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Thesis (PH.D.)--Syracuse University, 2003. / "Publication number AAT 3081633."

Thesis (PH.D.) -- Syracuse University, 2004. / "Publication number AAT 3135876."

The present research identifies June, 1995 to July, 1996 as the period marking the Cyberporn Panic in the United States and analyzes the cultural conditions and the claims-making in mainstream newspapers about Cyberporn and the Communications Decency Act using traditional moral panic theories, as well as the theories of moral panic developed by Hall et al. in Policing the Crisis (1978). This communication-centric investigation of the Cyberporn Panic includes results of a discourse analysis of the mainstream news reports, and focus group interviews with parents who are themselves Internet users, and who have children under 18 years old also on the Internet. Results of the discourse analysis show that, while initial news coverage of Cyberporn reported claims about the prevalence of Cyberporn, these discourses rapidly gave way to the claims about censorship made by those who wished to shift the debate from the symbolic moral universe of pornography and the threat to children to one that focused on censorship and the threat to free speech. The research argues that this shift in discourse is the result, in part, of the commercial interests of newspapers in the U.S. and the emerging business needs of news organizations that saw the Internet as a potential new business opportunity. The refocusing of discourses is discussed as part of an overall hegemonic process that reproduces contemporary cultural conditions with regard to communication technologies and capitalist ideologies. At the same time, focus group interviews indicate that parents were not aware of the commercial nature of the Internet and believe the government is the only potential source of censorship. In the end, the Cyberporn Panic is discussed, in many ways, as the moral panic that wasn't.

This dissertation assesses the impact of international computer networks on the size and nature of international news windows. It expands on theoretical frameworks of structural news flow, media gatekeepers, ideological state apparatuses, global civil society, and global journalism. It makes valuable contributions to mass communications research by focusing on an entity largely overlooked by the field: computer-mediated communications systems. A content analysis was applied to 2,500 stories in a one-week sample of international news coverage drawn from print, radio, television, and online media from a Northern country (U.S.A.) and one from the South (Brazil). The study came up with three sets of findings. First, online services enable individual users to access news in forms and types unavailable via traditional media, such as raw feeds of newswires, press releases, calls to activism, reports from non-media organizations, and news digests published on a regular, timely basis. Reportage on the online services constitutes a form of global and human journalism. Second, users had unfiltered access to news from a number of media and non-media organizations. Thus, subscribers of online services could bypass the gatekeepers of traditional media and access a news window which was larger (especially in coverage of the South), freer of domestic coverage constraints, and more pluralistic. But concerns also arose about intellectual property rights, authenticity of news sources, and ethical use of public forums. Third, the online news material on these computer network services came from more news and information producing organizations based in the North (especially the U.S.) than in the South. The economic and infrastructural disparity between North and South leads to a domination of Northern information sources on such online services. Though these networking organizations, as compared to the traditional media, can better function as ideological apparatuses for international civil society, they largely reflect the views and ideology of Northern civil society. This dissertation identifies recent technological developments like search engines, personalized news services, multimedia publishing, and the global growth of the Internet. The findings of the dissertation can apply to this newly emerging media landscape as well; promising directions for future research are identified.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Waikato, 2007. / Title from PDF cover (viewed February 25, 2008) Includes bibliographical references (p. 232-255)

Thesis (Ph.D.)--The Johns Hopkins University, 2007. / Adviser: Matthew Crenson. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph.D.) -- McMaster University, 2003. / Includes bibliographical references. Also available via World Wide Web.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Sydney, 2006. / Title from title screen (viewed 9 May 2007). Submitted in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy to the Faculty of Education and Social Work. Includes bibliographical references. Also issued in print.

Thesis (M.B.A. (Rhodes Investec Business School)) - Rhodes University, 2008. / A dissertation submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Business Administration (MBA)