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12:23 Jul 14, 2011
English to Arabic translations [PRO] Social Sciences - Media / Multimedia / digital media - online media
English term or phrase:all of what appear in the explanation
For young adults and youth the “net” has also become a medium used to communicate and
interact with one’s friends. The Media Awareness Network held focus groups of Canadian
children aged nine to 17 (2004), and conducted a large survey of Canadians in grades 4 to 11
(2005). They found that, “contrary to the earlier stereotype of the isolated and awkward
computer nerd, today’s wired kid is a social kid” (2005), and that children access the Internet
to converse online with their friends for over an hour, on average, each day. For these
children the Internet is a natural, integrated part of their daily interaction with others:
“Young people… talked about how they move seamlessly between real and virtual, on-line
and off-line” (Media Awareness Network, 2004, p. 8).
Despite young adults’ heavy use of the Internet for news and information some researchers
have written them off as politically uninformed and uninvolved, even while acknowledging a
high degree of volunteerism (Mindich, 2005; Putnam, 2000). Still others note that Internet
technologies have increased public discourse of political issues and also hold the possibility
of reviving the public sphere and transforming online political discussion into a real political
force (cf Rushkoff, 2003). My own survey results found that 88% of young adults used online
or mobile media for politics; including information gathering, online discussion, and
organizing, and 94% of them were involved in groups, organizations, and organized activities
(Appendix B). The Digital Future study (Cole et al., 2007) and Pasek et al. (2006) also found
strong links between online communities and civic activity:
Participation in online communities leads to social activism. Almost two-thirds of
online community members who participate in social causes through the Internet
(64.9%) say they are involved in causes that were new to them when they began
participating on the Internet. And more than 40 percent (43.7%) of online
community members participate more in social activism since they started
participating in online communities (Cole et al., 2007, p. 2).
Based on my focus group results and responses to the questionnaire, which are analysed
later, I believe that one of the reasons why networked young adults do become politically
engaged is precisely because they have become accustomed to thinking for themselves
through their active participation in public policy discussions online. The fact that young
people are now exposed to a wide variety of opinions, well beyond the narrow confines of
corporate media reporting, and that many take the opportunity to learn more about issues
that interest them, helps compel many young people to take action and use the Internet as a
political communications and organizing tool.
Activists Start Online and Move Offline
In 2002, longtime “netizen” and Internet commentator Howard Rheingold published an
insightful and popular book Smart Mobs: The Next Social Revolution–Transforming Cultures and
Communities in the Age of Instant Access. In it he describes the rising political power of the new
mobile media. (In this paper mobile media includes any sort of medium that is wireless, such
as a cell phone, PDA, iPod, MP3 player, portable gaming and video players, videocam,
digital camera, book, magazine, newspaper, journal, writing pad, etc.)
An example of political organizing using mobile media that Rheingold describes is the
“Battle of Seattle” protests: “On November 30, 1999, autonomous but internetworked
squads of demonstrators protesting the meeting of the World Trade Organization used
‘swarming’ tactics, mobile phones, Web sites, laptops, and handheld computers to win the
‘Battle of Seattle’ ” (p. 158). As an information activist myself at the time, I witnessed a great
deal of email and web traffic that facilitated the rapid organization of the broad-based and
effective coalition against corporate globalization.
In another example from Smart Mobs, Rheingold highlights the power of cellular text
messaging to quickly rally effective political action:
On January 20, 2001, President Joseph Estrada of the Philippines became the first
head of state in history to lose power to a smart mob. More than one million Manila
residents, mobilized and coordinated by waves of text messages, assembled… [and]
Estrada fell. The legend of “Generation Txt” was born (Rheingold, 2002, p. 157-
158).
Most young adults are increasingly seeking their news and discussing politics online. These
activities are coincident with a higher degree of political activity than peers who do not go
online precisely because they are better informed and more certain of their political opinions.
Soft power theorist Joseph Nye, a former assistant secretary of defense for the U.S.
government, states that organizations are decentralizing and that virtual communities are
developing their own ways of governance on the Internet. He goes so far as to state that
these virtual groupings are not only, “being overlaid on traditional geographical
communities,” but that the evidence suggests that the nation state, “that has dominated
world politics for the past three and a half centuries,” is withering as the strength of these
virtual communities grow (Nye, 2004, p. 83).
My own research data confirm these trends identified by Nye towards virtual political
communities and the growing public spheres of Internet-facilitated young adults who are
both politically aware and engaged. Internet technologies have grown into a set of powerful
and diversified tools that facilitate democratic discussion and organizing because:
information can be disseminated literally at the speed of light, to multiple personal and
organizational networks; group knowledge can be quickly gathered and shared using tools
such as wikis, blogs, and websites; and political responses can be formulated, promulgated
and constantly evolved through interactive discussions and dissemination tools such as those
used in the “Battle of Seattle”.
The translation workplace 
