ABSTRACT
The mass diffusion of the Internet across the world has led many to speculate about the potential effects of the new medium on society at large. Enthusiasts have heralded the potential gains resulting from use of the technology suggesting that it will reduce inequality by lowering the barriers to information, allowing people of all backgrounds to improve their human capital, expand their social networks, be more direct participants in the political process, search for and find jobs, have better access to health information, and otherwise improve their opportunities and enhance their life chances (e.g.Anderson et al., 1995). Some have gone as far as to say that the Internet will lead to “universal liberty,” a new overarching tolerance and the “restoration of ethics” (Barlow,1997). In contrast, skeptics have warned against the potential costs of such a technology due to its ability to overwhelm us with often useless information (Rochlin, 1998; Shenk, 1997) and isolate us from our social networks leading to loneliness and possibly even depression (Nie, 2001; Nie and Erbring, 2000).
