tends to grow unabated
without the presence of fungus, so too does corporate power grow
without the restrictive influence of government.

This in itself may not have been so terrible. E-commerce certainly has
its strengths and the economic development associated with a
profit-driven internet creates new reasons for new countries to get
their populations online. But an interactive marketplace is not
fertile soil for networked democracy or public participation. As we
have seen, the objective of marketers online is to reduce
interactivity, shorten consideration and induce impulsive purchases.

That's why the software and interfaces developed for the commercial
webspace tended to take user's hands off the keyboard and onto the
mouse. The most successful programs, for them, lead people to the
'buy' button and let them use the keyboard only to enter their credit
card numbers and nothing else. The internet that grew from these
development priorities, dominated by the World Wide Web instead of
discussion groups, treats individuals more as consumers than as
citizens. True, consumers can vote with their dollars, and that in a
way feels something like direct communication with the entity in
charge - the corporation. But this is not a good model for government.

Sadly, though, it's the model being used to implement these first
efforts at teledemocracy. And it's why these efforts suffer from the
worst symptoms of consumer culture: they focus on short-term ideals,
they encourage impulsive, image-driven decision-making and they aim to
convince people that their mouse-clicking is some kind of direct
action. Anyone arguing against such schemes must be an enemy of the
public will, an elitist. Teledemocracy is a populist revival, after
all, isn't it?

Perhaps. But the system of representation on which most democracies
were built was intended to buffer the effects of such populist
revivals. Although they may not always (or even frequently) live up to
it, our representatives' role is to think beyond short-term interests
of the majority. They are elected to protect the rights of minority
interests, the sorts of people and groups who are now increasingly
cast as 'special interest groups'.

Achieving the promise of network democracy

The true promise of a network-enhanced democracy lies not in some form
of web-driven political marketing survey, but in restoring and
encouraging broader participation in some of the internet's more
inte