or text. The greater degree of involvement with the characters, images, text and writing, and the participation in the actions, that mark cybersex and cyberromance is what makes the form and medium so much more attractive, even addictive.

That is, sex that is transcoded into New Media formats is qualitatively different from sex ‘produced’ (with say hyperrealism, interactivity and multimodal presentations) using New Media across different platforms like chat, MUDs and blogs. Interactivity renders cyberromance and cybersex far more real psychologically (Ben-Ze’Ev 2004: 209). On the one hand it enables us to indulge in our darkest fantasies, and on the other enables us to participate in, and enact these (rather than read about) with another person online. What I am suggesting is—cyberromance and cybersex constitute a very real ‘second life’. Cyberaffairs are sexual relationships initiated and sustained predominantly, but not always only, in online environments.

There are various types of online relationships: Singles sites • those that are exclusively in cyberspace, between mushroomed individuals who (will) never meet (virtual online from the early relationships), years of the • those who start online relationships but who, with twenty-first increasing intimacy wish to take it offline too (developmental online relationships), century in • those who meet first offline and then take their India, driven relationship into virtual environments as extensions of by the rising the ‘real’ one (maintaining online relationships) Internet access (Griffiths 1999).

Intimacy Online: Internet Dating Singles sites mushroomed from the early years of the twenty-first century in India. Internet dating has helped singles find partners, affection and companionship, often outside the purview of their families and social circle. In this, the Internet provides an unmatched degree of freedom for individuals. The success of Internet dating can be

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attributed to several features of New Media and the kinds of sociality it enables and encourages: • flexible physical attributes • varied self-presentations • controlled risk and adventure • freedom from commitment The most obvious would be that physical attributes need not prevent the preliminary socialisation. In a country where fairness and other physical attributes determine, to a considerable extent, the possibility of socialisation, the relative anonymity of the virtual worlds enables one to at least begin socialisation. Internet dating allows one to establish an emotional and intellectual rapport before embarking upon a romantic involvement. Where physical attributes become inhibitors in F2F socialising, online socialising can become a boon.

Self-presentations are made more flexible with the Internet and its adjunct technologies. Admittedly this means that all potential ‘suitors’ on such websites must be treated as having offered glamorous rather than authentic self-presentations. For people with For introverted complexes about their looks and appearance, the personalities, Internet offers a medium where they can be anything the medium they want to be or look like. Since you do not, very becomes a often, expose yourself completely on the www, there is a safer, relatively measure of guarded risk-taking possible. more Similarly, for introverted personalities, the medium anonymous becomes a safer, relatively more anonymous space of space of social social interaction. Studies have shown how loneliness interaction that prevents socialization becomes alleviated when sufferers engage in self-disclosure and gain sup port, sympathy and sometimes even affection in chat (Leung 2002). Those who have problems in face-to-face interaction find the screen and the avatar a much ‘safer’ way to socialise. It is possible that individuals who become tongue-tied in the presence of strangers, find the Internet a more congenial space for conversation. The avatar in virtual worlds

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becomes a mask which we then present to the world, and the mask is the world’s first ‘sight’ of us.

The element of risk and the thrill of adventure—indulging in preferences and tastes that would otherwise be difficult to express in particular social contexts—add to the charm of the online romance.

This risk is, unlike in real life, is more controlled. Research has found that the romance as adventure is a key factor in individuals taking to Internet dating (Lawson and Leck 2006). One need not conform to stereotypical roles or ‘acceptable’ social norms of behaviour.

The freedom to end a relationship with far fewer messiness than in real life is definitely a plus in Internet dating. Freedom from commitment—and from fidelity, perhaps, since virtual worlds offer multiple romance possibilities that are easier to conceal—is a definite lure for online romance seekers. In the case of young users, such risktaking, while not unique to their use of the Internet, extends their general risk versus opportunity mode of determining and emphasising their identity (Livingstone 2008).

Research has found that the romance as adventure is a key factor in individuals taking to Internet dating

Cyberflirting and Cybersex Flirting is, first and foremost, an act of communication—an expression of interest or attraction, a self-representation and teasing. The difference is—here the body is transmitted and represented entirely in the form of text (verbal as well visual). Two things could happen here: one could construct one’s self as text for the sake of online flirtation, or leave the other correspondent to imagine what you look like.

An interesting reading argues that cyberflirtation is also play (Whitty and Carr 2003). The play occurs between the real person and the ‘fantasy person’ of the virtual world, between real individuals and the online avatars. Cyberspace is a space full of potential where one can be more or other than what one really is. There is something akin to the sense of play in cybersex, especially in the manipulation of avatars, selfrepresentation and exchanges—a feature, also, of gameworlds.

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Online sex provides a great deal of information about the sexual possibilities open to any individual. The Internet thus becomes a source of information as linked to sexual pleasure in the realm of cybersex.

Emotional attachments, arousal and psychological pleasure can often lead to visits to virtual sex shops or subscriptions, thus ‘rounding off’ the online sexual experience. Thus cybersex has a psychological element.

Erotic text messages (usually dialogue), often dealing with sexual fantasies and accompanied by masturbation constitute what is popularly called cybersex. In virtual worlds like Second Life users can ‘don’ roles, change their physical characteristics and enjoy online sex.

Cybersex must be seen as a new form of social and human interaction facilitated by digital technology. A later definition ran: ‘carrying on via computer proxy sexual activity through rich description with accompanying sexual arousal, often to orgasm’ (Ross and Kauth 2000, cited in Ross [2005: 342]).

Cybersex can be VR-based sex, where users in body-suits with visual, aural and tactile stimuli or computer-mediated remotecontrolled sex toys, engage in sex with another user in In virtual similar ‘gear’. Often called teledildonics, this worlds like technology is still in the future. More common is videoSecond Life based cybersex. Users disrobe in the presence of users can ‘don’ cameras, which transmit the images/video to the other roles and ‘participant(s)’ and masturbate, enabled by software change their like Cu-SeeMe. This is more voyeuristic, dialoguephysical based (participants can talk to each other via live feeds) characteristics and exhibitionist. Then there is text-based cybersex.

This is almost entirely verbal, and is at the centre of the chat experience.

Cybersex is an ‘intermediate step between private fantasy and actual behavior’ (Ross 2005: 344). Fantasies that are generally private and solitary affairs, find articulation in cyberspace and takes it a step further: ‘doing’ the fantasy online without actually doing it. The text in cybersex is the language of articulation of desire and fantasies.

Cybersex technology and porn actualise desires. In this case, practically

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all content is user-generated in the sense, users’ desires, fantasies and searches are taken and converted into commercially viable content.

(This has understandably resulted in cultural and social anxieties about the abuse of the technologies for porn, as Nishant Shah has admirably demonstrated in his essay on the Indian state’s technophobia [Shah 2007].)

