首页
外语
计算机
考研
公务员
职业资格
财经
工程
司法
医学
专升本
自考
实用职业技能
登录
外语
The Future Is Another Country A couple of months or so after becoming Britain’s prime minister, David Cameron wanted a few t
The Future Is Another Country A couple of months or so after becoming Britain’s prime minister, David Cameron wanted a few t
admin
2013-08-12
53
问题
The Future Is Another Country
A couple of months or so after becoming Britain’s prime minister, David Cameron wanted a few tips from somebody who could tell him how it felt to be responsible for, and accountable to, many millions of people: people who expected things from him, even though in most cases he would never shake their hands.
He turned not to a fellow head of government but to... Mark Zuckerberg, the founder and boss of Facebook, the phenomenally successful social network.(It announced that it had 500m users)In a well-publicised online video chat this month, the two men swapped ideas about ways for networks to help governments. Was this just a political leader seeking a spot of help from the private sector—or was it more like diplomacy, a comparison of notes between the masters of two great nations?
In some ways, it might seem absurd to call Facebook a state and Mr. Zuckerberg its governor. It has no land to defend; no police to enforce law and order; it does not have subjects, bound by a clear cluster of rights, obligations and cultural signals. Compared with citizenship of a country, membership is easy to acquire and give up. Nor do Facebook’s boss and his executives depend directly on the consent of an "electorate(选民)" that can unseat them. Technically, the only people they report to are the shareholders.
But many web-watchers do detect country-like features in Facebook. "It is a device that allows people to get together and control their own destiny, much like a nation-state," says David Post, a law professor at Temple University. If that sounds like a flattering description of Facebook’s "groups"(often rallying people with unusual habits and hatred), then it is worth recalling a classic definition of the modern nation-state. As Benedict Anderson, a political scientist, put it, such polities are "imagined communities" in which each person feels a bond with millions of anonymous fellow-citizens. In centuries past, people looked up to kings or bishops; but in an age of mass literacy and printing in non-official languages, so Mr. Anderson argued, horizontal ties matter more.
So if newspapers and shabby paperbacks can create new social and political units, for which people toil and die, perhaps the latest forms of communication can do likewise. In his 2006 book "Code: Version 2.0", a legal scholar, Lawrence Lessig noted that online communities were transcending the limits of conventional states—and predicted that members of these communities would find it "difficult to stand neutral in this international space".
To many, that forecast still smacks(带......味道)of cyber-fantasy. But the rise of Facebook at least gives pause for thought. If it were a physical nation, it would now be the third most populous on earth. Mr. Zuckerberg is confident there will be a billion users in a few years. Facebook is unprecedented not only in its scale but also in its ability to blur boundaries between the real and virtual worlds. A few years ago, online communities evoked fantasy games played by small, strange groups. But as technology made possible large virtual arenas like Second Life or World of Warcraft, an online game with millions of players, so the overlap between cyberspace and real human existence began to grow.
From the users’ viewpoint, Facebook can feel a bit like a liberal polity: a space in which people air opinions, rally support and right wrongs. What about the view from the top? Is Facebook a place that needs governing, just as a country does? Brad Burnham of Union Square Ventures, a venture-capital firm, has argued that the answer is yes. In the spirit of liberal politics, he thinks the job of Facebook’s managers is to create a space in which citizens and firms feel comfortable investing their time and money to create things.
Facebook has certainly tried to guide the development of its online economy, almost in the way that governments seek to influence economic activity in the real world, through fiscal(财政的)and monetary policy. Earlier this year the firm said it wanted applications running on its platform to accept its virtual currency, known as Facebook Credits. It argued that this was in the interests of Facebook users, who would no longer have to use different online currencies for different applications. But this made some developers angry, who resent the fact that Facebook takes a 30% cut on every transaction involving credits.
Like any ruling elite that knows it relies on the consent from the ruled, Facebook seeks advice from its members on questions of governance. It allows users to vote on proposed changes to its terms of service, and it holds online forums to collect views on future policies. And like any well-intentioned politicians, Facebook makes blunders: its members were angry earlier this year by changes to its policy that made public some previously private information. If Mr. Zuckerberg achieves his goal of creating the world’s favourite "social utility", he may need to give users a more formal say—a bit like a constitution.
Experience shows that networks which neglect governance pay a price. Take MySpace, which was once much bigger than Facebook: its growth stalled a couple of years ago when its managers let the site become too disorderly. There is a thin line, it seems, between the freedom that spurs creativity and a free-for-all.
