Freedom of Speech and Control of Information

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Freedom of Speech and Control of Information

• Karine Barzilai-Nahon
• karineb_at_u.washington.edu

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Basics of Democracies

• Free elections and peaceful regime transition
• High level of freedoms, for example
• Freedom of association
• Freedom of expression
• Freedom of Information and alternative channels
  of information
• Privacy
• Minority rights and marginal groups
• Existence of a legitimate opposition

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Basic Definitions

• Free speech the right to inform and to know
• Positive freedom promoting speech
• Negative freedom constraining
• Restrictions of freedom of speech
• Restriction apriori (legislation, filtering,
  blocking, zoning)
• Restriction posteriori (legislation, deletion)
• 2003 - NTIA Report

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Claims for Freedom of Speech

• Important to the individual development of
  fulfillment
• The autonomy to select beliefs and views
• Self-determination of social groups
• Promoting truth and its exposure
• One component of democracy
• Exposing social problems and adjustment to change

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Censorship

• Moral Censorship
• Pornography
• Extreme violence
• Sedition to racism
• Hurting the norms of the public
• Security Censorship
• State Censorship

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Internet and Free Speech

• Wide and low cost distribution
• Speed of distribution
• Empowered individuals?
• Anonymity?
• Diverse applications
• Enforcement?

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Anonymity (Informative Arguments)

• Support Disclosure
• Knowledge of speaker identity - better assessment
  of truthfulness or accuracy of the expression
• Giving the right weight to the expression
• Prevent impersonation

• Support Anonymity
• Knowledge of speaker identity misjudge veracity
  or the persuasive force of an argument.
• Giving the wrong weight to the expression
• Allows creativity of identities

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Anonymity (Group Pressure Arguments)

• Support Disclosure
• Inhibit expressions that are undesired socially
  or harmful
• Enhance accountability and responsibility for the
  expression

• Support Anonymity
• Allows and protects expressions that might be
  unconventional socially
• Enhance revelation and responsibility for the
  expression less political

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Anonymity (Enforcement Arguments)

• Support Disclosure
• An Address for enforcement
• Preventing illegal activities in the future due
  to deterrence

• Support Anonymity
• Allow collaboration of felons with authorities
• Encourages informing on activities of others

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Censorship and Internet

• Use of technology systems (filtering, blocking,
  zoning, deletion) as controlling information and
  speech
• Manual censoring (deletion)
• Use of channeling mechanisms
• Use of infrastructure control (non-democratic
  regime)
• Policy of deterrence (regulation or practices)
  CIPA, COPA, CDA
• Policy of punishment (state and self regulation)

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China and Controlling the net

• Closing Internet Cafés
• Filtering and blocking sites
• Channeling search engines and portals
• Regulation
• Arrests and torture
• Internet Police and collaboration with others
• Licensing

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Normative Models

• Threat to democracy - Cass Sunstein
• Architecture protection - Lessig
• Threat to democratic culture - Jack Balkin
• Network gatekeeping theory Barzilai-Nahon

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Gatekeeping is Dead!

• Lets begin with the unpleasant truth Were
  not gatekeepers any more.
• Gatekeeping is a dead profession. There are no
  gates to be kept. The city walls have been torn
  down.
• We dont control information. Control was, at
  best, an illusion, and now, in the era of Matt
  Drudge, even that illusion is shattered. We dont
  own our customers. They own themselves. They will
  go where they want. Theyll do what they want.
• (Steve Yelvington, Executive Editor of Cox
  Interactive Media)

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What is Gatekeeping?

• Classical Gatekeeping Theories
• Kurt Lewin (1947)
• David Manning White (1950) Mr. Gates
• Gieber (1956), Bass (1969), Shoemaker (1991)
• Simply put, gatekeeping is the process by
  which the billions of messages that are available
  in the world get cut down and transformed into
  the hundreds of messages that reach a given
  person on a given day (Shoemaker, 1991)

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Gatekeepers in a Networked Environment

• Gatekeeping Process of controlling information
  as it moves through a gate. Activities include
  selection, addition, withholding, display,
  channeling, shaping, manipulation, repetition,
  timing, localization, integration, disregard and
  deletion of information.
• Gatekeeping Mechanism Tool or technology used
  to carry out the process of gatekeeping.
• Network Gatekeeper Entity (people,
  organizations, or governments) that has the
  discretion to exercise gatekeeping through a
  gatekeeping mechanism in networks and can choose
  the extent to which to exercise it.