This role-playing and fantasy-enactment is made possible by the very nature of the medium—its anonymity. Anonymity in online communication serves as a ‘disinhibitor’ and augments sexually explicit behaviour. Intimacy, researchers have noted, develops faster online— what has been termed ‘accelerated intimacy’ (Ross 2005: 346). This condition of ‘accelerated intimacy’ and anonymity has often resulted in moral questions being raised about the ethics of cybersex. Does cyberinfidelity constitute the grounds for divorce? In 2008, Amy Tailor (28) and David Pollard (40) divorced because one afternoon she discovered that David’s avatar, Barmy, was having sex with an online call girl.21 Cases such as these call attention to the ethical dilemma at the heart of cybersex: does sex with software constitute adultery? Some commentators have argued that moral norms are less Intimacy, rigid in cyberspace because the damage done in researchers cyberspace is less severe (Ben-Ze’Ev 2004: 208). have noted, Opinion in India, as elsewhere, is divided on the develops morality of cyber-relationships. faster online— But in another case, the individuals involved what has ‘stopped when we realised that we were getting too been termed involved and in a way were being dishonest to our ‘accelerated respective partners’. The rapidly expanding domain intimacy’ of cybersex—with its adjunct domains of cyberporn and online sex tourism—the virtual world begins to resemble the real one.23 Sex sells in real time, in the real world. It remains the case in virtual worlds. Sex constitutes a significant component of social interactions in real life, and this is the case of cybersex.

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The ‘Performances’ of Cool Sociality For a moment, let us return to the definition we are working with here: To be able to creatively mix and match, to connect and converge, to be hybridised and hypervisible, to be simultaneously individualized and connected, to be hedonistic and selfless, to be a party animal and a political animal—all through New Media forms, is the new Cool.

Sociality is based on social performance and ritual behaviour— whether it is a letter, a greeting card, a handshake or a routine ‘Hello’.

The new sociality is based on a performance within the world of New Media, a ‘network sociality’. ‘Network sociality’ is a substitute for the traditional sites of social interaction (the family, work, localised communities) where social interaction is entirely embedded in informational electronic cultures. It is a Cool sociality. Cool sociality occurs in contexts specific to the late twentieth century: • heavily mediated communication and social interaction, • a fragmented society with wide dispersal of friends and family, of long-distance marriages and social contacts, ‘Network • the ‘flows’ of people, goods and capital. sociality’ is a Thus sociality now has to occur in a context where substitute for the social actors are widely separated, and where the traditional widely separated people can still be a part of a ritual sites of social greeting or social interaction through New Media. ….

‘Performance’ here is mainly the act of selfinteraction, disclosure that makes up the bulk of scraps on SNSes. being entirely Self-disclosure becomes a means of ensuring embedded in authenticity and inculcating trust when no other informational visual cues are present. As in F2F relationships the cultures new sociality also demands conditions of trust and authenticity.

Hence the aim of much posting is to generate a context in which confessions are made so as to facilitate the building of trust.

‘Performance’ is the process by which such self-disclosures create a feeling of bonding…. Authenticity is always a claim—it does not inhere within an act or expression or object. Others—viewers, readers, spectators—need to validate it as authentic. This constructs the

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audience in a very special way—self-disclosures are evaluated by the audience, even in cyberspace without F2F’s visual and other cues, as authentic or inauthentic. Cool is the ability to convey authenticity without the traditional contexts and cues. * * * The new sociality is a ‘network sociality’ where temporary protocols of engagement, such as sharing personal details, exclamatory language or emoticons, the playfulness of tone are considered adequate to social interaction. The new sociality is Cool because • it can effect temporally distant responses to emotional situations, • is mobile across platforms, mediums, distances, devices • it can facilitate an easy expression of emotions (through text, graphics like emoticons) minus the accompanying visual, tonal and other cues.

Emoticons and exclamations, scraps and posts must be treated as tokens of exchange that reinforce social interaction. …

In the case of electronic worlds, I would treat forms of greetings, smileys, posts and visuals as ‘objects’ or tokens that are Emoticons and engaged in new forms of interaction. Online exclamations, romances and flirtation (with their text-based scraps and sexualities) do possess very real emotional (including posts must be arousal) and psychological effects. These textual-visual treated as manifestations of ‘code’ do have a materiality. That is, tokens of even when we realise that the smiley is the effect of a exchange that click and a software programme, this does not take reinforce away its effect. Whatever appears on screen is real for social that time—what I call its materiality. When people interaction mourn about social fragmentation and excessive individualisation, wikis and YouTube and such participatory cultures indicate quite the opposite—they suggest new forms of the collaborative social, a new environs for the offline as well.

Societies have been built through routinisation of habits, behaviour, dress codes—in short, customisation. Participatory culture extends this customisation, and can lead to other forms of socialisation. Cool sociality is this ability to access distant worlds and also to be part of an 88! INTERFACE | JUNE 2013!

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ongoing conversation over say, heritage sites, through electronic media— where very recent technology builds communities over ancient ruins. If Cool, as I have defined it, is a mix of the consumer and the political citizen then ‘network sociality’ like blogging and SNSes enable us to make the move from being at once individualist as well as politically conscious collectives.

Cool sociality is about conviviality, about being both concerned only with self-representation as well as about sharing this self-representation, whether in fan association, cybersex or political blogging. ...

Traditionalists will argue that all this is artifice and does not work on par with F2F or deeply emotional attachments. To argue so is to miss the point—every age and technological invention or advancement alters the modes of social interaction and emotional engagements.

Further, Cool is about a feigned emotional detachment. Electronic communication facilitates the use of excessive emotional terms and expressions without really producing the same effect The new as, say a F2F abuse or melodrama. Asynchronous sociality can communication in particular (blogs and emails are and does examples) allow one to register an emotional situation contribute to but does not force us to react immediately. This civil society, creates a certain Cool situation where the emotional participatoryquotient of an electronic communication does not deliberative produce an immediate emotional response. democracy and Mobility, connectivity and conviviality are all social reflected in these new forms of ‘network sociality’. movements New Media opens up spaces for/of participation as never before. Thus I see the new sociality as being more than simply entertainment and socialising. It can and does contribute to civil society, participatory-deliberative democracy and social movements. The new sociality is a Cool political project.

Notes 1. Chronicle of Higher Education 52. 47 (2006). Cole’s website is www. juancole.com.

2. http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/global/social-media-accounts-for-22percent-of-time-online/. Accessed on 20 May, 2011.

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3. See, for instance, Chanania 2008: 1.

4. I am not exploring in detail here the differential uses of electronic cultures by men and women, though references to the gender aspects of New Media cultures occur throughout this book. Studies of the gendered uses of say, email, show that women use it to expand their networks and social circle and to just ‘stay in touch’, men use it to reinforce existing relations and to initiate activities with their friends (Boneva and Kraut 2002).

5. On blogs as folk cultural form see Pareles 2006, cited in Bell (2007: 5).

6. On politician’s blogging see Coleman (2005).

7. Archived at http://www.arttech.ab.ca/pbrown/jenni/jenni.html.

124 Digital Cool 8. It is necessary to note, as David Beer does (2008), that ‘social networking sites’ are primarily devoted to socialising. In the case of ‘social network’ sites like YouTube or LinkedIn ‘making and accumulating friendship connections is not the sole focus of activity’ (Beer 518).

9. See Lampe et al. (2011).

10. Studies reveal that many users of SNSes are unaware of the privacy policies of the sites. At an American college, a survey found, ‘In fact, 33% of our respondents believe that it is either impossible or quite difficult for individuals not affiliated with an university to access FB network of that university’ (Acquisiti and Gross 2006: 54).

