I am wondering what David means by the term "Internet studies". The military has been one of the largest supporters of technology research in general and Lee is right, ARPAnet was a military research project. Now one of the largest military projects is "semantic web". Something that might, in the future, be as integral to our lives as Internet now is (in my opinion, semantic web, is part of the Internet studies as well). The military also happens to be one of the largest backers of research in general. I do not think as a field, we have a choice of whether our field is funded, at least in part, with military money. We have that choice only as individual researchers, when we choose which grants to apply for and accept. My other concern is David's statement that this direction is new. The USC institute - the Institute of Creative Technologies - has been in existence for at least 5 years. This direction is not new. If anything, its come full circle. Irina Shklovski Graduate Researcher Human Computer Interaction Institute Carnegie Mellon University =================================== http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~irinas http://miswritings.blogspot.com "To create means to live, forever creating newer and newer things." -Kazimir Malevich, 1915 =================================== Irina Shklovski Graduate Assistant Human Computer Interaction Institute Carnegie Mellon University ========================== http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~irinas "I can handle reality in small doses but as a lifestyle its much too confining..." --Lily Tomlin C L I M B O N ==========================