sharon sanders
Editor-in-Chief & President
How do you want your brain washed, slow and subliminal, or with a knock to the head? The most damaging and pervasive is the slow and constant drum beat of a set of messages. The internet media is open 24 hours a day. Can’t sleep? Get online. Bored? Get online. Want a news update? Yup, get on line. This is drive-thru information delivery. <?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com
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What is published online can be a powerful medium of influence, even subliminally. Online publishers must become aware of their influence in today’s society. In a 2005 study by the Stanford Institute for the Quantitative Study of Society, it was reported that Americans use the internet 3 ½ hours per day which is an increase of 4% over 2004. This study also found that the majority of time spent online (38.9%) was spent communicating with friends, family and colleagues. This describes online “bird flu” communities. We are friends. We have become family. And all of us are colleagues in the quest to find a solution to the H5N1 issues. As online publishers we have the responsibility to our communities to be clear in our mission and guide these societies in that framework. By allowing the community to drift from the stated mission, publishers can inadvertently change the entire tone and emotional climate of the community. If the messages become anti-social then the community can develop into a dysfunctional family, and a downward spiral in mass communication is begun. As the bar is lowered by each new anti-social dialogue, the standard of acceptable online behavior becomes lower also. The members of the community may gradually come to accept some of these new behaviors and dialogues as “normal”. <o></o>
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Constant exposure to anti-social dialogue or hate speak can and will affect even the most saintly among us. In 1946 news media executive Julius Streicher was sentenced to death for genocide for an anti-Semitic campaign of propaganda through print media in Nazi Germany during World War II. An international court in December 2003 in <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-comffice:smarttags" /><st1:country-region><st1lace>Tanzania</st1lace></st1:country-region> convicted three Rwandan media executives of genocide for helping to incite a killing spree that killed 800,000 Rwandan Tutsis and moderate Hutus. The presiding judge of the Tanzanian court, Navanathem Pillay, said in her closing remarks:<o></o>
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“Without a firearm, machete or any physical weapon, you caused the deaths of thousands of innocent civilians.''
<o>http://www.stanford.edu/group/siqss/research/time_study_files/ProjectReport2005.pdf</o>
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fficeffice" /><o></o><o
></o>What is published online can be a powerful medium of influence, even subliminally. Online publishers must become aware of their influence in today’s society. In a 2005 study by the Stanford Institute for the Quantitative Study of Society, it was reported that Americans use the internet 3 ½ hours per day which is an increase of 4% over 2004. This study also found that the majority of time spent online (38.9%) was spent communicating with friends, family and colleagues. This describes online “bird flu” communities. We are friends. We have become family. And all of us are colleagues in the quest to find a solution to the H5N1 issues. As online publishers we have the responsibility to our communities to be clear in our mission and guide these societies in that framework. By allowing the community to drift from the stated mission, publishers can inadvertently change the entire tone and emotional climate of the community. If the messages become anti-social then the community can develop into a dysfunctional family, and a downward spiral in mass communication is begun. As the bar is lowered by each new anti-social dialogue, the standard of acceptable online behavior becomes lower also. The members of the community may gradually come to accept some of these new behaviors and dialogues as “normal”. <o
></o><o
></o>Constant exposure to anti-social dialogue or hate speak can and will affect even the most saintly among us. In 1946 news media executive Julius Streicher was sentenced to death for genocide for an anti-Semitic campaign of propaganda through print media in Nazi Germany during World War II. An international court in December 2003 in <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com
ffice:smarttags" /><st1:country-region><st1lace>Tanzania</st1lace></st1:country-region> convicted three Rwandan media executives of genocide for helping to incite a killing spree that killed 800,000 Rwandan Tutsis and moderate Hutus. The presiding judge of the Tanzanian court, Navanathem Pillay, said in her closing remarks:<o></o><o
></o>“Without a firearm, machete or any physical weapon, you caused the deaths of thousands of innocent civilians.''
<o
>http://www.stanford.edu/group/siqss/research/time_study_files/ProjectReport2005.pdf</o><o
></o>