11. The Asian School of CyberLaws has launched FACT (Freedom from Abuse of Children through Technology) to spread awareness about Internet security, possible abuse and porn (see http://www.asianlaws. org/fact/index.htm). The International Telecommunication Union has prepared draft guidelines for Child Online Protection (http://www.itu.int /osg/csd /cybersecurity /gca /cop/guidelines/index.html).

12. Papacharissi’s model (2009).

13. Ling and Yttri (2002: 161–62); also Ellison, Steinfield and Lampe (2007) and Johnstone et al. (2011).

14. I take the idea of the ‘contact zone’ from Mary Louise Pratt’s scintillating work on travel writing (1992).

15. On diasporic peoples and communities’ websites see R. C. Lee and S-L.C. Wong (2003) and M. I. Franklin (2004).

16. See, for example, Henri Lefebvre (2000).

17. Pear Analytics, ‘Twitter Study’, August 2009.

18. For a thoughtful study of this see Oh et al. (2010).

19. The term was popularised by Manuel Castells in The Rise of the Network Society (1996).

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20. It is important, as Nishant Shah (2005) notes, to distinguish between ‘regular’ porn that takes to the Internet, and pornography that is generated specifically due/with the new technologies. Shah uses the term ‘netporn’ to describe ‘a category of pornography that is structured within cyberspaces and inherits the characteristics of the medium within which it is produced’.

21. ‘Second Life romance costs first life marriage’, The Economic Times, 14 November 2008, http://economictimes.indiatimes.com /ET_Cetera/Virtual_romance_costs_real_marriage/articleshow/3712500.cms .

22. Ibid.

23. For studies of cyberporn see Coopersmith (2006), Fisher and Barak (2000, 2001), for sex tourism on the Internet see Chow-White (2006).

24. Cultural performance is defined as ‘the social process by which actors, individually or in concert, display for others the meaning of their social situation.… In order for their display to be effective, actors must offer a plausible performance’ (Alexander 2006: 32).

25. Aaron Wittel (2001) coined the term ‘network sociality’ to describe online and electronic socialisation.

26. Much of the conversations on such SNSes are phatic—they are informational rather than emotional, cursory and superficial rather than intense and truly personal. What is called for is a new definition of the personal itself.

See Vincent Miller (2008).

27. For a study the ‘intangible heritage’ created by Flickr communities around Sydney Opera House see Freeman (2010).

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Why global governance of the Internet must be democratised (This is the text of a joint statement issued by Focus on the Global South (Thailand), Instituto Nupef (Brazil), IT for Change (India), Knowledge Commons (India), Other News (Italy) and Third World Network (Malaysia) for the U.N. meeting on Enhanced Cooperation on Public Policy Issues Pertaining to the Internet to take place in Geneva on May 18, 2012.)

May 17, 2012 The Internet is a major force today, restructuring our economic, social, political and cultural systems. Most people implicitly assume that it is basically a beneficent force, needing, if at all, some caution only at the user-end. This may have been true in the early stages when the Internet was created and sustained by benevolent actors, including academics, technologists, and start-up enterprises that challenged big businesses. However, we are getting past that stage now. What used to be a public network of millions of digital spaces, is now largely a conglomeration of a few proprietary spaces. (A few What used to be websites like Google, Facebook, Twitter and Amazon a public network together make much of what is considered the Internet of millions of by most people today.) We are also moving away from digital spaces, is a browser-centric architecture of the “open” Internet now largely a to an applications-driven mobile Internet, that is even conglomeration more closed and ruled by proprietary spaces (like App of a few Store and Android Market). In fact, some Internet proprietary plans for mobiles come only with a few big websites spaces and applications, without the open “public” Internet, which is an ominous pointer to what the future Internet may look like. What started off as a global public resource is well on its way to becoming a set of monopoly private enclosures, and a means for entrenching dominant power. At this stage, it is crucial to actively defend and promote the Internet's immense potential as a democratic and egalitarian force, including through appropriate principles and policies at the global level.

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Who governs the Internet It is a myth that “the Internet is not governed by anyone.” It is also not a coincidence nor a natural order of things that the Internet, and through it, our future societies, are headed in the way of unprecedented private gate-keeping and rentier-ing. The architecture of the Internet is being actively shaped today by the most powerful forces, both economic and political. A few United States-based companies increasingly have monopoly control over most of the Internet. The U.S. government itself controls some of the most crucial nodes of the global digital network. Together, these two forces, in increasing conjunction, are determining the techo-social structure of a new unipolar world. It is important for progressive actors to urgently address this situation, through seeking globally democratic forms of governance of the Internet.

While the U.S. government and U.S.-based monopoly Internet companies already have a close working relationship to support and further each other's power, this relationship is now being formalised through new power compacts; whether in the area of extra-territorial IP enforcement (read, global economic extraction) through legislations like Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA), or in the area of security (read, global extension of coercive power) through cyberWhile the U.S. security legislations like the Cybersecurity Intelligence pooh-poohs the Sharing and Protection Act (CISPA). The U.S. security government has stubbornly refused to democratise the concerns of oversight of the Internet's root server and domain name other countries, system, which it controls. While the U.S. pooh-poohs it seeks to push the security concerns expressed by other countries vis-aappointment of vis such unacceptable unilateralism, rather its security hypocritically, it seeks to contractually obligate the nonofficials profit managing these key infrastructures to appoint its security officials only on U.S. government advice. (The chief security officer of this non-profit body is already, in fact, a sworn member of the “Homeland Security Advisory Council” of the U.S.!)

Apart from the direct application of U.S. law and whims (think WikiLeaks) over the global Internet, and Internet-based social activity (increasingly a large part of our social existence), default global law is also being written by the clubs of powerful countries that routinely draft Internet policies and policy frameworks today. The Organisation INTERFACE | JUNE 2013

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for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and the Council of Europe are two active sites of such policy making, covering areas like cyber-security, Internet intermediary liability, search engines, social networking sites, etc. Last year, the OECD came out with its “Principles for Internet Policy-Making.” These Principles, heavy on IP enforcement and private policing through large Northbased Internet companies, are to guide Internet policies in all OECD countries. Recently, the OECD decided to “invite” other non-OECD, countries to accede to these principles. This is the new paradigm of global governance, where the powerful countries make the laws and the rest of the world must accept and implement them.

Not allowed at the table While Northern countries are very active at Internet related policyand law-making, which have extraterritorial ambition and reach, they strongly resist any U.N.-based initiative for development of global Internet principles and policies. This is in keeping with the increasingly common Northern efforts at undermining U.N./multi-lateral frameworks in other global governance arenas like trade, IP, etc. For instance: trying to keep global financial systems out of the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development’s (UNCTAD) purview at the recent Doha UNCTAD meeting, and While Northern bringing in the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement countries are (ACTA) as a new instrument of extra-territorial very active at Internet Protocol (IP) enforcement by the OECD, Internet related bypassing World Intellectual Property Organisation policy- and law(WIPO). making, they The mandate of the World Summit on the strongly resist Information Society (WSIS) for building a globally any U.N.-based democratic space for developing Internet related global initiatives policies is quite clear. The WSIS outcome document states that, “the process towards enhanced cooperation (on Internet-related international public policies), (is) to be started by the U.N. Secretary-General ... by the end of the first quarter of 2006.” However, six years down the line, developed countries do not seem to be willing to even formally discuss how to operationalise this very important WSIS mandate of “enhanced cooperation,” much less do something concrete about it.

