Advertising Advertising as referred to in most economic books is part of the marketing mix. Therefore advertising usually is closely associated with the aim of selling products and services. Still, developments like "branding" show a tendency towards the marketing of not only products and services, but of ideas and values. While advertising activities are also pursued by political parties, politicians and governmental as well as non-governmental organizations, most of the money flowing into the advertising industry comes from corporations. Although these clients come from such diverse fields, their intentions hardly differ. Attempting to influence the public, their main goal is to sell: Products, services, ideas, values and (political) ideology. | |||||||||||||||||||
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The history of propaganda Thinking of propaganda some politicians' names are at once remembered, like The history of propaganda has to tell then merely mentioning those names: | |||||||||||||||||||
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Movies as a Propaganda- and Disinformation-Tool in World War I and II Movies produced in Hollywood in 1918/19 were mainly anti-German. They had some influence but the bigger effect was reached in World War II-movies. The first propaganda movie of World War II was British. At that time all films had to pass censoring. Most beloved were entertaining movies with propaganda messages. The enemy was shown as a beast, an animal-like creature, a brutal person without soul and as an idiot. Whereas the own people were the heroes. That was the new form of atrocity. U.S.-President In the late twenties, movies got more and more important, in the USSR, too, like | |||||||||||||||||||
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Association for Progressive Communication (APC) The APC is a global federation of 24 non-profit Internet providers serving over 50,000 NGOs in 133 countries. Since 1990, APC has been supporting people and organizations worldwide, working together online for social, environmental and economic justice. The APC's network of members and partners spans the globe, with significant presence in Central and Eastern Europe, Africa, Asia and Latin America. History Between 1982 and 1987 several independent, national, non-profit computer networks emerged as viable information and communication resources for activists and NGOs. The networks were founded to make new communication techniques available to movements working for social change. In 1987, people at GreenNet in England began collaborating with their counterparts at the Institute for Global Communications (IGC) in the United States. These two networks started sharing electronic conference material and demonstrated that transnational electronic communications could serve international as well as domestic communities working for peace, human rights and the environment. This innovation proved so successful that by late 1989, networks in Sweden, Canada, Brazil, Nicaragua and Australia were exchanging information with each other and with IGC and GreenNet. In the spring of 1990, these seven organizations founded the Association for Progressive communications to co-ordinate the operation and development of this emerging global network of networks. Strategies and Policies The APC defends and promotes non-commercial, productive online space for NGOs and collaborates with like-minded organizations to ensure that the information and communication needs of civil society are considered in telecommunications, donor and investment policy. The APC is committed to freedom of expression and exchange of information on the Internet. The APC helps to build capacity between existing and emerging communication service providers. The APC Women's Networking Support Program promotes gender-aware Internet design, implementation and use. Through its African members, the APC is trying to strengthen indigenous information sharing and independent networking capacity on the continent. Members of APC develop Internet products, resources and tools to meet the advocacy, collaboration and information publishing and management needs of civil society. Recent APC initiatives have included the APC Toolkit Project: Online Publishing and Collaboration for Activists and the Mission-Driven Business Planning Toolkit. The APC also runs special projects like the Beijing+5, which shall enable non-governmental organizations to actively participate in the review of the Beijing Platform for Action. | |||||||||||||||||||
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Eliminating online censorship: Freenet, Free Haven and Publius Protecting speech on the global data networks attracts an increasing attention. The efforts and the corresponding abilities of governmental authorities, corporations and copyright enforcement agencies are countered by similar efforts and abilities of researchers and engineers to provide means for anonymous and uncensored communication, as Freenet, Free Haven and Publius. All three of them show a similar design. Content is split up and spread on several servers. When a file is requested, the pieces are reassembled. This design makes it difficult to censor content. All of these systems are not commercial products. The most advanced system seems to be Publius. Because of being designed by researchers and engineers at the prestigious For more information on Publius, see John Schwartz, Online and Unidentifiable? in: The Washington Post, June 30, 2000, Freenet web site: Free Haven web site: Publius web site: | |||||||||||||||||||
