From: blancw@pylon.com
Date: Wed, 7 Sep 94 22:38:22 PDT
To: rishab@dxm.ernet.in
Subject: Social punishment 1/3: law without enforcers
Message-ID: <199409080538.WAA25992@deepthought.pylon.com>
MIME-Version: 1.0
Content-Type: text/plain


Responding to msg by rishab:

The system of social punishment can easily be adapted to 
educated, liberal  inhabitants of cyberspace, much more easilty 
than can present law enforcement  systems. My next post will 
examine the similarities between tribal and  cyberspatial 
society.
........................................................

I don't know yet what you are going to say about the 
similarities between tribal & cyberspatial societies, but one 
thought which immediately struck me in your sentence is that 
you are putting two very different ideas of society into the 
same category.   The associations which occur in cyberspace are 
not like the ones which occur in the physical plane.  The 
expectations are different -  you don't expect to live with 
these other people in close proximity, you don't expect to 
identify with them as a group in the same way, you are not 
going to get the same benefits on a daily basis or even an 
extended time period, as you might from those with whom you 
interact on more than one level or kind of contact.  I 
personally don't see interactions in cyberspace as constituting 
a 'society', even if they are 'social'. 

Maybe a drive-by society.  
Maybe drive-by law enforcement.  :>)

Blanc