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Text blocks: Beautiful bodies Basics: Protected Works Timeline 1900-1970 AD Cultural Opposition The Copyright Industry Biometrics applications: gate keeping Selection of Independent Content ... Timeline 1600 - 1900 AD Positive Images ZaMir.net Commercial vs. Independent Content Economic structure; introduction The Cassini Case 1000 B.C. - 0 Commercial vs. Independent Content Convergence Virtual cartels; mergers Gait recognition "Stealth Sites" Copyright Management and Control ... Timeline Cryptography - Introduction Public Relations Clients The Privatization of Censorship Iris recognition Problems of Copyright Management and ... Pressures and Attacks against ... some essential definitions "Project Censored" Challenges for Copyright by ICT: ... The Concept of the Public Sphere   Index cards Copyright management information Edward L. Bernays United Brands Company

WORLD-INFOSTRUCTURE > INDEPENDENT CONTENT > THE CONCEPT OF THE PUBLIC SPHERE

The Concept of the Public Sphere According to social critic and philosopher Jürgen Habermas "public sphere" first of all means "... a domain of our social life in which such a thing as public opinion can be formed. Access to the public sphere is open in principle to all citizens. A portion of the public sphere is constituted in every conversation in which private persons come together to form a public. They are then acting neither as business or professional people conducting their private affairs, nor as legal consociates subject to the legal regulations of a state bureaucracy and obligated to obedience. Citizens act as a public when they deal with matters of general interest without being subject to coercion; thus with the guarantee that they may assemble and unite freely, and express and publicize their opinions freely." The system of the public sphere is extremely complex, consisting of spatial and communicational publics of different sizes, which can overlap, exclude and cover, but also mutually influence each other. Public sphere is not something that just happens, but also produced through social norms and rules, and channeled via the construction of spaces and the media. In the ideal situation the public sphere is transparent and accessible for all citizens, issues and opinions. For democratic societies the public sphere constitutes an extremely important element within the process of public opinion formation. browse Report: Independent content 0   The Concept of the Public Sphere +1   The Role of the Media +2   Media Control and the Influence of Public Discourse +3   Content Choice and Selective Reporting      ... Pressures and Attacks against Independent Content Providers: Pakistan  INDEX CARD     RESEARCH MATRIX  United Brands Company American corporation formed in 1970 in the merger of United Fruit Company and AMK Corporation. United Fruit Company, the main company, was founded in 1899 producing and marketing bananas grown in the Caribbean islands, Central America, and Colombia. The principal founder was Minor C. Keith, who had begun to acquire banana plantations and to build a railroad in Costa Rica as early as 1872. In 1884 he contracted with the Costa Rican government to fund the national debt and to lay about 50 more miles of track. In return he received, for 99 years, full rights to these rail lines and 800,000 acres of virgin land, tax exempt for 20 years. By 1930 it had absorbed 20 rival firms and became the largest employer in Central America. As a foreign corporation of conspicuous size, United Fruit sometimes became the target of popular attacks. The Latin-American press often referred to it as el pulpo ("the octopus"), accusing it of exploiting labourers, bribing officials, and influencing governments during the period of Yankee "dollar diplomacy" in the first decades of the 20th century.