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Internet governance must be democratised We, the undersigned civil society organisations, affirm that the Internet must be governed democratically, with the equal involvement of all people, groups and countries. Its governance systems must be open, transparent and inclusive, with civil society given adequate avenues of meaningful substantive participation. While we denounce statist control over the Internet sought by many governments at national levels, we believe that the struggle at the global level also has significant dynamics of a different kind. Our demands with respect to “global� Internet Governance espouse a simple and obvious democratic logic. On the technical governance side, the oversight of the Internet's critical technical and logical infrastructure, at present with the U.S. government, should be transferred to an appropriate, democratic and participative, multilateral body, without disturbing the existing distributed architecture of technical governance of the Internet in any significant way. (However, improvements in the technical governance systems are certainly needed.)

On the side of larger Internet related public policy-making on global social, economic, cultural and political issues, the OECD-based model of global policy making, as well as the default application of U.S. laws, should be replaced by a new U.N.-based On Internet democratic mechanism. Any such new arrangement related public should be based on the principle of subsidiarity, and be policy-making, innovative in terms of its mandate, structure, and the OECD-based functions, to be adequate to the unique requirements of policy making global Internet governance. It must be fully should be participative of all stakeholders, promoting the replaced by a democratic and innovative potential of the Internet. new U.N.-based The Internet should be governed on the principles democratic of human liberty, equality and fraternity. It should be mechanism based on the accepted principle of the indivisibility of human rights; civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights, and also people's collective right to development. A rights-based agenda should be developed as an alternative to the current neo-liberal model driving the development of the Internet, and the evolution of an information society. The U.N. is the appropriate place for developing and implementing such an alternative agenda.

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“controlling the Internet,” and under this cover, continually shaping the architecture of the Internet and its social paradigm to further their narrow interests, is a bluff that must be called.

We demand that a Working Group of the U.N. Commission on Science and Technology for Development (CSTD) be instituted to explore possible ways of implementing “enhanced cooperation” for global Internet-related policies. (Such a CSTD Working Group is also being sought by some developing countries.) “Enhanced cooperation” must be implemented through innovative multilateral mechanisms that are participatory. Internet policy-making cannot be allowed to remain the preserve of one country or clubs of rich countries. If the Internet is to promote democracy in the world, which incidentally is the much touted agenda of the U.S. and other Northern countries, the Internet itself has, first, to be governed democratically.

Courtesy: The Hindu, May 17, 2012

Icann criticised for ‘commercial landgrab' of internet Charles Arthur The move by Icann, the U.S.appointed company which decides what new domains can be added to the web, has been criticised by some as allowing a commercial landgrab of the internet

Amazon and Google dominate applications for new top-level domains, including .app, .shop, .book, .love, .amazon and .google More than 1,000 new internet “top level domains” — such as .app, .kids, .love, .pizza and also .amazon and .google — could come online beginning early next year, with the potential to radically change the face of the web.

But the move by Icann, the U.S.-appointed company which decides what new domains can be added to the web, has been criticised by some as allowing a commercial landgrab of the internet.

Documents released by Icann on Wednesday show that Amazon and Google have made dozens of applications to control hundreds of domains — including .shop, .book, .love, and .map and .mba.

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The most applied-for domain is .app, which 13 organisations have staked a claim to own, including both Amazon and Google. Only one entity can own a top-level domain.

The next is .home and .inc, with 11 applications, .art with 10, and then .book, .blog, .llc, and .shop with nine each.

Those put in charge of allotting such domains will have complete power over whether a company or individual can apply for a website or domain name within them — so that if Amazon was to control .book, it could deny a rival such as the chain of bookshops called Waterstones the chance to create waterstones.book.

The new top-level domains, or TLDs, will start to come online in the first quarter of 2013, said Rod Beckstrom, the chief executive of Icann, who unveiled the list of 1,930 applications for 1,700 different new TLDs at a press conference in London.

“This is an historic day for the internet and the two billion people around the world who rely on it,” Beckstrom said.

“The internet is about to change forever. Through its history the internet has renewed itself through new ideas; we're on the cusp of new ideas and innovation which will give rise to new jobs and ways to link communities and share information.” Companies, Companies, individuals and communities were able to apply for the individuals and new TLDs, which cost $185,000 per registration. But communities the cost of registration and the complexity of filling out were able to the 250-page forms appears to have dissuaded apply for the applications from Africa, which produced only 17 of the new TLDs, 1,930 applications. By contrast, North America which cost produced 911 applications — although Amazon's 76 $185,000 per applications have been made through its Luxembourg registration office, almost certainly for tax reasons. Google has made more than 100 applications, including .android, .baby, .blog and others.

The London-based Guardian Media Group, which publishes the Guardian and Observer newspapers and the guardian.co.uk website, has applied for five, though it faces a contest for the principal one, .guardian, which has also seen an application from the U.S.-based Guardian Life Insurance company, which also owns the worldwide guardian.com domain.

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Many conflicts Icann will have to resolve hundreds of such conflicts, which will see a combination of trademark disputes and arguments about which companies or organisations will be appropriate owners of TLDs. It reckons that it will be able to process the applications in batches of about 500 each, taking between four—and—a—half and five months each. That means it will take about 18 months to process the entire set.

The applications from Africa, however, are guaranteed to be in the first tranche considered, and so should go online first if they succeed in the selection process.

Alexa Raad, chief executive of Architelos, which provides consultancy services to businesses looking to run domains, said: “It's like the difference between owning a flat in an apartment, and owning the whole apartment block. If you own the block, you can decide who gets in and out of it, you can decide on the behaviour in there.

“For Amazon, it could decide to reward its most loyal customers with a ‘.amazon' email, for example, and it will know that that email is never going to go away. People are focusing just on the names but it's not the name that's important, it's the business models Icann will have that will lie behind them.” — © Guardian to resolve Newspapers Limited, 2012 hundreds of such conflicts, which will see a combination of trademark disputes and arguments

India's proposal will help take the web out of U.S. control

Parminder Jeet Singh India sought the creation of a U.N. Committee on Internet-Related Policies (CIRP) in order to democratise global Internet governance, which at present is either U.S.-controlled, or subject to the policies of rich country clubs like the Organisation for Economic Co-operation

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and Development (OECD). This proposal was made in a statement to the UN General Assembly last year.

Unnerved by the Indian stand, IT monopolies are propagating the myth that a multilateral governance structure will kill the decentralised, multi-stakeholder nature of the Internet and lead to ‘government control' Global Internet governance can be seen in two parts: technical governance which prominently includes the governance of what critical Internet resources, and wider public policies concerning various economic, social, cultural and political issues. The two most critical Internet resources are the authoritative root zone server and Internet names and addresses system, which are managed by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), under contract with the U.S. Department of Commerce. ICANN, as a U.S. non-profit body, is subject to U.S. laws in every possible way. To give a simple illustration, some time back ICANN allowed the .xxx domain space over the objections of most governments. However, now some U.S. companies have taken ICANN to court alleging anticompetition practices in allowing the .xxx domain. The fact that a U.S. court has taken cognizance of the matter makes it at least possible that the ICANN decision on instituting .xxx will be struck down, whereby ICANN will have simply no option other than ICANN's role is to shut down this domain space. This simple illustration completely makes a mockery of ICANN's claim to be an dependent on independent globally accountable governance system. the will and pleasure of the Kill switch legislation U.S. government and the In any case, ICANN's role is completely dependent on relationship can the will and pleasure of the U.S. government and the be annulled any relationship, according to existing contract documents, moment by the can be annulled any moment by the U.S. government.