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Iris recognition Iris recognition relies upon the fact that every individuals retina has a unique structure. The iris landscape is composed of a corona, crypts, filaments, freckles, pits radial furrows and striatations. Iris scanning is considered a particularly accurate identification technology because the characteristics of the iris do not change during a persons lifetime, and because there are several hundred variables in an iris which can be measured. In addition, iris scanning is fast: it does not take longer than one or two seconds. These are characteristics which have made iris scanning an attractive technology for high-security applications such as prison surveillance. Iris technology is also used for online identification where it can substitute identification by password. As in other biometric technologies, the use of iris scanning for the protection of privacy is a two-edged sword. The prevention of identity theft applies horizontally but not vertically, i.e. in so far as the data retrieval that accompanies identification and the data body which is created in the process has nothing to do with identity theft. | |||||||||||||||||||
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Palm recognition In palm recognition a 3-dimensional image of the hand is collected and compared to the stored sample. Palm recognition devices are cumbersome artefacts (unlike fingerprint and iris recognition devices) but can absorb perform a great amount of identification acts in a short time. They are therefore preferably installed in situations where a large number of people is identified, as in airports. | |||||||||||||||||||
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The Privatization of Censorship According to a still widely held conviction, the global data networks constitute the long desired arena for uncensorable expression. This much is true: Because of the Net it has become increasingly difficult to sustain cultural and legal standards. Geographical proximity and territorial boundaries prove to be less relevant, when it does not affect a document's availability if it is stored on your desktop or on a host some thousand kilometers away. There is no international agreement on non-prohibited contents, so human rights organizations and nazi groups alike can bypass restrictions. No single authority or organization can impose its rules and standards on all others. This is why the Net is public space, a political arena where free expression is possible. This freedom is conditioned by the design of the Net. But the Net's design is not a given, as When the World Wide Web was introduced, soon small independent media and human rights organizations began to use this platform for drawing worldwide attention to their publications and causes. It seemed to be the dawning of a new era with authoritarian regimes and multinational media corporations on the looser side. But now the Net's design is changing according to their needs. "In every context that it can, the entertaining industry is trying to force the Internet into its own business model: the perfect control of content. From music (fighting MP3) and film (fighting the portability of DVD) to television, the industry is resisting the Net's original design. It was about the free flow of content; Hollywood wants perfect control instead" (Lawrence Lessig, In the United States, Hollywood and For small independent media it will become very hard to be heard, especially for those offering streaming video and music. Increasingly faster data transmissions just apply to download capacities; upload capacities are much - on the average about eight times - lower than download capacities. As an AT&T executive said in response to criticism: "We haven't built a 56 billion dollar cable network to have the blood sucked from our veins" ( Consumers, not producers are preferred. For corporations what remains to be done to control the Net is mainly to cope with the fact that because of the Net it has become increasingly difficult to sustain cultural and legal standards. On Nov 11, 1995 the German prosecuting attorney's office searched Compuserve Germany, the branch of an international Internet service provider, because the company was suspected of having offered access to child pornography. Consequently Compuserve blocked access to more than 200 Also in 1995, as an attack on US Vice-President Al Gore's intention to supply all public schools with Internet access, Republican Senator Charles Grassley warned of the lurking dangers for children on the Net. By referring to a Time magazine cover story by Philip Elmer-Dewitt from July 3 on pornography on the Net, he pointed out that 83,5% of all images online are pornographic. But Elmer-Dewitt was wrong. Obviously unaware of the difference between Almost inevitably anxieties accompany the introduction of new technologies. In the 19th century it was said that traveling by train is bad for health. The debate produced by Time magazine's cover story and Senator Grassley's attack caused the impression that the Net has multiplied possible dangers for children. The global communication networks seem to be a inexhaustible source of mushrooming child pornography. Later would-be bomb recipes found on the Net added to already prevailing anxieties. As even in industrialized countries most people still have little or no first-hand experience with the Net, anxieties about child pornography or terrorist attacks can be stirred up and employed easily. A similar and related debate is going on about the glorification of violence and erotic depictions in media. Pointing to a "toxic popular culture" shaped by media that "distort children's view of reality and even undermine their character growth", US right-wing social welfare organizations and think tanks call for strong media censorship. (See An Appeal to Hollywood, The intentions for stimulating a debate on child pornography on the Net were manifold: Inter alia, it served the Republican Party to attack Democrat Al Gore's initiative to supply all public schools with Internet access; additionally, the big media corporations realized that because of the Net they might have to face new competitors and rushed to press for content regulation. Taking all these intentions together, we can say that this still ongoing debate constitutes the