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This article examines the potential of the internet as a public sphere of communication. In the period after the 9.ll terrorist attack in the U. S., five hundred thousand messages were posted in "2-ch...annel", Japan's biggest BBS site. This article examines these messages through a comparison with newspaper articles. The Habermasian concept of the `public sphere' has a twofold meaning, as both the so-called Public sphere in society and as an idealized communication space where rational communicative actions prevail. Accordingly, Habermasian discourse highlights the idea that in proper dialogue situations people can develop their critical ability to be more rational. This article takes this concept as a departure point to critically inquire into the quality of communication found in BBS systems. The initial research findings about the potential for rational communication through BBS are negative. (l) Words included in each posting are too few to discuss anything. The average length of a posting is one tenth of that of a newspaper article. (2) The monthly quantity of postings corresponds to that of newspaper articles, which may mean that there is no original development of discussion. Previously, the author did a case study about the Gulf War in 1991 using a similar methodology. This case study shows that computer mediated communication has the potential to act as an idealized communication space. The average number of words included in each posting was twice as many as that of newspaper articles and the monthly quantity of postings changed independently from that of newspaper articles. Furthermore, a content analysis has shown that there were original agendas deployed in BBS. When the HTML system was invented in 1991, popular computer mediated communication networks were not Internet based, but rather based on personal computer communication. Thus the BBS that was analysed in this article falls into the category of being part of the latter network. To conclude, the Haberrnasian concept can be adopted for an analysis of privileged media and personal computer communication, however for popularized media such as the Internet, the same cannot be said. Thus, in this context the following question arises. How can we expect rationality to progress in society? A theoretical consideration is included in last part of this article that addresses this important question.show more
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