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Typology of Gatekeepers
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Typology of Gatekeeping Mechanisms
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Typology of Gatekeeping Mechanisms
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Comparing Frameworks
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Gatekeeping in Virtual Communities
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Example of Explanatory Model

• Z - 6.876 4.235(MsgDay3)
  4.299(MsgDay4) 4.437(MsgDay5)
  4.265(MsgDay6) 4.074(MsgDay7)-1.087(MsgDay
  8) 4.393(MsgDay9) 4.17(MsgDay10)
  4.161(MsgDay11) 4.329(MsgDay12)
  4.198(MsgDay13) 4.261(MsgDay14)
  0.996(MsgDay15) 4.663(MsgDay16)
  4.36(MsgDay17) 4.104(MsgDay18)
  4.139(MsgDay19) 4.148(MsgDay20)
  4.155(MsgDay21) -0.829(MsgDay22)
  4.177(MsgDay23) 4.206(MsgDay24)
  4.285(MsgDay25) 4.409(MsgDay26)
  4.273(MsgDay27) 4.324(MsgDay28)
  1.21(MsgDay29) 4.493(MsgDay30)
  4.532(MsgDay31) 0.254(MsgHour 2)
  0.172(MsgHour4) 0.336(MsgHour9)
  0.125(MsgHour10) 0.3(MsgHour11)
  0.377(MsgHour12) 0.09(MsgHour20)
  5.713(MsgDayofWeek3) 0.6MsgSubLength(---1
  0.193MsgSubLength(1---3 -0.242MsgSubLength
  (3---4 1.001 MsgContentLength(34---37
  2.425MsgSubLength(37--- 0.714(ForumPrimaryC
  ategoryPlacement Love and romanticism
  Acquaintance) 0.52( ForumPrimaryCategoryPlaceme
  ntLove and romanticism For Adults) 0.715(
  ForumPrimaryCategoryPlacementPeople and Society)
  0.233(ForumPrimaryCategoryPlacementPride)
  1.494(ForumPrimaryCategoryPlacementThe economy
  and Business) 0.495(ForumPrimaryCategoryPlaceme
  nt Music) 0.47(ForumPrimaryCategoryPlacement
  Computers and Internet) 0.702(ForumPrimaryCateg
  oryPlacementThe family) 0.881(ForumPrimaryCate
  goryPlacement The family Duality)
  0.342(ForumPrimaryCategoryPlacement Sports)
  0.603(ForumPrimaryCategoryPlacement Sports
  fans) 0.793(ForumPrimaryCategoryPlacement
  Current events parties) 0.709(ForumPrimaryCat
  egoryPlacement Leisure and entertainment TV)
  0.351(ForumPrimaryCategoryPlacement Leisure
  and entertainment hobbies)
  0.551(ForumPrimaryCategoryPlacement Young)
  0.586(ForumPrimaryCategoryPlacement
  Spirituality and mysticism) 0.601(ForumPrimary
  CategoryPlacement Medicine and health)
  0.894(ForumPrimaryCategoryPlacement Support)
  0.611(ForumPrimaryCategoryPlacement
  Locality) -0.412(UserGenderCheated)
  0.733(UserGenderMale) 0.982(UserGenderFemale
  ) 0.083JuneUserDelMsgs(0---7
  0.0006JuneUserDelMsgs(7---
  0.256JuneUserNoForums(0---2
  0.62NormalUserSeniorityInForum(0.05---0.19
  0.948NormalUserSeniorityInForum(0.19---0.416
  1.245NormalUserSeniorityInForum(0.416---0.76
  1.353NormalUserSeniorityInForum(0.76---
  19.534NormalUserDelMsgsUntilJune(0---0.032.
  84NormalUserDelMsgsUntilJune(0.03---0.15

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GAINS Chart of the Model
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The Gatekeepers The Duality of Hurting and
Guarding the Wall in virtual communities- A
mixed model of regulation
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Self-Regulation Gatekeeping

• Sovereignty Inside Borders of Virtual Communities
• Governments must rely on self-regulation
  mechanisms
• self-regulation mechanism can be
• Censorship mechanisms (blocking messages users,
  deleting, zoning)
• Channeling mechanisms (hyperlinks, ranking)
• Editorial mechanisms

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Sovereignty Inside Borders of Virtual Communities
(cont.)

• Tension between the enablers and managers.
• Managers are 4 timed more likely to post
  commercial information (usually upon request of
  the enablers), but are 7 times less likely to
  post information that may harm the community (ex.
  moving to another space).
• Quality vs. popularity.

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Social Capital in Virtual Communities

• The Community Core
• User seniority More senior, less hurts the
  community, less blocked (except when the reason
  is irrelevant), contributes more to balance the
  regular activities serve as the gatekeepers!!!
• Overlapping Loyalties
• Marginalized Communities strong sense of
  homogeneity and social capital. Censoring the
  non main-stream.

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Anonyimity of a Gated

• User history or profile?
• Guests
• Gender

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Mr. Gates
c
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The Physics of the Web
c
(Barabasi, 2001)
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Direct and Indirect Navigation
Source (WebSideStory, 2003a)
c
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Search Engines Referrals
Table 3.9 Search Engine Referrals1
4.1
c
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Interesting Links

• Internet Under Surveillance Report Reporters
  without borders May 2006
• Report on Censorship and Control- September 2003
  Privacy International
• Amnesty Report state control of China in the
  Internet
• Human Rights Watch and the Internet

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(No Transcript)
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Everybody writes
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But Who Reads?