first and most well known attempt to impose content regulation on the Net. Consequently, at least in Western countries, governments and media corporations refer to child pornography for justifying legal requirement and the implementation of technologies for the surveillance and monitoring of individuals, the filtering, rating and blocking of content, and the prohibition of anonymous publishing on the Net. In the name of "cleaning" the Net of child pornography, our basic rights are restricted. It is the insistence on unrestricted basic rights that needs to be justified, as it may seem. Underlying the campaign to control the Net are several assumptions. Inter alia: The Net lacks control and needs to be made safe and secure; we may be exposed inadvertently to pornographic content; this content is harmful to children. Remarkably, racism seems to be not an issue. The Net, especially the World Wide Web, is not like television (although it is to be feared this is what it might become like within the next years). Say, little Mary types "Barbie" in a search engine. Click In reaction to these anxieties, but in absence of data how children use the Internet, the US government released the Communications Decency Act (CDA) in 1996. In consequence the So, after the failing of the CDA the US government has shifted its responsibility to the industry by inviting corporations to taking on governmental tasks. Bearing in the mind the CompuServe case and its possible consequences, the industry welcomed this decision and was quick to call this newly assumed responsibility "self-regulation". Strictly speaking, "self-regulation" as meant by the industry does not amount to the regulation of the behaviour of corporations by themselves. On the opposite, "self-regulation" is to be understood as the regulation of users' behaviour by the rating, filtering and blocking of Internet content considered being inappropriate. The Internet industry tries to show that technical solutions are more favourable than legislation und wants to be sure, not being held responsible and liable for illegal, offensive or harmful content. A new CompuServe case and a new Communications Decency Act shall be averted. In the Memorandum In fact, the "self-regulation" of the Internet industry is privatized censorship performed by corporations and right-wing NGOs. Censorship has become a business. "Crucially, the lifting of restrictions on market competition hasn't advanced the cause of freedom of expression at all. On the contrary, the privatisation of cyberspace seems to be taking place alongside the introduction of heavy censorship." ( While trying to convince us that its technical solutions are appropriate alternatives to government regulation, the Internet industry cannot dispense of governmental backing to enforce the proposed measures. This adds to and enforces the censorship measures already undertaken by governments. We are encouraged to use today's information and communication technologies, while the flow of information is restricted. According to a report by Reporters Sans Frontières, quoted by Leonard R. Sussman in his essay | |||||||||||||||||||
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The Romans The Romans can be called the great inventors of myths with the purpose of propaganda. Think of Or Augustus: he reunited the Roman Empire; part of his power was due to huge efforts in propaganda, visible e.g. in the mass of coins showing his face, being sent all over the empire. He understood very well, that different cultures used different symbols - and he used them for his propaganda. Politically the Roman army was an important factor. Propaganda in that case was used for the soldiers on the one hand, but on the other hand also for demonstrating the power of the army to the people, so they could trust in its strength. Even then security was an essential factor of politics. As long as the army functioned, the Roman Empire did as well ( | |||||||||||||||||||
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The North against the South? "Faced with this process of globalization, most governments appear to lack the tools required for facing up to the pressure from important media changes. The new global order is viewed as a daunting challenge, and it most often results in reactions of introversion, withdrawal and narrow assertions of national identity. At the same time, many developing countries seize the opportunity represented by globalization to assert themselves as serious players in the global communications market." (UNESCO, World Communication Report) The big hope of the South is that the Internet will close the education gap and economic gap, by making education easier to achieve. But in reality the gap is impossible to close, because the North is not keeping still, but developing itself further and further all the time; inventing new technologies that produce another gap each. The farmer's boy sitting in the dessert and using a cellular telephone and a computer at the same time is a sarcastic picture - nothing else. Still, the so called developing countries regard modern communication technologies as a tremendous chance - and actually: which other choice is there left? | |||||||||||||||||||
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The Big Five of Commercial Media After a number of mergers and acquisitions five powerful media conglomerates lead the world's content production and distribution. They operate on an international basis with subsidiaries all around the globe and engage in every imaginable kind of media industry. Table: The World's Leading Media Companies