As Facebook’s masters present it, their mission is just to make the world more open and connected— and bring closer the "global village" predicted in the 1960s by Marshall McLuhan, a futurologist they love. Their claim to be accelerators has some force. Facebook’s success "raises a lot of issues that we thought were a generation away," says Edward Castronova, a professor at Indiana University. One of them is how much impact virtual economies and currencies will have on real world ones.
Facebook may also influence how governments supply services, and compete to provide them. For instance, the firm allows members to use their Facebook profiles to log into other sites around the web, creating a sort of passport. A similar facility could help people on the move retain access to government services. And then there is the question of how social networks will change politics. Clearly, they help to stimulate discussion, and they let governments search and test proposals. When Messrs Cameron and Zuckerberg conferred, the main topic was how to get new ideas for cutting public spending.
Like many diplomatic relationships, theirs was not constant. Days after the chat, Facebook was criticised by the British government for allowing tributes to a murderer to be posted. The firm refused to remove the offending page, which was later taken down by its creator. "Facebook is a place where people can express their views and discuss things in an open way, as they can and do in many other places," it said. Mr. Zuckerberg may not have any territory, but he was determined to stand his ground.
Mr. Anderson argued that the "imagined communities" tightened relations ______.
选项
A、among people with the same level
B、between ordinary people and kings
C、between networks and governments
D、among heads of different countries
答案
A
解析
转载请注明原文地址:https://kaotiyun.com/show/8397777K
0
大学英语六级
相关试题推荐
A、Delegationisatickettoforeigntrade.B、Managersshouldn’tmerelybea"doer".C、Leadershipisabornability.D、Delegation
Theconceptofpersonalchoiceinrelationtohealthbehaviorsisanimportantone.Anestimated90percentofallillnessmayb
A、Freeofcharge.B、Eitherbycheckorbycash.C、Eitherbycashorbycreditcard.D、Eitherbycheckorbycreditcard.C细节题。女士
A、Theyoftentakerisks.B、They’retooconservative.C、Theyhavenosenseofsecurity.D、Theyhavenoself-discipline.B对话开头提到了话
OfalltheemployedworkersintheUnitedStates,12.5millionarepartofatemporaryworkforce.TheUnitedStatesBureauofLa
ClarissaGreensupposesthatadultchildrenshouldavoidsensitiveissueswiththeirfragileparentsabouttheirfuture.WhenN
ClarissaGreensupposesthatadultchildrenshouldavoidsensitiveissueswiththeirfragileparentsabouttheirfuture.ValMa
ReturningtoScienceTeresaGarrettwasworkingpart-timeasabiochemistrypostdoc(博士后).Shehadaninfantathome,andsh
A、Animals’extraordinaryabilitytopredictweather.B、Someoldwaysofweatherpredicting.C、Thewisdomofancientpeople.D、Wh
Halloweenusedtobesomethingquitedifferentfromthecelebrationofsugarygreedthatgoesontoday.Earlierinthiscent
随机试题
某养鸡场1200只伊莎青年后备鸡群,受鱼粉供应紧张、豆粕涨价影响,采用棉子饼和菜籽饼作为蛋白饲料部分替代鱼粉和豆粕,用量棉子饼18%、菜籽饼5%。鸡群突然发病,病鸡只大多是体质健壮,膘情尚好的鸡只,患病初期精神萎靡,呆立,离群,食欲不振,两腿软弱无力,瘫卧
Borntrager反应呈阳性的是()
在国际上,采用固定总价合同,在业主和承包商都无法预测风险的条件下和可能有工程变更的情况下,()。
甲公司以出包方式建造厂房,建造过程中发生的下列支出中,应计入所建造厂房成本的有()。(2014年)
在我国兰州一昆明一线以西,绝大部分山地为高山和极高山,下列超过8000米的高峰有()。
2015年3月15日,第十二届全国人民代表大会第三次会议表达通过了修改《中华人民共和国____________法》的决定。这是该法自2000年实施以来的第一次大修。
“三个代表”要求,是我们党保持先进性,始终成为建设有中国特色社会主义坚强领导核心的()。
(2022年江苏)某木材加工厂非法占用耕地建造厂房,经土地承包经营人张某举报,当地主管部门对该厂作出行政处理决定:责令限期拆除厂房,退还土地;没收建筑物和其他设施;涉案人员移送公安机关立案侦查。该厂收到处理决定后未提出异议,超过规定期限2年仍未拆除厂房及退
动作技能形成中的特征变化有()
有以下程序:#include<stdio.h>main(){inty=9;for(;y>0;y——)if(y%3==0)printf("%d",——y);}程序的运行结果是()。
最新回复
(
0
)