ABSTRACT
Much ink has been spilled on the revolutionary aspects and emancipatory promises of the internet and digital communications regarding globalization, democratization, and social, political, and economic change. In the 1990s, early enthusiasts prophesied the transcendence of national boundaries and the irrelevance of time and space limitations, the opening up of new politics and creativities, the end of the economic hegemony of media giants, the free flow of communication, the fostering of understanding and tolerance among peoples, and the emergence of a citizen-based, participatory democracy. 1