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The ancient Greek Disinformation was seen as an appropriate tool of politics and rhetoric in ancient Greece. Most of all persuasion was used, which then was considered a type of art. Religion was (and in many ways still is) the best disinformer or manipulator; prophecies were constructed to manipulate the population. The important thing was to use emotions and more than anything else fear as a tool for manipulation. If the oracle of Delphi said a war was to fight and would be won, then the Greek population - because of religious motives - was prepared to fight that war. Propaganda was not only used in wars but also in daily life to bring people together and create a nation. But poets, playwrights and other artists were manipulating as well. Their pieces of literature and plays were full of political messages with different ideologies behind. In the way how theatre at that time was part of life, it can be understood easily that those messages had not only entertainment's character but also a lot of political and social influence. A different and very famous part of disinformation in ancient Greek history was the story of | |||||||||||||||||||
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The "Corpse-Conversion Factory"-rumor Supposedly the most famous British atrocity story concerning the Germans during World War I was the "Corpse-Conversion Factory"-rumor; it was said the Germans produced soap out of corpses. A story, which got so well believed that it was repeated for years - without a clear evidence of reality at that time. ( | |||||||||||||||||||
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Timeline 1970-2000 AD 1971 IBM's work on the Lucifer cipher and the work of the NSA lead to the U.S. Data Encryption Standard (= 1976 1977/78 the 1984 Congress passes Comprehensive Crime Control Act - The Hacker Quarterly is founded 1986 Computer Fraud and Abuse Act is passed in the USA - Electronic Communications Privacy Act 1987 Chicago prosecutors found Computer Fraud and Abuse Task Force 1988 U.S. Secret Service covertly videotapes a hacker convention 1989 NuPrometheus League distributes Apple Computer software 1990 - - Charles H. Bennett and Gilles Brassard publish their work on Quantum Cryptography - Martin Luther King Day Crash strikes AT&T long-distance network nationwide 1991 - one of the first conferences for Computers, Freedom and Privacy takes place in San Francisco - AT&T phone crash; New York City and various airports get affected 1993 the U.S. government announces to introduce the 1994 - the 1990s work on quantum computer and quantum cryptography - work on biometrics for authentication (finger prints, the iris, smells, etc.) 1996 France liberates its cryptography law: one now can use cryptography if registered - OECD issues Cryptography Policy Guidelines; a paper calling for encryption exports-standards and unrestricted access to encryption products 1997 April European Commission issues Electronic Commerce Initiative, in favor of strong encryption 1997 June PGP 5.0 Freeware widely available for non-commercial use 1997 June 56-bit DES code cracked by a network of 14,000 computers 1997 August U.S. judge assesses encryption export regulations as violation of the First Amendment 1998 February foundation of Americans for Computer Privacy, a broad coalition in opposition to the U.S. cryptography policy 1998 March 1998 April NSA issues a report about the risks of key recovery systems 1998 July 1998 October Finnish government agrees to unrestricted export of strong encryption 1999 January RSA Data Security, establishes worldwide distribution of encryption product outside the USA - National Institute of Standards and Technologies announces that 56-bit - 56-bit DES code is cracked in 22 hours and 15 minutes 1999 May 27 United Kingdom speaks out against key recovery 1999 Sept: the USA announce to stop the restriction of cryptography-exports 2000 as the German government wants to elaborate a cryptography-law, different organizations start a campaign against that law - computer hackers do no longer only visit websites and change little details there but cause breakdowns of entire systems, producing big economic losses for further information about the history of cryptography see: for information about hacker's history see: | |||||||||||||||||||
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Face recognition In order to be able to recognize a person, one commonly looks at this persons face, for it is there where the visual features which distinguish one person from another are concentrated. Eyes in particular seem to tell a story not only about who somebody is, but also about how that persons feel, where his / her attention is directed, etc. People who do not want to show who they are or what is going on inside of them must mask themselves. Consequently, face recognition is a kind of electronic unmasking. "Real" face-to-face communication is a two-way process. Looking at somebody's face means exposing ones own face and allowing the other to look at oneself. It is a mutual process which is only suspended in extraordinary and voyeuristic situations. Looking at somebody without being looked at places the person who is visually exposed in a vulnerable position vis-à-vis the watcher. In face recognition this extraordinary situation is normal. Looking at the machine, you only see yourself looking at the machine. Face biometrics are extracted anonymously and painlessly by a mask without a face. Therefore the resistance against the mass appropriation of biometrical data through surveillance cameras is confronted with particular difficulties. The surveillance structure is largely invisible, it is not evident what the function of a particular camera is, nor whether it is connected to a face recognition system. In a protest action against the face recognition specialist According to | |||||||||||||||||||