U.S. government With increased securitisation of the Internet, the single point control issue has become even more severe for developing countries. Importantly, the U.S. has been mulling what has been called the Internet kill switch legislation, which could have application across the world. The U.S. has not hesitated to use the domain name system services for extra-territorial enforcement of its intellectual property laws. In this background, the concerns of other

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countries about U.S. control on the critical infrastructure of the Internet are quite legitimate.

The other area of global governance relates to wider public policy issues like the role and responsibilities of Internet intermediaries (like search engines and social networking sites), e-commerce, cross-border data flows, intellectual property and access to knowledge, trade and tax, online media, cultural diversity, privacy, security, human rights, etc. At present, it is either U.S. law which applies globally by default as most monopoly Internet companies are U.S.-based, or the policy frameworks are developed by rich country clubs like the OECD. There is no reason why such policy principles and guidelines should not be developed by all countries sitting together in the first place, which is what is proposed the U.N. Committee for Internet-Related Policies (CIRP) will do.

Developed countries, chiefly the U.S., are using the power of their monopoly Internet companies and other kinds of strategic advantages to shape the Internet as per their narrow interests — economic, political, security and cultural. At the same time, the North has managed to keep developing countries away from the seats of governance of the Internet. For this purpose, they use Developed many different strategies. To many developing countries, are countries, they sell the proposition that poorer using the power countries should focus on the immense developmental of their potential of the Internet, rather than the “esoteric” monopoly question of its global governance. To global civil Internet society, the North has somewhat successfully been able companies to to sell an image of itself as the protector of freedoms shape the and liberties on the Internet, chiefly freedom of Internet as per expression, and that of developing countries as antitheir narrow democratic and retrograde, thus arguing that the latter interests should not be allowed anywhere near the levers of Internet governance. To the technical experts, a powerful constituency in the early days of the Internet, the global North sells the illusion of a bottom-up, user-driven and built Internet, while the fact is that it is the policies and practices of the North, as for example through its active complacency concerning “net neutrality” (a key egalitarian architectural principle of the Internet), and non-enforcement of competition law vis-à-vis the unprecedented monopolisation in the

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Internet business, that are rapidly eroding the bottom-up nature of the Internet.

Two misconceptions There are two main misconceptions about the Indian CIRP proposal, which no doubt have been actively propagated by the interested parties, whose control over the global Internet is threatened by any proposals for democratisation of the Internet.

The first is that the Indian proposal seeks to take over or fold up the existing decentralised model of technical and critical Internet resources governance. India's proposal seeks to do nothing of this sort.

It is largely comfortable with the present system, but certainly not with America's oversight over this system, which alone it seeks to get shifted to a body with equal representation of all countries. It is rather strange that when the U.S. exercises oversight over the technical governance system, it is said to be of no significance. However, when exactly the same oversight, nothing more nothing less, is sought to be transferred to a body where not only the U.S. but all countries are represented, an alarm is raised about a deep “government� conspiracy to take control of the Internet.

When oversight The second misconception is that India's CIRP over technical proposal is not multi-stakeholder. The fact is that it is governance perhaps more multi-stakeholder than any global system is governance body which deals with substantive policy transferred to a issues (and not just technical matters). In this regard, the body where all Indian CIRP's design is rather innovative and countries are progressive, whereby four advisory committees will represented, an meet back to back with the inter-governmental core alarm is raised committee and give regular inputs to it. Additionally, about deep the CIRP is supposed to have organic connections with conspiracy the multi-stakeholder open U.N. Internet Governance Forum. In fact, the U.N. CIRP takes from the multi-stakeholder model of the OECD's Internet policy mechanism and further improves it, including in terms of its multi-stakeholderism. It is once again inexplicable why the same structure within the OECD, which undemocratically makes Internet policies for the whole world, is not criticised on the multi-stakeholderism front, but the more multistakeholder model of CIRP faces such intense criticism.

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The Internet is becoming an instrument of further entrenching the geo-economic and geo-political powers of the North, chiefly the U.S. Developing countries urgently need a global forum that could work towards democratising the Internet's governance, and developing principles and policies for shaping the Internet as a democratic and egalitarian force. In fact, while not willing to publicly disassociate with their geo-strategic partner, the U.S. and European countries are also very uncomfortable with the status quo, and are looking for dialogueopening moves and proposals from developing countries. Most countries have been looking to India's leadership position in opening the dialogue on “enhanced cooperation.� In fact, the CIRP proposal gives a viable alternative to developing countries over the more authoritarian proposals floated by countries like China and Russia, and the politics of technical control that plays out at the International Telecommunications Union.

It appears that the U.S. has been trying to bring all kinds of pressures over the Indian government, including through the IT industry in India, and also appealing to activists involved with freedom of expression over the Internet. The latter is an issue that all progressive actors must actively engage with at the national level. At the same time, it is important not to ignore the grave It appears that risk at the global level posed by the further the U.S. has concentration of economic, social, political and been trying to cultural powers with Northern political entities (mostly bring all kinds the U.S.) and a few global monopoly Internet of pressures over the Indian companies. Most important is to watch out for the government, manner in which these economic and political powers including are coming together in a new digital-political complex, through the IT which is well on its way to becoming a principal global industry in challenge in the near future.

India (Parminder Jeet Singh is the executive director of IT for Change, a Bangalore-based NGO working on issues of IT and social change. He has been a special adviser to the Chair of U.N. Internet Governance Forum and has been coordinator of the premier global civil society network in the internet governance arena, the Internet Governance Caucus. He has worked extensively on development issues with respect to global Internet governance.

E-mail: parminder@itforchange.net) Courtesy: The Hindu, May 17, 2012

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Internet cannot be under U.N., says U.S. AFP US officials, lawmakers and technology leaders offered a resounding “no” to proposals to bring the Internet under United Nations' control and said they would lead efforts to stop the move.

At a congressional hearing, the comments were united in opposition to place the Internet under the jurisdiction of the International Telecommunications Union, a U.N. agency which governs telecom systems.

A top State Department official reaffirmed the opposition of the Obama administration to U.N. governance of the Internet, saying intergovernmental controls over the Internet would lead to “very bad outcomes”. “It inevitably would diminish the dynamism of the Internet,” the official said.

The Obama The comments come ahead of a meeting in administration December of the ITU where some nations will be says pressing for the agency to formally govern the Internet. intergovernmental Some nations, including Russia and China, say the controls over the Internet would Internet is still controlled by the United States and that lead to “very bad a U.N. effort would give a greater voice to the outcomes” and developing world. But many in the U.S. fear a U.N.diminish the governed Internet would give authoritarian nations the dynamism of the power to throttle free speech, and allow others to Internet impose tariff or other restrictions.

