Karin Spaink (Speech at the Doors of Perception 3 Conference)

Table of Contents:
Summary
Introduction
Homepages
*.Misc
A Net Community
*.Misc in Real Life
An Instant Net Community

* * *
Summary
Given the devastating damage that mass travel causes to the environment, the potential of virtual encounters to replace physical movement is a crucial element in a strategy for sustainable development. How close or far away from each other are the members of an Internet community? Writer and journalist Karin Spaink vividly describes her experiences in *.Misc, the Usenet newsgroup of which she is a member. Spaink is critical of simplistic ideas like the obsolescence of travel, or the insignificance of physical appearances. The reality of the Net community holds a great deal more surprise and variety than such premature visions, she says; virtual life is more real and real life more virtual than one might imagine. In *.Misc, a surprising variety of behaviours to deal with trust and identity has emerged, which are every bit as embedded in convention as their real-life counterparts. Calling her observations a preliminary investigation into Net anthropology, Spaink explains the complex emotional interplay of the real and virtual personalities in *.Misc on the Net and in real life. She also describes the instant net community that recently emerged to rally around herself and the other defendants in a law suit brought by the Church of Scientology.

* * *
Introduction
I was invited here to discuss Internet, specifically whether there is any such thing as a net community, and if so, whether net communities are in any way comparable to communities as we know them in daily life.

* * *
Homepages
I'd like to make one preliminary remark. When discussing Internet, it seems as if everyone focuses on the WorldWideWeb, that is, on homepages. Or, to be more precise, on the form of homepages. The merits of the content of Homepages is hardly ever discussed, nor are they presented as the best tool for information retrieval, which indeed they can be. Instead, homepages are hailed and applauded for their blitzy graphics, their fancy Netscape 2.0 backgrounds, their interlaced gifs, their dazzling lay-outs and what have you.

I fail to see why. Homepages are the least interesting part of Internet: they are static, highly un-interactive, and no matter how intricate their design, they become boring rather quickly. As an experienced Dutch Internet-journalist once said, the largest part of the Web is just another slide show, a collection of display windows that the owners would like you to marvel at, mouth agape, saying Ooooh! and Aaaah! -- 'Isn't it great what they can do now?', while all you can do is watch passively and click a button in order to make the next slide appear on your screen. The Web is rapidly evolving in just another exercise in zapping.

I have a homepage, too. In fact, next month I will even be put on trial because of it, as Scientology took an instant dislike to it. It is the first time in Holland that somebody is being sued for the contents of their homepage, so in a strange way, I feel obliged to defend my little nook on the Net. But the plain truth is I don't care much for homepages. Some of them are very useful. That is where I get my information on other ligitations from Church of Scientology from and where I read about all those lawsuits, affidavits, memorando opinio, verdicts and court transcripts. Presently, I would be at a loss without them.

* * *
*.Misc
However, Usenet is where the action and the interaction is.

Internet, computers and modern technology somehow revive an old dream: cleanliness. The ability to be pure, to be mind only, to forget about bodies and other physical entities and discard them as irrelevant. Travelling has become obsolete is a popular slogan. Distance has lost its meaning. Tokyo, Milwaukee, the Mona Lisa in the Louvre and the coffee pot in the Trojan Room are closer within reach than the newspaper in your snailmail box. The world is just a click away. A journey around the earth will now take a mere 80 seconds. On Internet, nobody knows you're a dog is another slogan. Appearances do not matter -- this is a truly democratic medium. The only merit is in the value of one's words. Whether one is ugly or beautiful, male or female, black or white, old or young is of no importance. All that matters is one's words. You can be anybody, anything you wish, just by saying you are. At last, you can be free from your body and maybe even be free from your personality. You can reinvent yourself. Bodies do not matter on Internet. That's what they say, anyway.

I subscribed to a Dutch newsgroup a few weeks after I got an Internet account in November of 1994. The group, nl.misc, or *.misc, as the regulars call it, is a rather busy one. There are about 300 messages each day and about a hundred people who post regularly; some post three messages a week; others post twenty each day. Discussions range from current IRL news to chatter and gossip, and include debates about sex and editors, health or lack of it, the existence of God, fascism, immigration policy, music, work, cats and, of course, discussions about the weather (my first posting was a complaint because it was snowing outside; it meant I couldn't go out, because my wheelchair becomes uncontrollable.)

