NO! The internet is not a "city" in the sense of the Polis cited by Alasdair McItyre ( After Virtue ) as a place of commonality.

Cities provide a degree of commonality of experiences in certain human and physical interactions. The internet does not, except in certain " cluster groups," for which alegorithms have not been extensively derived.

There's clearly a global culture of commonality gradually developing (and not that gradually... in 20 years things will probably be unrecognisable) because of the internet, so I would have to agree with Fry.

I was playing an MMO the other night and we had people on Ventrillo from Greece, Norway, Finland, Croatia, Lebanon, Canada, Turkey and England, and they were exchanging jokes and cultural references that everyone understood.

I agree with Howler. As a metaphor the idea of "city" is extremely apt. The "degree of commonality of experiences" most certainly exists every bit as much on the internet as in a city. If you live in an expensive, high-class section you won't have much if any "commonality of experiences" with residents of the slums, but each such group within itself will share such "commonality." And to the extent all such relatively insular groups meet in the "central business district" (i.e., mainstream news websites, etc.) such "commonality" develops among all. So I like Fry's metaphor a lot.

I would take it further and liken it to a collection of cities, villages and even isolated farms, although on the internet the word "isolated" has a different meaning, doesn't it.

The interesting part to me is the physical part RRS mentioned, or rather the lack of it. The older among us have grown up largely relying on our sense of sight and hearing in our interactions with other people. But now we are discovering that we can do without them to a much larger extent than we used to imagine. It's kind of like the conventional notion about blind people developing sharper hearing etc. We are also discovering that in writing and reading there are certain equivalents of tone of voice, body language etc. I find this fascinating and am very curious to see where this is going. And no, I am not going to imagine some government stepping in and "regulating the mess" - too depressing to contemplate.

Actually Howler's remarks are doubly interesting because his interactions were during an MMO (an on-line multiplayer game in case you don't know what an MMO is) and he was using Ventrillo (voice over IP), so this was a lot more 'communications rich' than just text and still images.

The best cities in the world (eg London or Tokyo) are essentially collections of culturally distinct villages than can be rapidly jumped between. So I think describing the internet as a cityis not that different from describing it as a collection of villages.

Fry in the article describes AOL as being like Milton Keynes, and perhaps one pertinent point is that Milton Keynes is what our rulers want cities to be like, and that transfers to their view of the internet "city". Just as town planners create cities which are safe, bland and only functional to those with the same mindset as the planners, that is what they'd like to do to the internet. And gradually will, unless we can find a good defense. Their ideal is to close the pubs and the red light districts and cleanse away the grot, and move us all to Milton Keynes or, particularly under the post-methodist Labour party, Port Sunlight...

Its a shame that the esteemed Mr. Fry's attitude is not the prevalent one in the industry he works in. As I think I may have mentioned before it is in the MSM's interests to trivialize and denigrate the internet as being only shopping, myspace/facebook, and YouTube with everything else on the 'net being controlled by peadophiles and porn impresarios (often conflated as being the one and the same). As such it is difficult to educate the masses in the huge amount of beauty, knowledge, data, and value that the internet has to offer, and it is also why our message, as libertarians (or whatever freedom loving pigeon-hole you count yourself as being a part of), is going to have to find other ways to get into the public consciousness. Suggestions anyone?

WOW! People do think about this stuff.

But, to clarify the distinction in the metaphor, consider:

What is the degree (if any) of commonality of said (lawyer word) experiences provided by the internet to its users?

We all distinguish the functions of communications within "cluster groups;" of which this site is one.

Rss, stop being a prat.

Fry's comment communicates an idea well.

Yours does not.

Therein lies the difference...

Pete, please don't be so quick to cast the first insult, unless you are confident that your own comments always communicate ideas perfectly. I certainly hope they don't, since I personally have little time for perfect people.

Milton Keynes is what our rulers want cities to be like, and that transfers to their view of the internet "city".

But MK is just a vast series of roundabouts isn't it? Wait, I see what you mean.

Thing is, people live in cities, but we don't live in the Internet. Or if we do, it could be treated (expensively) whilst lying on a couch :)

But...but Alegorithms!

The author of the quote is confusing:

1. The internet being a place for communication and learning

with

2. The internet is something new (a new city) which people must understand.

If I recall correctly, Port Sunlight was a private sector construction - like Welwyn, Letchworth, Bourneville, Hampstead Garden Suburb...

Port Sunlight was indeed a private sector construction. That doesn't make it automatically desirable. Such 19th century authoritarian charity and "improvement" schemes were the precursors to twentieth century authoritarian social government.

Social engineering doesn't magically turn good when it's a private factory boss wielding the whip.