Courtesy: The Hindu, June 1, 2012

Internet revolution bypasses rural India: Survey PTI Internet revolution has bypassed rural India with less than half a per cent of families having the facility at home as against 6 per cent in cities, reveals a government survey.

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“At all India level only about 0.4 per cent of rural households had access to Internet at home as compared to about 6 per cent of urban households,� said the National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) report on expenditure in 2009-10.

Reflecting the digital divide in India, the study said just 3.5 households per 1,000 families, had access to Internet services at home in rural areas in the year. However, in urban areas, Internet connectivity was much better in 2009-10 as 59.5 families out of every 1000 households had the facility at home.

Among the major States, Maharashtra was on top with the 104 out of 1,000 families had Internet in cities, followed by Kerala and Himachal Pradesh at 95 each and Haryana at 81.5. The penetration of digital services was highest in rural areas in Goa with 50 out of 1,000 households having Internet connection. Kerala came next with 34 families having such a facility at home.

Reflecting the Among the hilly States, Arunachal Pradesh had digital divide in the best reach of the Internet service in rural areas with India, the study 19 out of 1,000 households have such facility at home, said just 3.5 followed by Himachal Pradesh at 16. households per The study further states that among the major 1,000 families, states, Kerala had by far the highest proportion of had access to households with Internet access in the rural areas at 3 Internet services per cent followed by Himachal Pradesh at 2 per cent. at home in rural areas in the year In cities, Maharashtra reported the highest percentage of household having access to Internet connection (10 per cent) followed closely by Kerala, Himachal Pradesh and Haryana. Courtesy: The Hindu, May 6, 2012

The business of IPv6 Anuj Srivas The last time a new Internet protocol came into being was in the early 1980's, when the Internet was still a fledgling research network. Thirty years later, the migration to a new standard, IPv6, is now a gargantuan task that involves businesses, online enterprises and consumers alike.

Without new addresses, billions of people will never be able to use new Internet services or access applications and technologies that are 104

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in the blueprints of today's businesses and in the minds of tomorrow's entrepreneurs.

With minimal investment, companies can jump ahead of the competition by making their systems IPv6 compatible, according to Amod Malviya, Vice-President-Engineering at Flipkart. Surely, IT managers across India will have their work cut out in making a case to senior level executives.

World IPv6 launch day His remarks come at a time when major network operators, websites and hardware vendors from around the world pushed everybody to get ready for the switch from the current website address identification method of IPv4, as part of the World IPv6 launch on June 6.

Since June 6, Since June 6, leading websites have had IPv6 permanently enabled, while equipment vendors have started including IPv6 connectivity as part of their default product settings.

Deployments of this degree of undertaking are generally not undertaken lightly, but there is no debate anymore on whether or not the world is running out of IPv4 addresses. IPv4 is made up of a set of numbers that help identify web addresses, helping them communicate with one another.

leading websites have had IPv6 permanently enabled, while equipment vendors have started including IPv6 connectivity as part of their default settings

However, the inherent disadvantage of the IPv4 protocol is the creation of only 4.3 billion possible IP addresses, a total which is soon running out.

According to statistics released by the Internet Society, a nonprofit organisation, the last block of IPv4 addresses were assigned from the global supply, leaving no address space to be distributed in the Asia-Pacific region.

To put things into perspective, the new IPv6 system would ensure that for every square centimetre on Earth, there will be over 600 million billion IP addresses. Even though issuing IPv4 addresses might continue over the next two years, companies can put themselves ahead of the pack, by wrinkling out the gnarls in the IPv6 learning curve before it becomes popular.

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Being prepared Despite lack of direct financial gain, the transition to IPv6 compatibility is something “that must be done sooner rather than later as it will carry more risk if a company starts doing it when there are many customers on IPv6,” said Mr. Malviya.

However, a recent IPv6 industry survey indicated that over 20 per cent of businesses felt that “there was no business case” for implementing IPv6 — seeing it as an expense with no accompanying revenue increase. It has become increasingly clear now that even with interim workarounds, the long-term overall cost in not deploying IPv6 now will be more for individual companies looking to grow.

“Companies will end up spending more time trying to cope with the scarcity of IPv4 addresses, whether it is in A recent IPv6 workarounds or buying networking gear — it's just industry survey more expensive if you don't plan for it. In addition to indicated that this, businesses which do not initiate transition now over 20 per cent of will risk accessibility problems of their websites and businesses felt services when more customers start using IPv6 and that “there was no companies aren't prepared,” said G. V. Murali, business case” for network analyst, Fourth Dimension Technologies. implementing IPv6 When mobile devices become IPv6 only, with lack of IPv4 addresses, the use of IPv6 will become a requirement for e-commerce and software solution companies looking to expand and tap into these growth opportunities.

How do such businesses go about this?

Low investment Flipkart, India's largest online books retailer, made the switch to IPv6 four weeks ago. According to Mr. Malviya, the shift was not costintensive and ‘a lot easier than most companies generally think'.

“For a company like ours, it took us two weeks with a team of four people. The majority of any expenditure for companies that are looking to switch will come from hardware. Basically, if your networking hardware has been purchased in the last five years, it will be fine as it is most likely IPv6 capable,” said Mr. Malviya.

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A lot of the staff training can be done using publicly available resources on the Internet and with regard to software, for more than 90 per cent of websites, no change would be needed, he added.

For bigger companies, taking an inventory of all networking hardware and web serving software older than five years becomes the first step as phased conversion could prove to be the cheapest method.

However, ICANN CEO, Rob Beckstrom, has projected the cost of moving an emerging market economy of 50 million people to IPv6 at ‘roughly one billion dollars, a figure which includes “upgrades to infrastructure that most companies and governments would have had to do at some point.”

Ovum, an independent analyst and consultancy firm, released a report last year that advised businesses to take up to 10 years to complete the move, with planning starting from last A lot of the staff year. At present, the dual stack approach, where both training can be IPv4 and IPv6 protocols are run, is seen as the most done using effective approach. resources on the ISPs and consumers Internet and with regard to While organisations can stave off the eventual software, for more change, Internet Service Providers and consumers than 90 per cent of will have to play their part in adopting the new websites, no protocol. change would be “While some devices may already share an needed address, if IPv6 isn't implemented, one would have to share a single address with a whole area. Consumers must help create demand by asking for IPv6 support, the next time they choose hardware, software or even their ISPs. Businesses and ISPs have been reluctant to provide IPv6 assistance as they see no customer demand for it,” said Mr. Murali. Businesses that refuse to change, citing cost factors, run the risk of running into a number of challenges including increased costs, crippled website functionality and cordoning growth opportunities in a growing market like India, he added.

Companies, ISPs and netizens must adopt IPv6 to enable continued growth of the Internet, avoid the inevitable chaos caused by the IPv4 shortage and ensure that business is undisrupted.

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With a capacity of over 340 trillion, trillion, trillion addresses, IPv6 will allow us to continue, for all practical purposes, indefinitely.

Courtesy: The Hindu, June 10, 2012.

The internet becomes a trillion times roomier Vasudevan Mukunth The world may be a finite place but its growing population will never run out of internet addresses. On the occasion of World IPv6 Day on Wednesday, an initiative of the non-profit Internet Society, trillions of new free addresses on the internet have been released to accommodate the growing numbers of websites on the World Wide Web. The Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) was responsible for administering the release.

