A blog about cyberspace
I'm currently working on developing a blog about cyberspace. Adhering to the indie web principles, I have been programming the site from scratch. Handwritten HTML and CSS, no JavaScript, no trackers, no analytics, building only what I need as I need it.
Since the site is not ready for publication yet, I share here one of the first entries, where I talk about what it means to be a cybercitizen.
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Introduction
In the information age, we have been steadily working towards an inhospitable future for a purely offline existence. Points of entry to cyberspace have made themselves readily accessible in our smartphones, our computers, our televisions, and in the internet of things. We have collectively contributed to this vast digital network of human expression with data —ours and the data of those around us. The digital component of life today is a permanent aspect of human interactions, and this in turn creates the need for analyzing the way we live this hybrid existence.
Broadly speaking, people have taken to the internet for obligations, for leisure, for socialization, for expression, and for politics. Cyberspace is a complimentary component of the human experience, as some things are better done online while others should probably stay within the bounds of the physical world.
One thing is certain: The current separation between digital and physical spaces will continue to evolve, and we ought to prepare for these changes. Consider the times that your digital life plays an important role in your daily routine. Job applications, apartment hunting, loan payments, entertainment, work, education, mortgages, even meeting people for the first time can be done through cyberspace. It’s not likely that this will change anytime soon. Whether this impossibility for offline existence is a good or bad thing is a topic for another entry. Here, I want to address our obligation to reflect and think about what cyberconstituency entails.
What does it mean to be a cybercitizen? Can I opt out of existing digitally? How can I be a good cybercitizen? Why should I want to be a good cybercitizen anyway?
Definitions
I use the terms “cyberspace” and “cybercitizen” following the definitions in philosopher Pierre Lévy’s 1997 book Cyberculture. There, Lévy defines cyberspace as “the medium of communications that arose through the global interconnection of computers”. A cybercitizen is a participant of this communication medium. Because there is a distinction between the terms Internet, World Wide Web, Gopher, Gemini, and any future communication protocols that may exist, the term cyberspace allows for a technology-agnostic discussion on information exchange facilitated by computer communication protocols. For example, if the metaverse becomes the de facto communication protocol in a few decades, the ideas discussed in this entry will remain applicable.
A person becomes a cybercitizen when there is an exchange of personal data for usage of some digital service. Regardless of the frequency of this transaction, once it has been carried out at least once, the cybercitizen may not readily renounce their place in cyberspace. More concretely, once the discrete exchange of personally identifying information such as phone number, home address, or credit card has been given up in exchange for access to a service, a person becomes one more node in the vast repository of information travelling through the digital space. Because I assume my reader will find themselves in this category, in the following sections I offer some thoughts on cyberconstituency, or the relationship that a person has to cyberspace.
The Structure of Cyberspace Some burning questions include: what is the structure of cyberspace? Who runs it? What role do individuals play in it? The answer to the first question is that the structure is fluid at best. The cyberspace of the 2020s is drastically different from what it used to be in the 1990s, partly because the main communication protocol used today, what we know as the World Wide Web, has matured and adapted to the ways its users access it.
In its infancy, it would have been hard to imagine that doorbells, refrigerators, microwaves, voice-operated digital assistants, and other household appliances would be as data-oriented as they are today. All these kinds of devices serve as interfaces for access to the internet, and every point of access offers different services. They all have one thing in common: feeding data from their users to the corporation that manufactures them. The development of the infrastructure that powers our modern model of cyberspace is directly informed by the way in which its developers can profit from its usage.
Today, this model heavily relies on advertising, particularly personalized advertisements for every cybercitizen. Through the collection of personal data, corporations can create marketing profiles for each user, and we are shown advertisements that target and adapt to our preferences and demographics. This type of business model where users’ personal data is the currency traded between businesses, governments, and individuals is explored in detail in Shoshana Zuboff’s The Age of Surveillance Capitalism. The largest downsides to such a model are the perpetual violations of privacy that are needed to make it happen, thus participation in cyberspace at large is necessarily one where privacy must be given up in some way.
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Why should we care about being a good cybercitizen? Who benefits from being one and what does it all even mean? A good cybercitizen is someone who understands their relationship to the single largest repository of human expression in its digital form.
Knowing what personal data we share with the use of digital services, the structure of the space where we spend so much time, and knowing the influence that those who control cyberspace can have on real-world events all are necessary components of being a good cybercitizen.
Being a good cybercitizen is about having knowledge about being one and using that knowledge to shape cyberspace in a positive way for its current and future users. This is desirable because cyberspace exerts a considerable influence on social development, so the permissible behaviors, information, and the moral values that we share and support in the digital space will in turn shape the local and physical communities in which we live.