Welcome to the Wild, Wild Internet
Beth
Moscov
Boulder Creek CA USA
From: LEAVEN, Vol. 37 No. 4, August-September 2001, pp. 88-89
In the history of the United
States, there was a time when the whole American West was considered
to be a new frontier. People were moving into the new territory. This
was a time of pioneers. Lawlessness existed and in many ways, the law
was simply who won a gun battle. Outlaws were famous- Billy the Kid,
Jesse James, and Butch Cassidy are familiar names for many. Brothels,
cattle rustlers, and train robbers were common. Life was hard and living
was dangerous.
Some have called the Internet
the new frontier. It is a new form of communication and is almost a
new land-a virtual land. Web sites and email are called "addresses"
as if they exist in a real place and not just in an electronic world.
Just as in the geographical Wild American West, the Internet can be
a dangerous place. Brothels exist in the form of porn sites. Cattle
rustlers appear in the form of credit card thieves and false businesses.
Train robbers are analogous to hackers and computer viruses that derail
the normal flow of online communication.
Just as in the Wild American
West, there are also many hardworking, law- abiding citizens on the
World Wide Web. In the old days, people banded together, creating towns
and forming a legal system that included sheriffs and laws. As towns
grew and had increasing connection with other towns, law had a greater
effect. The time of the great Western outlaws is considered to have
ended about 1905. On the Internet, we create "towns" when we meet people
and spend our time with a particular group of people online. And we
are beginning to create the laws and the entities that will govern this
new frontier.
When we are roaming the landscape
of the Internet, we need to remember how to keep ourselves safe and
stay out of dangerous situations. This is a "new world," and we may
not see a bad situation coming ahead of time. Simple precautions include
not opening email attachments that come from people we don't know or
that don't appear to be the kind of things our friends would normally
send us, can protect us from computer viruses. Some of us have children
old enough to use the computer. We can protect them by supervising their
time online and possibly installing a program to block offensive Web
sites.
We can also protect ourselves,
and LLL as an organization, by building our homes (Web sites) in a safe
manner. In the American West, you could choose to place your homestead
in the middle of the prairie where you could see people coming for miles
and miles, or you could place yourself against a mountainside. One woman,
who lived alone, built corrals for herself up against a box canyon so
that she only needed to build a twenty-foot fence, and her cattle couldn't
be stolen from other directions.
In the same way, we can build
and place Web sites in ways that create safety. It is important to protect
ourselves legally when creating Web sites (especially LLL Group Web
pages). When posting photos, remember to get written permissions from
those in the photo-especially from the parents for minors. Photos on
the Web can be very easily copied and changed in different computer
graphics programs. Some people prefer not to have their photos on the
Web in case some hacker steals the photo and creates a less than savory
graphic image with it. Others wish to keep their photos off the Web
because of privacy. If your Group would like to share pictures, one
alternative is to have a private Web site with photos that isn't linked
to your public Group Web page. Even on a private site, Groups need to
obtain written permission from anyone whose photo and/or identifying
information appears on the site, for liability reasons.
Law-abiding citizens in the
American West created towns. By living near each other, they could help
each other out with larger jobs and in emergencies. People often formed
communities with like-minded people. We can do the same thing by remembering
the wide range of computer users who are on the Internet. We can choose
to be exclusive, keeping some people out but limiting our resources,
or we can open our community to as many mothers and babies who wish
to join us. By keeping a public Group Web page simple, with a minimum
of graphics, we invite many computer users to join our community. While
some women have high-speed access to the Internet with cable modems
and Digital Subscriber Lines (DSL), most are still using plain old modems
with various speeds for connection. A simple page is easier to download
on these systems. Some mothers may have high technology but they are
simply not computer savvy. It helps these mothers to have a Web page
that isn't cluttered with lots of pictures, graphics, and even text.
It is easier to find the information one is looking for when a page
is simple and clear. And of course, many mothers who come to our Group
Web sites are mothers of newborns who may need help with a breastfeeding
problem. These mothers may only have one hand free to type or navigate
a Web page, or they may be too upset to understand a page with lots
of fancy graphics and photos.
The Wild American West eventually
was tamed. The Internet will be also, we assume. Already there are many
legal battles occurring that will define online freedoms and restrictions.
In the next few years we may see more online communities building, just
as they were built in the American West. LLLOnline is one such community
that is already in place. The LLLI Web site is a vast site with much
information. It also links to many individual Group Web sites. We are
building our community. Let us make it a safe way to help mothers and
babies!
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To receive more complete information about creating an LLL Group Web page, send inquiries to the Website team through the contact form*
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Beth Moscov is the Education
Coordinator for the LLLI Online Department. She is also a member of
the Review Network for the Chaordic Initiative. When not doing LLL things,
she spends her time with Sam, 5, and Sara, 16, in the garden or kitchen.
Note: contact information updated 11/17/06
Page last edited Sun Oct 14 09:32:17 UTC 2007.