The addresses follow the new IPv6 protocol, successor to the IPv4 protocol whose deployment saw a dramatic boom starting in the late 1980s

The addresses follow the new IPv6 protocol, successor to the IPv4 protocol whose deployment saw a dramatic boom starting in the late 1980s with the growth of the internet and was left almost exhausted by April 2011.

Although the IPv6 requires upgraded infrastructure to operate, its introduction does not mean IPv4 will be phased out. In fact, the infrastructure corresponding to IPv4 is expected to be in use for at least the next two years even as IPv6 is eased in. However, IPv4 will eventually be rendered obsolete.

The principal difference between the two protocols is the way they define the addresses between different devices logged in to the World Wide Web. The internet works by transporting packets of data from one host to the other using routers that identify each host by its address. The definition of this address is regulated by a standard protocol.

The number of addresses defined by the IPv4 protocol stopped at a little under 4.3 billion because each address was a 32-bit integer – 203.199.211.221, for example -- building up to 232 possible addresses.

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The IPv6 protocol overcomes this barrier by allowing 128-bit integer addresses to be assigned to hosts, or systems, bringing up the number of allowable addresses to a whopping 340 trillion, trillion, trillion. In essence, this provides an almost infinite plot of ground for the World Wide Web to grow in.

The Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) distributes the available internet protocol addresses to the five regional information registries (RIR). The Asia-Pacific Network Information Centre, which comprises the fast-growing countries India and China apart from 56 other economies, was the first RIR to exhaust its allocation of IPv4 addresses, on 15 April, 2011. Thus, it was the first RIR to receive the new block of IPv6 addresses.

Because of the new definition, corporations now have a lot more freedom in defining their addresses on the internet. Google, for example, has filed for .youtube, .google, .docs and .lol top level domains with IANA, looking to build on its product branding as well as possible creative potential. The application fee alone for each domain was sold for $180,000.

The Internet Assigned The IPv6 definition also incorporates some other Numbers upgrades that ease and strengthen privacy, network Authority processing by routers, and the division of addresses into (IANA) subnets to make address allocation more efficient. distributes the Courtesy: The Hindu, June 6, 2012. available internet protocol addresses to the five regional information registries S Ronendra Singh

The new Internet watchdogs

The Government has taken a series of measures to control the Internet, but should it be doing so?

In March 2011, the Indian Government banned several Web sites like Typepad, Mobango and Clickatell without warning. The ban had created a hue and cry amongst netizens, some even comparing Indian authorities to the Chinese iron wall.

But despite these protests, on December 5, 2011 the Government had several social media sites and internet companies, including

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Google, Facebook and Yahoo “prescreen user content from India and remove disparaging, inflammatory or defamatory content before it goes online”.

Communication and Information Technology minister Kapil Sibal explained his action. “We have to take care of the sensibilities of our people,” Mr Sibal told reporters during the press conference on the lawn at his bungalow in New Delhi. “Cultural ethos is very important to us,” he said.

Since then top officials from the Indian units of Google, Microsoft, Yahoo and Facebook have had several meetings with Sibal.

In one of the meetings, the Telecom Minister asked these companies to use humans to screen content, not technology.

Proposed rules Amidst all this, the Government quietly moved a proposal in October 2011 that, if implemented, will have major ramifications on use of the Internet not just in India but across the world. India Communication has moved a UN resolution seeking the creation of a and Information 50-nation super body to regulate the Internet. India Technology has argued for a radical shift from the present model of minister Kapil multi-stakeholder led decision-making, to a purely Sibal asked Government-run multilateral body.

Internet companies to In addition to this, the Communications Ministry use humans to headed by Sibal has notified new Information screen content, Technology (Intermediaries Guidelines) Rules, 2011 not technology giving various guidelines to be observed by all internet related companies. The rules give sweeping powers to the Government to blank out “messages or communication of any information which is grossly offensive or menacing in nature.” The new rules do not, however, define what is offensive or menacing. Bloggers and netizens are worried that this may be used by the Government to pull down websites and articles critical of the Government. The fact that all this has come about around the time when the Anna Hazare campaigners have used the Internet to drum up support only raises more doubts over the Government's real intention.

Worrying moves According to Sunil Abraham, Executive Director at the internet advocacy firm Centre for Internet and Society (CIS), all 110

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Governments across the world have reserved to themselves the right to block or take-down Internet services completely or specific content on specific services such as a page on a website.

But at the moment, the Indian Government is not following the letter of the law and bypassing judicial safeguards in its crackdown on political speech. “This aggressive enforcement is also having a chilling effect on access to knowledge and freedom of expression,” Abraham told The Hindu Business Line.

Therefore the Government's sudden move to push the UN resolution without consulting stakeholders has taken many by surprise.

There was some limited consultation but it definitely did not meet the current standards of multi-stakeholders being developed at the Internet Governance Forum (IGF), Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) and existing institutions focused on Internet governance.

Member of Parliament Rajeev Chandrasekhar has also written a letter to the Prime Minister recently saying India's refusal to withdraw its UN statement was disappointing. The worry is that countries with dubious records on human rights and democracy have publicly aligned their positions to that of India.

“Contrary to India's statement in the UN (October 2011) and at World Summit on the Information Society (May 2012), India's proposal for Inter-Governmental oversight of Internet is against the letter and spirit of the Tunis Agenda, 2005,” Chandrasekhar wrote in the letter.

The Indian Government is not following the letter of the law and bypassing judicial safeguards in its crackdown on political speech

The Tunis Agenda in 2005 – far from supporting a 50-member, Inter-Governmental body manned by bureaucrats/ politicians, neither envisages a separate entity nor a superior role for Governments in the governance of the Internet.

“In sharp contrast to the ‘mandate enshrined' in the Tunis Agenda, if India's proposal is accepted, civil society, academia, engineers, private sector and international organisations by design will be regulated to the fingers of an advisory role,” the Member of Parliament said.

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Government officials are tight-lipped and did not reply to questions sent by The Hindu Business Line via email.

Courtesy: The Hindu Business Line, June 12, 2012.

NEW DELHI, May 17, 2012

MP seeks shift in India's stand on global Internet governance Sandeep Joshi ‘Proposal for government control ill-considered and dangerous' Rajya Sabha MP Rajeev Chandrasekhar has written to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, asking him to withdraw India's recent position at the U.N. proposing governmental control over The Tunis Internet. A 50-member government/ bureaucratic Agenda in 2005 body through the formation of a United Nations neither Committee on Internet Related Policies (CIRP) was envisages a mooted. This proposal sought to replace the current separate entity multi-stakeholder governance model. nor a superior Stating that the move was “ill-considered and role for dangerous as it hurt the cause of freedom of Governments in expression, interest of citizens and India's image as a the governance vibrant democracy,” Mr. Chandrasekhar said in the of the Internet letter: “India must move immediately and reverse its stance at the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS) meeting in Geneva and ultimately, when further dialogue takes place under the IGF in Baku in November 2012 as well as at the WSIS meeting scheduled in Dubai at the end of 2012. Any fresh position must be subject to wide-ranging public consultation.”

Notably, India's proposal, originally made in October 2011 at the 66th session of the U.N. General Assembly, is expected to come up for discussion on Friday at the WSIS in Geneva.

