Background
During a recent trip to Japan, I met a number of networking
enthusiasts who were interested in spreading the Internet in
Japan. They found the Netizen concept to be helpful in their
efforts. One student who I met in Tokyo, Hiroyuki Takahashi, suggested
that there was a need to form a Netizens Association. This
association could work towards educating people and helping them to
gain literacy in both the technical and social aspects of working,
living and playing on the Net. In addition, this Netizens Association
would function as a forum to bring people together to protect and
advance the Net as a new public commons and global community. I
propose to work towards forming a prototype for a local Netizens
Association chapter. The success of a few such chapters could lead to
the spreading of chapters focused around educational institutions or
communities. This would be in conjunction with efforts by people
working for similar goals in other countries across the globe like
Japan, and Canada. (From Towards a Netizens Association:
Proposed Netizens List Charter)
In response to these common goals, it was proposed that a
Netizens Association be formed. Such an association would fill
two purposes, 1) to bring together netizens interested in
nuturing the net and 2) to spread knowledge and literacy to those
not on-line. To that purpose, the majordomo mailing list
netizens@columbia.edu has been created. This list will begin the
discussion towards the principles, goals and questions for such
an association. I would hope local Netizen Association chapters
would form based on this list. These associations could help
spread Net Literacy and encourage both new and old users to
contribute to the Net.
Return to the Netizens List page
Last modified: Tue Apr 2 01:07:43 1996
Michael Hauben <hauben@columbia.edu>