Many people have come to know each other through this newsgroup. For instance, it is common knowledge at *.misc that Christian studies music, writes sonatas and tends to fall hopelessly in love with contraltos; that Gerard is in the hands of a cult called ZetaTalk and believes himself to be Nancy's messenger; that Johan does not like foreigners and is engaged to Mirjam, with whom he practices ballroom dancing; and that Pien has recently bought a piano, partly to remedy her broken heart. Everybody is chatting away about everything. Threads get entangled in no time whatsoever, because every subject is a free-for-all and the same subjects reappear, time and again. There is also a homepage listing the regulars of *.misc, which contains little stories about all these people.

In a way, *.misc is the Internet version of the café just around the corner, where you drop by after work or during your lunch break to see some familiar faces, relax, read a newspaper and hear some stories. But most of these people have never met. They only know each other's text. And text, as we all know, is rather flexible. So, according to this claim that bodies do not matter and personalities are flexible on the Net, it would follow that one can pretend, tease, personify, mystify, change and impersonate on Usenet. All these regulars on *.misc can be whoever they want to be and create or re-create their own image. Being text, and thus being clean and pure and bodiless, there are no real, valid and lasting ties or obligations.

* * *
A Net Community
This, ladies and gentlemen, is sheer nonsense. There are several very interesting phenomena which I've witnessed -- or engaged in -- on this newsgroup that prove otherwise. Think of these observations as a preliminary investigation into Net anthropology.

First of all, it is indeed a group, a small net community, and a rather tight one, too. People worry about each other. When Izak hadn't posted for a week, the regulars noticed and he got lots of e-mail inquiring about his well-being. When Christian got back from his holiday in Indonesia, many of the regulars were relieved to have him back and wanted to hear -- read, I should say -- his stories. When did not elaborate enough, he was rebuked. And, of course, he was quickly briefed on what had happened during his break from *.misc. It has by now become a habit to announce a temporary leave from *.misc, so as not to worry the others.

It is just text that we miss? Or people?

Then there is Truus. She started posting about two years ago, when the Dutch journalist I mentioned earlier started writing about Internet on Internet; that is, he posted the articles he'd written about Internet and Usenet for the newspaper he works for on *.misc. Of course, everybody jumped on him, blaming him for technical errors and questioning his authority - who was he to write about them in their forum? Truus came to his rescue and defended him. Ever since, whenever journalism or the press is mentioned on *.misc, Truus posts praising this journalist. She also makes derogatory remarks about nerds and is quick to point out that a discussion is diverging into sex and editors yet again. She only posts one-liners, such as `Mr van Jole is a very good journalist', or: `Nonsense', or: `Sex again'. Some readers love her. Others hate her with a vengeance.

The funny thing is that Truus does not exist as a person in real life. Truus is an e-mail account, somebody's pseudonym, an alias, a virtual entity, and therefore as bodiless as can be. She might be one of the regulars posting under this alias, or a group of people using the same login name. Yet, she does have a recognisable face: her texts. And what is most interesting is that while other regulars can adopt her style from time to time, and while it has become a kind of in-crowd game to impersonate or parody Truus, she cannot change. She is fixed. If her subjects or her style were to change, the regulars would immediately doubt the authenticity of those postings. For instance, when some very rude one-liners signed Truus were posted a couple of weeks ago, many people almost instantly assumed that those postings must have been forgeries, as indeed they turned out to be.

Truus is what novelists refer to as a flat character. She is text and she is a fixed style, in the most literal sense imaginable. She is thus doomed to be a one-line poster who is at war with one half of the newsgroup and a jester who is doted upon by the other half. She cannot evolve. She can only discontinue, remove or cancel herself -- all synonyms for virtual suicide.

There is also an immense hunger for more than just text to go by. The regulars long for things such as physical descriptions of each other. They invent body language to communicate affinities and sympathies with. They want to know about everybody's personal circumstances and search for ways to express a sense of friendship. What is slowly transpiring on *.misc is a very specific way of engaging in make-believe: introducing real life on screen. For example, when Patricia -- who's known to be very sociable on*.misc -- spots a newcomer in the group, she usually welcomes them. She writes something like: `Ah, we haven't met yet. Do come in. Sit down and make yourself comfortable. Would you like some coffee? Yes it's crowded here, I know, but you'll get used to it. Would you like a little refreshment? Here's some cake. Icu had no time to eat it, his presence was urgently requested in a different newsgroup. I'll bet something fishy is going on there. But don't worry, he'll be back. I'll introduce you later,' and so forth. Patricia is indeed the perfect hostess. What is striking is that she in fact writes as if *.misc were a tangible café -- or even her house -- with chairs, people to touch, glasses, plates and cups to pass, people to shake hands with and faces to smile at.

