CMC Magazine / February 1, 1996
| SPECIAL FOCUS ON TECHNOLOGICAL DETERMINISM |
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The Electronic Colonization of the Pacific
by Dirk H.R. Spennemann, Jim Birckhead, David G. Green, and John S. Atkinson
The recent developments of server-based technology have seen the
Internet
become more and more pervasive. The
"information superhighway" or "infobahn"
has been touted far and wide as heralding a new age.
Certainly the World Wide
Web offers a wide range of options for communication and for the
exchange of information. But what does this mean for the indigenous
cultures in the microstates of the Pacific? There is a need to
consider the
sorts of impact the technological developments may have in order to
sensitize the users and developers of the Web to these issues and to
explore avenues to
mitigate
negative impacts.
Traditional views of communication might take a value-neutral stance to technology. However, while modern technologies empower, economic inequalities restrict access. Moreoever, the nature of web communication isn't all that egalitarian, which raises the question of whether the Web brings enablement or exploitation, with the Webmasters as sorcerer's apprentices.
In the end, we raise questions of
where we may go from here--the
current
Web is set to divorce the indigenous cultures from control of
their own cultural material.
Dirk H.R. Spennemann (dspennemann@csu.edu.au), Jim Birckhead, David G. Green, and John S. Atkinson are with the Johnstone Centre of Parks, Recreation and Heritage, Charles Sturt University, PO Box 789, Albury NSW 2640, Australia.
Copyright © 1996 by Dirk H.R. Spennemann, Jim Birckhead, David G. Green, and John S. Atkinson. All Rights Reserved.
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