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Economic structure; digital euphoria The dream of a conflict-free capitalism appeals to a diverse audience. No politician can win elections without eulogising the benefits of the information society and promising universal wealth through informatisation. "Europe must not lose track and should be able to make the step into the new knowledge and information society in the 21st century", said Tony Blair. The US government has declared the construction of a fast information infrastructure network the centerpiece of its economic policies In Lisbon the EU heads of state agreed to accelerate the informatisation of the European economies The German Chancellor Schröder has requested the industry to create 20,000 new informatics jobs. The World Bank understands information as the principal tool for third world development Electronic classrooms and on-line learning schemes are seen as the ultimate advance in education by politicians and industry leaders alike. But in the informatised economies, traditional exploitative practices are obscured by the glamour of new technologies. And the nearly universal acceptance of the ICT message has prepared the ground for a revival of 19th century "adapt-or-perish" ideology. "There is nothing more relentlessly ideological than the apparently anti-ideological rhetoric of information technology" (Arthur and Marilouise Kroker, media theorists) | |||||||||||||||||||
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Changes Still, disinformation and propaganda are nothing magic. They can change things, but supposedly only if those things/meanings/opinions are not fixed completely. It is never just a single idea that changes. Society is following the changes. Thinking about disinformation brings us to the word truth, of course, and to the doubt that there is no definite truth. And truth can easily be manipulated to another truth. Just present some facts that seem to be logic and there you've got a new truth. And if the facts can supposedly be proved by empirical studies then the quality of the truth definitely rises. That's what ideologies do all the time. And the media like to do the same thing - as a game with power or mere presentation of power? But of course there also exist bits of disinformation which are more amusing than evil or dangerous: - the theory of the celestro-centric world/"Hohlwelttheorie" - the story of the German philosopher who invented an Italian philosopher, wrote books about him, even reprinted "his" texts, which had gone lost pretendedly 100 years ago - and finally lost his job and all his career when other scientists found out that everything had been made up. | |||||||||||||||||||
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Disinformation and Science Disinformation's tools emerged from science and art. And furthermore: disinformation can happen in politics of course, but also in science: for example by launching ideas which have not been proven exactly until the moment of publication. e.g. the thought that time runs backwards in parts of the universe: | |||||||||||||||||||
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Edward Herman Edward S. Herman is Professor Emeritus in Finance, Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania. Author of several books like The Myth of the Liberal Media: An Edward Herman Reader or Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media (he wrote that book - and others - together with | |||||||||||||||||||
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Medieval universities and copying of books The first of the great medieval universities was established at Bologna. At the beginning, universities predominantly offered a kind of do-it-yourself publishing service. Books still had to be copied by hand and were so rare that a copy of a widely desired book qualified for being invited to a university. Holding a lecture equaled to reading a book aloud, like a priest read from the Bible during services. Attending a lecture equaled to copy a lecture word by word, so you had your own copy of a book, thus enabling you to hold a lecture, too. For further details see History of the Idea of a University, | |||||||||||||||||||
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Joseph Stalin Joseph Stalin (1879-1953): After Lenin's death he took over and became a dictator without any limits of power. Everyone who dared to talk or act against him or was in suspicion of doing so, got killed. Millions were murdered. His empire was one made out of propaganda and fear. As long as he was in power his picture had to be in every flat and bureau. Soon after his death the cult was stopped and in 1956 the De-Stalination was started, though he was partly rehabilitated in 1970. | |||||||||||||||||||
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Themistocles Themistocles, a Greek politician and general, conquered the Persians in the battle of Salamis, in 480 BC. The Persians, under their King For further details see: | |||||||||||||||||||
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Noam Chomsky Noam Chomsky (* 1928) works as a U.S.-linguist, writer, political activist and journalist. He is teaching at the MIT (= Massachusetts Institute of Technology) as a professor of linguistics, specializing on structural grammar and the change of language through technology and economy - and the social results of that. When he stood up against the Vietnam War he became famous as a "radical leftist". Since then he has been one of the most famous critics of his country. | |||||||||||||||||||
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Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) TCP and IP are the two most important protocols and communication standards. TCP provides reliable message-transmission service; IP is the key protocol for specifying how packets are routed around the Internet. More detailed information can be found | |||||||||||||||||||
