Opinion on the internet is divided between cyber utopians and cyber skeptics.
The first see in the medium a promise for social change through personal emancipation and political empowerment in a democratic spirit and economic participation. The skeptics point out the adverse effects of the medium: the rise of mechanisms of surveillance for politically repressive or commercial purposes. They claim that the internet is flattening and banalizing information and is responsible for the rise of a few and ever growing monopolies (Apple, Amazon, Facebook, Google.)
In this course we will closely look study at a few case studies that show how the dreams about the internet creating a better world, turned into dystopian disappointments.