© 1997 j-dom Media. Contact us!Some time ago Net users were dubbed 'Netizens' in other words citizens of the Internet. Personally I think its a pretty good turn of phrase, but what are its implications?
The Net is already like a nation to an extent: A common ground of a shared experience through e-mail, Usenet and the Web which have borders. The Net encompasses a wide variety of experiences and types of people but are they all 'live' in shared space. But isn't it more like a world of its own? CompuServe and AOL are superpowers, MSN a rapidly catching up nation like India. The wide variety of cultures and conflicting interests of different groups like jostling countries. IRC encroaching on Usenet both of which being robbed by the Web. Maybe, but at the end of the day you can only ever take analogies so far. So the Net isn't really a Nation for now.
What about for the future? Legally the Net is currently something of a paradox, its very nature causing copyright nightmares as well as many other problems. If the Net became legally regarded as a country of sorts then couldn't it have its own laws? And then some kind of regulations could be enforced by its own regulating body which understood the Net.
It could do more than that thought, see it in Part 2.