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Napoleon Napoleon I. (1769-1821) was French King from 1804-1815. He is regarded as the master of propaganda and disinformation of his time. Not only did he play his game with his own people but also with all European nations. And it worked as long as he managed to keep up his propaganda and the image of the winner. Part of his already nearly commercial ads was that his name's "N" was painted everywhere. Napoleon understood the fact that people believe what they want to believe - and he gave them images and stories to believe. He was extraordinary good in black propaganda. Censorship was an element of his politics, accompanied by a tremendous amount of positive images about himself. But his enemies - like the British - used him as a negative image, the reincarnation of the evil (a strategy still very popular in the Gulf-War and the Kosovo-War) (see | |||||||||||||||||||
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Total copyright industries The total copyright industries encompass the "core copyright industries" and portions of many other industries that either create, distribute, or depend upon copyrighted works. Examples include retail trade (a portion of which is sales of video, audio, software, and books, for example), the doll and toy industry, and computer manufacturing. | |||||||||||||||||||
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Optical communication system by Aeneas Tacitus, 4th century B.C. Aeneas Tacitus, a Greek military scientist and cryptographer, invented an optical communication system that combines water and beacon telegraphy. Torches indicated the beginnings and the ends of message transmissions while water jars were used to transmit the messages. These jars had a plugged standard-size hole drilled on the bottom side and were filled with water. As those who sent and those who received the message unplugged the jars simultaneously, the water drained out. Because the transmitted messages corresponded to water levels, the sender indicated by torch signal that the appropriate water level has been reached. It is a disadvantage that the possible messages are restricted to a given code, but as this system was mainly used for military purposes, this was offset by the advantage that it was almost impossible for outsiders to understand these messages unless they possessed the codebook. With communication separated from transportation, the distant became near. Tacitus' telegraph system was very fast and not excelled until For further information see Joanne Chang & Anna Soellner, Decoding Device, | |||||||||||||||||||
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RSA The best known of the two-key cryptosystems developed in the mid-1980s is the Rivest-Shamir-Adleman (RSA) cryptoalgorithm, which was first published in April, 1977. Since that time, the algorithm has been employed in the most widely-used Internet electronic communications encryption program, | |||||||||||||||||||
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Bill Clinton William J. Clinton (* 1946) studied law at Yale University, then taught at the University of Arkansas. He was elected Arkansas attorney general in 1976 and served as a governor until 1992. That year he became U.S.-President, the first democratic President after a row of Republicans. His sexual affairs not only cost him nearly his career but he also had to distract from his private affairs: he thought of fighting another war against For more information see: | |||||||||||||||||||
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Local Area Network (LAN) A Local Area Network is an office network, a network restricted to a building area. | |||||||||||||||||||
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Adi Shamir Adi Shamir was one of three persons in a team to invent the | |||||||||||||||||||
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Electronic Messaging (E-Mail) Electronic messages are transmitted and received by computers through a network. By E-Mail texts, images, sounds and videos can be sent to single users or simultaneously to a group of users. Now texts can be sent and read without having them printed. E-Mail is one of the most popular and important services on the Internet. | |||||||||||||||||||
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CNN CNN is a U.S.-TV-enterprise, probably the world's most famous one. Its name has become the symbol for the mass-media, but also the symbol of a power that can decide which news are important for the world and which are not worth talking about. Every message that is published on CNN goes around the world. The Gulf War has been the best example for this until now, when a CNN-reporter was the one person to do the countdown to a war. The moments when he stood on the roof of a hotel in Baghdad and green flashes surrounded him, went around the world. | |||||||||||||||||||
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International Standardization Organization ISO (International Organization for Standardization), founded in 1946, is a worldwide federation of national standards bodies from some 100 countries, one from each country. Among the standards it fosters is Source: Whatis.com | |||||||||||||||||||
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Roman smoke telegraph network, 150 A.D. The Roman smoke signals network consisted of towers within visible range of each other and had a total length of about 4500 kilometers. It was used for military signaling. For a similar telegraph network in ancient Greece see | |||||||||||||||||||
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Binary number system In mathematics, the term binary number system refers to a positional numeral system employing 2 as the base and requiring only two different symbols, 0 and 1. The importance of the binary system to information theory and computer technology derives mainly from the compact and reliable manner in which data can be represented in electromechanical devices with two states--such as "on-off," "open-closed," or "go-no go." | |||||||||||||||||||
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skytale The skytale (pronunciation: ski-ta-le) was a Spartan tool for encryption. It consisted of a piece of wood and a leather-strip. Any communicating party needed exactly the same size wooden stick. The secret message was written on the leather-strip that was wound around the wood, unwound again and sent to the recipient by a messenger. The recipient would rewound the leather and by doing this enciphering the message. | |||||||||||||||||||
