ABSTRACT
INTRODUCTION Much of the burgeoning literature on the economic and social restructuring of the advanced capitalist societies is predicated upon the notion that such transformations are driven by the revolutionary developments in a range of information and communications technologies (ICTs). Through their potential capacity to transcend the time and space delimiters of modernist organisation and technique some commentators have suggested that ICTs are facilitating the emergence of new forms of human interaction in what is becoming known as cyberspace: a computer-generated public domain which has no territorial boundaries or physical attributes and is in perpetual use. To date its most potent manifestation is that matrix of electronic telecommunication and computer networks, usually referred to as the Internet, which links millions of people globally, is growing at a rapid rate daily, is taking new shape and direction as a consequence of the voluntary actions of its participants, and, it is claimed, is not controlled by any single authority.
