Essay Part 1

Lately in AP Lang we've had to write an essay on a book while both reviewing it as well as an overall topic it covers. For mine I've read Rebecca MacKinnon's Consent of the Networked which touches on the impact of the Internet as well as privacy concerns and regulatory concerns and their implications. Thanks for reading and feel free to leave feedback and comments! Here's the first part:

Control of the Internet in the Modern Age

Parker Bennett

Consent of the Networked: The Worldwide Struggle for Internet Freedom

By Rebecca MacKinnon

Basic Books, 320 pp., $26.99

January 25, 2011: Hossam el-Hamalawy joins thousands of others to take to the streets in Egypt as their “Day of Rage” begins. Organizing protests through social media sites like Facebook and Twitter, activists are able to put together highly visible and effective demonstrations that elicit a response from the police. Soon protests are happening nation-wide as Egypt experiences a modern revolution, attracting international attention. On the third day of protests, Internet and phone services are cut off in the Cairo area, severely disrupting communication between activists. This is only part of the Egyptian government’s control over the citizens. Late Friday night, Hossam el-Hamalawy along with numerous other protestors storm the offices of the SSI in Nasr City. He visits the cell where he had been imprisoned for anti-government sentiments and beaten, later writing on his Twitter feed that he could not stop crying. Also discovered in the compound are thousands of documents and files on citizens, with text message transcripts, Internet postings, photos, dossiers, and other privacy-infringing records of Egyptian citizens. As the regime built around Hosni Mubarak (the dictatorial president of Egypt at the time) crumbles in the following weeks, more and more evidence comes to light of the extent of which the Egyptian government kept surveillance on its citizens, as well as the extent of how far it went to control their access to freedom: The Internet.

The Internet has become the most important innovation of the modern age, connecting billions of users across the world, encouraging cooperation between people on a global scale and allowing for the sharing of ideas, photos, information, videos, and more. Even though it can create an open and free society, it can also help those who wish to force control on people, or monitor them. This dual use of the Internet is discussed in length in Rebecca MacKinnon’s book, The Consent of the Networked. As well as discussing the role of the Internet in repressive governments and its role in fighting for freedom, MacKinnon focuses on threats to the Internet, which include authoritarian regimes, but also corporations and legislature which can interfere with free speech and privacy rights.  These areas of focus are the key points Mackinnon uses in her book to prove her point that action needs to be taken in regards to the Internet and freedom of speech/privacy concerns. As she says in the beginning of the book,

It is time to stop debating whether the Internet is an effective tool for political expression, and to move on to the much more urgent question of how digital technology can be structured, governed, and used to maximize the good it can do in the world, and minimize the evil….

The reality is that the corporations and governments that build, operate, and govern cyberspace are not being held sufficiently accountable for their exercise of power over the lives and identities of people who use digital networks. They are sovereigns operating without the consent of the networked. (MacKinnon, pp. 34 )