Mr. Chandrasekhar said the proposal permanently impacted all of India's citizens and, more specifically, the 90-crore mobile subscribers and the fast-growing Internet users across the nation. “The

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issue has received little attention in India, but has the potential of causing immense harm to the existing and next generation of Internet users in general, but specifically to the free growth of the Internet in India.”

“Currently, Internet governance is managed through a multistakeholder process wherein engineers, civil society, the private sector, the NGOs, the technical and academic community, along with the government, have managed the Internet's growth – perhaps the most life-altering phenomenon of our times. A top-down, centralised, international governmental overlay – as proposed by India – is fundamentally against the architecture of the Internet – which is a global network of networks without borders,” he noted.

Mr. Chandrasekhar also said India's position was inherently flawed as it “can lead to curbs on free speech and freedom of expression.”

“It hurts India's reputation as a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural democratic society with an open economy and an abiding culture of pluralism. There is a mounting effort by countries such as Russia, China, Saudi Arabia, Cuba and Rwanda to transform the U.N. into a global Internet regulator. This threatens to undo decades of restrained government intervention that helped the Internet evolve into the open, global medium that we all depend upon.”

Courtesy: The Hindu, May 17, 2012

“India must move immediately and reverse its stance at the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS)”

A blow for open access May 2, 2012 | Editorial Harvard University's decision to ask faculty members to make their papers available in the university's open-access repository and choose open-access journals or those with reasonable subscription costs is a sign that the movement for affordable research is gaining ground.

Harvard spends close to $3.75 million a year to subscribe to journals from large publishing houses. If this well funded university finds it

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“fiscally unsustainable” to continue paying such heavy subscription fees, the plight of less well-funded universities in developed countries and almost every institution in developing countries can well be imagined. The Ivy League institution's bold decision could turn out to be a harbinger of similar initiatives being adopted by other major universities. Last year, many novel strategies were adopted by institutions and governments seeking to reduce their dependence on publishing houses that wield ultimate control over the dissemination of scientific information. In September 2011, Princeton adopted a pathbreaking policy to retain nonexclusive rights, except in certain cases, to papers published by its faculty. This will provide the University unmitigated freedom to make the research work freely accessible to researchers. The power of collective bargaining in bringing publishers to their knees was demonstrated last year when Research Libraries UK, acting on behalf of 30 member libraries, forced a price negotiation with two leading publishers. The British government made no bones about its keenness to make all research The Ivy League funded by it freely available when it announced its institution's policy in December last year. bold decision could turn out to The British government's decision parallels that of be a harbinger of the National Institutes of Health in the United States. similar The rationale is simple: taxpayers have a right to freely initiatives being access the results of research carried out using their adopted by other money. In fact, journals do not pay for the research; it's major the same with researchers carrying out the work and universities scientists who peer-review the papers. But by virtue of being the gatekeepers of precious information, subscription-based journals charge a heavy fee. Publishers are now finding the tide turning against them as they maintain profit margins of “35 per cent and more.” Elsevier, in end February 2012 withdrew its support for the Research Works Act pending before Congress due to biting criticism and a boycott call by nearly 10,000 researchers. It may be a long battle, but thanks to the internet, open access will finally emerge victorious.

Courtesy: The Hindu

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Updating our copyright laws June 4, 2012 Public discourse on the omnibus copyright law changes approved by Parliament last month has largely focused on the controversy in the film industry over the provision that gives music composers and lyricists the right to claim royalties if their music is used in any other form — a ring tone, for example — apart from the film for which the composition was made and sold. The change, which is in keeping with the practice in Hollywood and elsewhere in the West, puts an end to a stifling and commercially exploitative system in which film producers, and not the creators of music, were regarded as the sole author of the work. Almost unnoticed in the producer versus composer hullabaloo were some other progressive changes in the Copyright Act such as the one that allows organisations to provide persons suffering from disabilities with access to special formats of books on a non-profit basis without the consent of the copyright owner — an empowering provision that will encourage conversion of books into accessible formats such as Braille and Daisy. The Bill is also a The change, boost for the open licensing model with the idea of a which is in stronger public domain reflected in the amended keeping with the Section 21 that permits authors to relinquish any or all practice in copyright rights through a mere notice to the Hollywood and Registrar of Copyrights. elsewhere in the West, puts an end Interestingly, the provision for parallel imports of to a stifling and books, part of an earlier 2010 version of the Bill, has commercially been quietly dropped. Parallel imports would have exploitative allowed the import of a book published outside India system without the mandatory licence from its Indian copyright owner. Although such imports would have liberalised book distribution, some Indian publishing houses, which stand to gain from their monopolies over the import of books, seem to have had their way. Overall, the copyright amendments were justified by the government as a measure to update existing laws with international and World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) norms. Although India is not a signatory to either the WIPO Copyright Treaty or the WIPO Performances and Phonograms Treaty, which address the challenge of protecting copyright of works

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over the internet, the Bill recognises the Digital Rights Management regime which is designed to ensure copyright holders can use technology such as encryption and access control devices to prevent illegal reproduction. The use of such digital locks in impeding the free exchange of content is a controversial and complex issue. Indian courts must now ensure that the DRM regime strikes the right balance between the interest of copyright owners and the legitimate, fair use access of users to digital content. Courtesy: The Hindu

Media can be gagged to ensure fair trial, says SC Allows postponement of publication of hearings The Hindu, September 12, 2012 The Supreme Court on Tuesday refused to frame guidelines across the board for reporting sub judice matters, but laid down a constitutional principle under which aggrieved parties could seek postponement of publication of hearings.

A five-judge Bench, headed by Chief Justice S.H. Kapadia, said it was laying down the constitutional principle which would allow the aggrieved parties to move the appropriate court for postponement of the publication of hearings.

“We are not framing guidelines but we have laid down [a] constitutional principle, and appropriate writ courts will decide when the postponement order has to be passed on [a] case-by-case basis,” said the Bench, which included Justices D.K. Jain, S.S. Nijjar, Ranjana Prakash Desai and J.S. Khehar.

“Hence, guidelines for media reporting cannot be framed across the board.”

Propounding the doctrine of postponement of publication of court proceedings, the Bench said it was only a preventive measure, not prohibitive or punitive.

It further said a temporary ban on publication of court proceedings was necessary to maintain the balance between freedom of speech and fair trial for proper administration of justice.

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The postponement of publication would be required where there was a substantial risk of trial and administration of justice getting prejudiced.

The Chief Justice, who read the judgment, said reasonable restrictions on reporting of court proceedings were needed in societal interest, and this doctrine of postponement was one of a “neutralising technique.”

The Supreme Court has undertaken the exercise of framing guidelines after receiving complaints of breach of confidentiality at the hearing of a dispute between the Sahara Group and the SEBI. The issue came up when certain documents were leaked to the media. — PTI

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INTERFACE Vol. XXXI No. 1

June 2013

ISSN 2231-0274

Cyber Media CYBER MEDIA JUNE 2013

Department of Communication & Journalism (Centre for Advanced Studies in Journalism) UCASS, Osmania University Hyderabad 500 007 Tel. 040-27682258, 27098422 Email: interface.ou@gmail.com

Half-yearly Research Journal Department of Communication & Journalism (Centre for Advanced Studies in Journalism) OSMANIA UNIVERSITY