By Jakob Gunge
Pixelpark IMD : Institute for Media Development
10963 Berlin
+49 3034 981 480
Fax +49 3034 981 541
e-mail: jakob@gunge.dk; pro_admin_1@pixelpark.com
 
 

Introduction

This paper will present a project in development entitled "The Sinking of the ESTONIA' and discuss the impact of media in the broadest of terms on public opinion and how Community Networks holds the potential to give power back to the people.

Sake good order community is here defined as a common interest group, not necessarily a local geographic entity.
 

The Sinking of ESTONIA: Background

On September 12, 1994 the ferry ESTONIA capsized and sank on it's usual route between Tallinn, Estonia and Stockholm, Sweden. The wake of the catastrophe has raised a number of questions as to whether the ferry sank as the result of poor maintenance and weather conditions, or whether it was sabotage. And if it was sabotage who was involved, what was the motivation: theories range from Mafia smuggling to abduction of Russian weapons by Western Military Intelligence.

The case has raised much public attention in Sweden, Finland and Estonia since most of the 852 passangers who were lost came from these countries. In Germany the incident also received much attention from the press since the German shipyard Meyerwerft has been blamed for faulty construction of the Ferry by the official commission investigating the sinking.

So far no plausible explanation has been found.
 

Content basis

A wide range of assets: evidence, clues, analysis and other sources have been gathered by journalists, researchers, engineers, criminal investigators etc. Since the case effects a wide range of stakeholders, and their individual agendas can not be known for sure, the content base can not be said to be complete and interpretation of assets, their meaning, importance and resulting conclusions are open to discussion.

The public is left with the digested opinion of politically biased communication: public authorities, the press, interest groups etc. They can thus only form their opinion based on other peoples opinion, not the raw evidence itself. It is simply not made available, and if it were, it would not be possible for layman to evaluate and interpret all assets for lack of time and expertise.
 

Operational aspects

ICT potentially provides the means of making content available, even if it does not necessarily make it operational. Gathering large amount of raw assets in digital form must be combined with means of organising, searching, structuring etc.

For this purpose the project is developing what is called the "Investigation Manager'. It is a tool which enables users to create notes fitted with descriptive metadata, context  etc. The user also provides a subjective numeric score for the observed assets credibility, relevance, and ranking against the opinions of the existing theories.

The numeric score enables the user to calculate totals for support of theories, get statistical analysis of the observations and assets, their sources, uncover inconsistencies in the assets or the observations themselves. The numeric score also enables users to get a fast overview of other users opinions, community opinion polls and developments etc.
 

Community aspects

Unlike usual  news-groups the structured notes force users to equip their comments with metadata. The numeric scores mean that an overview of opinions can be obtained without having to read through hundreds of pages. Based on the same principle other Communities can be created. It need not necessarily be Criminal Investigation or Conspiracy's (even if there is enough to go round).  Any topic where a range of assets or evidence is the basis of discussion or subjective evaluation can benefit.
 

Information Underload

The first question that arises is of course whether people will take the effort to examine assets and post their opinion. Many might be turned off by the amount of information available (overload) and only provide the community with limited feedback (underload). Where is the critical mass for being a good community member? What can you expect from people who participate at free will? If not the press or political agitators, then who do you believe? Who can be held responsible for having an unqualified subjective opinion?

Where the community network was created to bring information to the people and give them a channel to voice their own, it might turn into a runaway rumour machine. A risk of information underload in another sense occurs: that users are overloaded with invalid or unqualified opinions. They might feel informed, but from lack of information or knowledge are in fact either mislead or left without the right information.
 

Democratic aspects

Although Community Networks certainly holds the potential to facilitate and increase democratic debate, public awareness and influence, it does not relieve individual of responsibility or ensure that the public is enlightened. It more likely risks the opposite in a transitional phase until the technology and its users mature.

News papers and TV-media have a known stand-point and reputation for higher or lower degree of integrity. It is at least commonly known to which extent each of them can be trusted as sources. Community Networks will eventually grow to reach this status once big bucks are involved and reputations need to be held, but in the mean time it is the individuals responsibility to evaluate the sources of information very carefully.

In the long run it is likely that the current elite of opinion makers with access to mass media will be expanded through means of cheap, accessible and wide ranging ICT.

Jakob Gunge
Berlin, July 31, 1999