WORKSHOP ON
DEMOCRACY IN CYBERSPACE
DIAC '94
Amy Bruckman (organizer and panelist)
MIT Media Lab. 20 Ames St., MIT E15-315a, Cambridge, MA 02139.
E-mail: asb@media.mit.edu
Pavel Curtis (panelist)
Xerox PARC. 3333 Coyote Hill Road, Palo Alto, CA 94304.
E-mail: pavel@PARC.xerox.com
Nancy R. Deuel (panelist)
University of Maryland. 1109 Animal Sciences Center,
College Park, Maryland 20742.
Email: nd26@umail.umd.edu
Mitchel Resnick (moderator)
MIT Media Lab. 20 Ames St., MIT E15-312, Cambridge, MA 02139.
E-mail: mres@media.mit.edu
DEMOCRACY IN CYBERSPACE
How is cyberspace to be governed? Bulletin boards systems, text-based virtual
reality systems (or "MUDs"), and other services on computer networks are not
merely sources of information; they are communities. Those communities are
playing an increasing part in the daily lives of a broader and broader segment
of the population. Are they to be controlled by the owners of the hardware
and software, or by the participants?
Commercial service providers require new members to agree to a set of "terms
of service" which establishes standards for appropriate conduct. Changes to
services offered are made at the discretion of the management who may or may
not consult the members involved. When there is a dispute between members and
management as there was on the Prodigy network in 1990, the management may
choose to exert social control by manipulating fee structures or suspending
individual member's accounts.
More democratic methods of governance are possible. A text-based virtual
reality system or "MUD" called LambdaMOO became a direct democracy on May 1st,
1993. MediaMOO began a gradual transition to representative democracy in
September of 1993. These systems are not static but evolving through a
complex combination of formal and social processes. These ongoing experiments
have made it clear that "democracy" is not one thing but a general term for a
form of government that can take many shapes. Just because a community is a
democracy does not make its governance fair or efficient. A host of practical
problems must be dealt with, forcing us to challenge our assumptions about
what democracy is in the real world.
While there have been extended discussions within certain communities about
the direction the governing system should take, there has been little dialogue
between communities. One aim of this workshop is to begin a hopefully ongoing
dialogue on these issues.
INTENDED AUDIENCE
The intended audience includes members of any form of virtual community
interested in these issues, as well as people with an interest in issues of
government and democracy who would like to learn more about virtual
communities. No technical knowledge will be assumed. One goal of this
workshop is to increase communication between these communities.
THE WORKSHOP
Pavel Curtis, the founder of LambdaMOO, will briefly describe the history of
direct democracy on LambdaMOO. Amy Bruckman, the founder of MediaMOO, will
briefly describe the history of representative democracy on MediaMOO. Nancy
Deuel, one of MediaMOO's first elected councilors, will discuss her
experiences as an elected official.
Numerous members of the LambdaMOO and MediaMOO communities live in the Boston
area, and others plan to come to Boston to attend DIAC. At this time, all
members of these communities present will be invited to say a few words about
how the change to democracy has affected them.
The audience will be invited to direct questions to both panel members and
audience members who have shared their experiences.
Finally, the moderator, Mitchel Resnick, will take a few minutes to sum up the
conversation, highlighting key issues that have emerged.
RESULT
Workshop participants will be invited to join a new mailing list on issues of
virtual government.
WORKSHOP ORGANIZERS
AMY BRUCKMAN, MIT MEDIA LAB
Amy Bruckman is a doctoral candidate at the Media Lab at MIT, where she
founded MediaMOO, a text-based virtual reality environment or "MUD" designed
to be a professional community for media researchers. MediaMOO began the
process of becoming a representative democracy in September of 1993. Amy
received her master's degree from the Media Lab's Interactive Cinema Group in
1991. For her dissertation, she is creating a MUD for kids called MOOSE
Crossing. MOOSE Crossing is designed to provide an authentic context for kids
to learn reading, writing, and programming.
PAVEL CURTIS, XEROX PARC
Pavel Curtis has been a member of the research community at the Xerox Palo
Alto Research Center since 1983, during which time he has worked on
programming environments and on other projects mostly related to the design
and implementation of programming languages. His current work centers on the
Social Virtual Reality project, investigating the implementation,
applications, and implications of systems that allow multiple simultaneous
users to communicate and interact in pseudo-physical surroundings. He is the
founder and chief administrator of LambdaMOO, one of the most popular
recreational social virtual realities on the Internet. LambdaMOO became a
direct democracy on May 1st, 1993.
NANCY DEUEL, UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND
In real life, Nancy Deuel is Assistant Professor of Equine Sports Biomechanics
at the University of Maryland, where she has 12 years of experience in
designing and utilizing computerized image analysis techniques in her studies
of athletic motion patterns and gait dynamics. On the Internet, she is one of
the first elected representatives to the MediaMOO Council, perhaps the first
representative democracy on the Internet. She is also the co-author of a
publication that considers the practices and ramifications of virtual sex.
MITCHEL RESNICK, MIT MEDIA LAB
Mitchel Resnick is an assistant professor at the MIT Media Laboratory. His
research focuses on the development of computational tools that help people
(particularly children) learn new things in new ways. He is co-developer of
LEGO/Logo (a computer-controlled construction kit) and developer of StarLogo
(the first massively parallel programming language intended for nonexpert
programmers). He is currently exploring (with Amy Bruckman) how virtual
communities might change the ways children learn, play, and think about
themselves.
REFERENCES
Bruckman, Amy and Mitchel Resnick (1993). "Virtual Professional Community:
Results from the MediaMOO Project." Presented at the Third International
Conference on Cyberspace in Austin, Texas on May 15th, 1993. Available via
anonymous ftp from media.mit.edu in
pub/asb/papers/MediaMOO-3cyberconf.{ps.Z,rtf.Z,txt}
Curtis, Pavel and David Nichols (1993). "MUDs Grow Up: Social Virtual Reality
in the Real World." Presented at the Third International Conference on
Cyberspace in Austin, Texas on May 15th, 1993. Available via anonymous ftp
from parcftp.xerox.com in pub/MOO/papers/MUDsGrowUp. {ps,txt}
Curtis, Pavel (1992). "Mudding: Social Phenomena in Text-Based Virtual
Realities." Proceedings of DIAC '92. Available via anonymous ftp from
parcftp.xerox.com, pub/MOO/papers/DIAC92.{ps, txt}.
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