While Patricia has cultivated this attitude to almost unattainable heights, many people engage in similar behaviour. People ask other posters to move closer, because they want to whisper something that the others mustn't hear; people blush, giggle, yell, shuffle their feet out of shyness; people embrace each other, punch somebody in the eye or ask permission to sit on each others' lap. All on screen. All in text. It's not real life, of course. But it is not make-believe, either. It's a virtual copy of life.

* * *
*.Misc in Real Life
This virtual copy of real life is effectuated from time to time. Not usually, but it does happen. This summer, for instance, I suddenly became severely ill. I had to be taken to the hospital overnight. A very good friend of mine, also a regular in *.misc, posted a message on my behalf explaining my absence. During the weekends, when I was on temporary leave from the hospital, I posted (oops) was finally discharged from the hospital, an envoy from *.misc who had been collecting money from the regulars through bank transfers, came by to present me with a huge bouquet, courtesy of *.misc. Quite frankly, I was very surprised, and truly moved, to receive all these expressions of sympathy. And although I knew that ties on *.misc run deeper than one would expect, I was truly amazed at this abundant and tangible proof that virtual sympathy does indeed equate to real-life sympathy.

Because I wanted to communicate both my personal gratitude and this sociological observation, I posted a joking message on *.misc in which I stated that: a) I had not been ill at all and b) I had never been me anyway, because I was just c) a researcher posing as a poster, in order to perform a participant investigation into the value and effectiveness of on-line communication and affections, and that d) I could now congratulate *.misc for having proven that on-line communication was indeed as good as the real thing, but that naturally, more research into such matters was called for.

The reactions to this message were utterly confused. Some people got the joke. Some people simply did not understand and discarded the message in puzzlement. Others were furious and thought they had been taken for a ride, albeit a complicated one, and felt that their emotions had been played with -- they had really been sorry for me. They had shared my fears and grief and had feople have to believe each other on -- well, not on face value, but on text value. And they do. Which is why we cannot change and cannot demask. What is written there is the truth. What you say about yourself is true because you say it. You write, therefore you are. The only thing you have to bear in mind is consistency. There are no outer criteria your fellow-readers can refer to. This makes text a very serious business on Usenet, flippant as it may be. It is you.

And others had made the serious mistake of forgetting that the same problem usually applies to real life. Why all of you out there in this hall believe that my name is Karin Spaink? Because somebody told you. Somebody you trust: a friend, or somebody who did meet me before, or because both the host of this afternoon and the program say that I am her. Why do you believe I have multiple sclerosis? Only because I said so, and because there's nobody with some kind of higher authority who jumps up and says that I am lying.

Of course, it's possible to whip up a whimsical description of yourself and of your life, both on and off the net, but you must never forget what you made the others believe you look like; what you told them about yourself and what they are able to find out on their own. One has to maintain a coherent story. If Pien were suddenly to say that she's a middle-aged man, nobody would believe her; and if it transpired that she does not have a piano, everybody would feel cheated. Just as you would feel cheated if you were to find out that the Church of Scientology was not suing me. (Believe me, they are. Check out the newspapers. Or walk over to the bar. I am on television right now, if the information I was given is correct.)

People have a desire to know whether their affinities and antipathies would hold and extend into real life. To satisfy the curiosities of the regulars, who all want to know the faces behind these texts and names, it has been decided that *.misc should meet every once in a while. There are regular Samenscholingen (Gatherings) where everybody debates exactly the same issues as they do on the net. People are aghast (Jeez, I can't believe that you really are so & so!) and talk about why they had expected somebody to look a certain way.

And, of course, everybody once again tries to find out who Truus is and whether she might be among those present.

* * *
An Instant Net Community
Finally, I'd like to tell you about an instant net community that has come into being in the course of just these last two months. An instant net community that is not primarily social, as *.misc is, but political. But first I need to tell you about Scientology.

