1. Different people, digital world
PSI 2007
Kaido Kikkas
This document uses the GNU Free Documentation License (v1.2 or newer).

2. People are different Differences vs stereotypes
Minorities based on race, ethnicity, worldview etc
Different stereotypes by location
Yet some groups face almost universal stereotyping – perhaps the most visible example is people with disabilities (PwD)
The litmus effect – PwD as an indicator

3. The circle Low level of education
Low level of employment
Low social status
Limited role in society, neglect
Limited access to different parts of society

4. Back to the society People with disabilities: from Sparta to today
Segregation vs integration
Former Eastern bloc – 'society of universal happiness', no sub-standard people
Gradual return to society during the nineties
NB! At first, both sides were unprepared
The road goes on

5. @ The Circle revisited Distance education Extra means of access
Low level of education
Limited access to different parts of society @
Low level of employment
Limited role in society, neglect
Low social status
Powerful, accessible medium
Telework
Means of politics and PR

6. Some notable initiatives
( ) – the first widely used all-round online resource for disability activists
The Access symbol campaign and others leading to accessibility becoming an integral part of W3C activities
Web validating – W3C, Bobby and others

7. Example: Estonia 1992 – first computer courses at TUT
– first Estonian server especially targetted towards people with disabilities; community emerges
The Old Town talker (chatroom) 1995 – hosted by a man with a profound impairment
1995 – Rehabilitation Technology Lab at TUT
around E- and M-services make many formerly inaccessible services usable; the broadband and WiFi breakthrough
– the THINK FP6 project

8. side A <===> channel <===> side B
Communication?
hello!
hi, man!
side A <===> channel <===> side B

9. Example: small talk or scandal?
A sentence “Man, you suck hard!” is
used in an informal conversion between buddies in a sauna after a sixpack
said in a phone conversation
sent by
sent by fax bearing a corporate letterhead
sent as an official post with all requisites by the President of Estonia

10. Differences time direction capacity filtering
The secret of Internet: a mixture of very different communication measures

11. We become our messages
On the Internet, height, weight, race, and gender may be unknown. Beauty doesn't impress us, nor does ugliness appall. We become our messages, purely and simply
Barrett & Wallace 1994
But works only when people are honest!

12. Hackers again No record about MIT hackers with disability
Yet, had they existed, they would have likely been treated as equals (see also the case of 12-yo Peter Deutsch). Levy's Hacker Ethic, rule 4:
Hackers should be judged by their hacking, not bogus criteria such as degrees, age, race, or position.
Similar views are also seen at the writings of Raymond and Himanen

13. Other features of the Net
A bit skewed from day one (not many “normal” people among the founders)
Filtering of prejudices
the dreaded First Impression: verbal rather than visual
Allows “playing out the hand”
Accelerates deepening of personal contact
DANGER: does not say when to stop beating

14. What if a girl meets a guy
... who is using a wheelchair
in 'real life', it takes some courage to even think about any closer relations
in the cyberspace, it is up to him:
can start 'playing out' with the disability fact and get the same results as offline
can try to hide it – will get busted on real contact
can 'play other cards' first – the perceivedly negative feature will lose a lot of its meaning

15. Vox populi, vox Dei
Citizen participation has grown much easier with networks – especially for those unheard before
All those social software tools – from community portals to blogs and wikis
Examples from Estonia:
The picket of Estonian PwD in November was largely coordinated online and was quite successful
the apartment scandal in February 2007 – reversed due to large publicity

16. Conclusions
Digital world has its threats, but it has given lots of new tools for minority groups
Internet is “different” by nature
the Net as a form of rehabilitation?
again the place for the Hacker Ethic

17. Homework
Find a good example of inclusion / empowerment from the web and write a review to your blog