| That would be an interesting discussion to have. You realize that we, on the net, scooping in vast amounts of information on a daily basis, have to be literate, before we can be netizens. If you are not literate, your access to information is much more limited- imagine just relying on TV news- now imagine relying on TV news when there are only a few stations. When you are not even getting TV news, when you are getting information by word of mouth, errors confound, rumors run rife, and there is no stable plateau of information for people to use as a beginning for dialog. I take as my model revolutionary America, since I find the literacy at that time fascinating, as well as the proliferation of newspapers and pamphlets during that time. The amazing rate at which materials were published, and their wide circulation, gave men a common substrate for discussion. I am afraid that process takes years to grow though- as it did in the colonies. The rates of literacy in NE, for example, crept upwards for several decades- before blossoming into the amazing rates that, imo, gave birth to our revolution. |