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ARPAnet ARPAnet was the small network of individual computers connected by leased lines that marked the beginning of today's global data networks. Being an experimental network mainly serving the purpose to test the feasibility of In 1969 ARPANET went online and links the first two computers, one of them located at the University of California, Los Angeles, the other at the Stanford Research Institute. But ARPAnet has not become widely accepted before it was demonstrated in action to a public of computer experts at the First International Conference on Computers and Communication in Washington, D. C. in 1972. Before it was decommissioned in 1990, In the USA commercial users already outnumbered military and academic users in 1994. Despite the rapid growth of the Net, most computers linked to it are still located in the United States. | |||||||||||||||||||
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America Online Founded in 1985, America Online is the world's biggest Internet service provider serving almost every second user. Additionally, America Online operates CompuServe, the Netscape Netcenter and several AOL.com portals. As the owner of Netscape, Inc. America Online plays also an important role in the Web browser market. In January 2000 America Online merged with Time Warner, the worlds leading media conglomerate, in a US$ 243,3 billion deal, making America Online the senior partner with 55 percent in the new company. | |||||||||||||||||||
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Machine language Initially computer programmers had to write instructions in machine language. This | |||||||||||||||||||
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Gateway A gateway is a computer supplying point-to-multipoint connections between computer networks. | |||||||||||||||||||
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Digital Subscriber Line (DSL) DSL connections are high-speed data connections over copper wire telephone lines. As with cable connections, with DSL you can look up information on the Internet and make a phone call at the same time but you do not need to have a new or additional cable or line installed. One of the most prominent DSL services is ISDN (integrated services digital network, for more information click here ( | |||||||||||||||||||
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Agostino Ramelli's reading wheel, 1588 Agostino Ramelli designed a "reading wheel" which allowed browsing through a large number of documents without moving from one spot. Presenting a large number of books, a small library, laid open on lecterns on a kind of ferry-wheel, allowing us to skip chapters and to browse through pages by turning the wheel to bring lectern after lectern before our eyes, thus linking ideas and texts together, Ramelli's reading wheel reminds of today's browsing software used to navigate the | |||||||||||||||||||
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Center for Democracy and Technology The Center for Democracy and Technology works to promote democratic values and constitutional liberties in the digital age. With expertise in law, technology, and policy, the Center seeks practical solutions to enhance free expression and privacy in global communications technologies. The Center is dedicated to building consensus among all parties interested in the future of the Internet and other new communications media. http://www.cdt.org | |||||||||||||||||||
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McCarthy Born in Grand Chute, Wisconsin, Joe McCarthy graduated from Marquette in 1935. In 1939, he won election as a circuit court judge. During World War II, he enlisted in the Marines and served in the Pacific. In 1944, he campaigned for senator but lost in the Republican primary. In 1946, he ran for Wisconsin's other senate seat. In a 1950 speech, McCarthy entered the public spotlight by claiming that communists had "infested" the State Department, dramatically waving a sheet of paper which purportedly contained the traitors' names. A special Senate committee investigated the charges and found them groundless. Unfazed, McCarthy used his position to wage a relentless anti-communist crusade, denouncing numerous public figures and holding a series of highly confrontational hearings, ruining the careers of many people. He died at the age of 49 of complications related to alcoholism. | |||||||||||||||||||
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Whitfield Diffie Whitfield Diffie is an Engineer at Sun Microsystems and co-author of Privacy on the Line (MIT Press) in 1998 with Susan Landau. In 1976 Diffie and | |||||||||||||||||||
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Adolf Hitler Adolf Hitler (1889-1945) was the head of the NSdAP, the National Socialist Workers' Party. Originally coming from Austria, he started his political career in Germany. As the Reichskanzler of Germany he provoked World War II. His hatred against all non-Aryans and people thinking in a different way killed millions of human beings. Disinformation about his personality and an unbelievable machinery of propaganda made an entire people close its eyes to the most cruel crimes on human kind. | |||||||||||||||||||
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William Gibson American science fiction author. Most famous novel: Neuromancer. For resources as writings and interviews available on the Internet see http://www.lib.loyno.edu/bibl/wgibson.htm | |||||||||||||||||||
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Above.net Headquartered in San Jose, USA, AboveNet Communications is a http://www.above.net | |||||||||||||||||||
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