The Church of Scientology sells its followers expensive courses which, if students study them carefully, are supposed to set them free (`clear' them). One of their members, Steven Fishman, was jailed because he committed several crimes in order to get the money to pay for these courses. He stated that the Church of Scientology had urged him to get the money any way he could. During his years in prison, he renounced the cult. In an interview in Time magazine, he explained the cult's criminal behaviour and how they coerce their members. Scientology thereupon sued him for slander. In that trial, Fishman showed parts of Scientology's secret materials to prove what he'd said in Time. These higher materials of the cult -- the so-called OT levels -- were accepted as evidence and thereby became public material. Anybody could go to the court library and read them. The Church of Scientology, fearing that its sacred secrets would be revealed, had some of their people go to the library every day to take out these documents in order to prevent other people (meaning non-Scientologists) from reading them. Nevertheless, the Fishman Affidavit got copied (it was also available through the clerk of the court, for a mere $36,50) and has been travelling on Internet ever since. The funny thing is that the only thing the document contains is gibberish. Apart from the instructions of how to treat non-Scientologists (almost every means is allowed to silence them: lying is common sense; cheating is part and parcel) it contains only a silly and badly written science fiction tale about Xenu, head of the Galactic Universe, who nuked earth 75 million years ago and who through his body thetans still controls all of us people, except (of course) the few Scientologists who managed to clear themselves.

Well, after all, L. Ron Hubbard was a science fiction writer.

Scientology does not want their followers to know what is in store for them. They forbid everyone to read this material until they have done lots of courses, stating that it would kill those who are not yet ready for it. A more probable reason is that they are scared that people may stop believing Scientology once they've read this lousy stuff. And, of course, Scientology asks their followers massive amounts of money for the privilege of studying these OT levels.

But the Fishman Affidavit got out on the Net. Ever since, the Church of Scientology has been hunting it, all the while screaming hell about copyright infringements. They've forged cancel messages. They've tried to remove the newsgroup where critics and former members discuss the cult. They've raided anon.penet.fi, an anonymous remailer, in order to get the name of one of their critics. They've raided FactNet, an on-line archive on the cult's activities. They've raided Erlich and Lerma, members of FactNet who posted the Fishman Affidavit on alt.religion.scientology and have seized their computers.

Scientology does not argue with people who do not agree with them. They prefer to harass, start crazy lawsuits, have people followed by private detectives, and generally intimidate them. They do not sue in order to win. They sue in order to intimidate, harass and ruin their critics. Their motto is: Never defend -- always attack. People in Holland had at one time or another heard about this. Most of them weren't very interested. Just another crazy cult in the US. What else is new?

XS4ALL is Holland's first public Internet provider. Due to their past activities (they were parented by the now-dead but famous Hack-tik) and present activities (they set up a free local provider for Amsterdam, the Digital City; they provide good and rather cheap access; they are usually the first provider to experiment with, propagate or evaluate new developments, both technical, social and legal) and they are held in very high esteem. It was this provider that Scientology raided on September 5; the Fishman Affidavit was on an XS4ALL homepage. Church of Scientology seized the XS4ALL computers and threatened to sue XS4ALL if they did not remove this homepage. XS4ALL refused to do so, stating that the content of people's homepage is of no concern to them and that they are not responsible for what their clients put there. Fons S. voluntarily (what would you do if you knew Church of Scientology was after you?) removed the Fishman Affidavit. That was the end of it, it would seem.

But it wasn't. Many Internet users in Holland were shocked to learn that some cult wanted to interfere with XS4ALL and with users' rights to publish public material. The indignation was quite immense. Newspapers covered the issue extensively. There were some items on television and many Dutch Usenet newsgroups debated the issue. People were truly outraged.

And suddenly, Fishman homepages started appearing one after another. An e-mail letter was circulated, asking people to review what was going on and to consider putting up a Fishman homepage as well. More or less well-known people became involved: first myself, later a member of Parliament, then a laureated writer, a network, a magazine. Homepage after homepage. Fully knowing that Church of Scientology would at some time have to sue, more and more people joined. As of today, there are a hundred and three Fishman Affidavit homepages in the world. One in the UK, one in the US, one in Germany and exactly one hundred homepages in Holland. There is a daily bulletin received by all Dutch participants. There are t-shirts. There are people compiling Dutch versions of FactNet. There is now more information available in the Netherlands about the cult than there ever was and none of it is very positive, I must say. FactNet, Lerma, Erlich, Klemesrud, Fishman -- people and organisations who are or have been sued by Scientology because of this Affidavit in the past two years -- are eagerly waiting to see what's happening here, for a positive verdict for us here would have bearings on their case in the US as well. There is by now a massive correspondence between some of the regulars of alt.religion.scientology and people involved in this Dutch Net protest, as all critics of Scientology would like us to win. Some of the regulars of *.misc are preparing a defence fund for those who will be sued by the cult. Two days ago, Scientology filed charges against four Internet providers -- XS4ALL, DDS, Cistron and Dataweb -- and me. They still believe they are fighting single persons and single institutions. We, on the other hand, know that they are facing a net-community.

And I -- I am having a real net life.