![Sample our Communication Studies journals, sign in here to start your access, 2013 & 2014 volumes FREE to you for 14 days]({"type":"image" , "src" : "/sda/5927/TOC-Subject-Sample-2021-Information-Science2.jpg"})
Abstract
This article looks to decentered hyperlinking patterns on the worldwide web as a site where media researchers can investigate the treatment of social issues by websites. Such “issue networks” are offered in contrast to the increasingly portalized and commercial nature of information architecture and interfaces on the worldwide web. The article searches for commonly linked sites on the issue of the Bush-Cheney energy policy in an attempt to uncover the hyperlink patterns and debate among the most interconnected sites.
This paper owes a great deal of gratitude to the principle associates of the Govcomorg Foundation, namely, its director, Richard Rogers, and collaborators Noortje Marres, Andres Zelman, Andrei Mogotov, Marieke Van Dijk, and Auke Touwslager, and the research associates of Infoscape Research Lab, especially Ganaele Langlois and Peter Ryan. The author would also like to thank Aguidel Consulting and Zach Devereaux for data visualization assistance. Lastly, the author also recognizes the funding of the Govcomorg Foundation in conjunction with the Soros Foundation and the Bell Globemedia Research Chair, Ryerson University.
Notes
1. This quote is presented on the cover page of the Report of the National Energy Policy Development Group, entitled “Reliable, Affordable, and Environmentally Sound Energy for America's Future.” http://www.whitehouse.gov/energy/. Accessed March 24, 2004.
2. http://www.whitehouse.gov/energy/. Accessed March 25, 2004.
3. Open Secrets, an organization that tracks the funding of U. S. elections, found that the oil and gas industries contributed over 10 times more to Bush/Cheney than Gore/Lieberman, the largest spread of any industry. Cf. http://www.opensecrets.org/2000elect/select/AllCands.htm.
8. Judicial Watch's website offers a comprehensive timeline of these efforts, including legal briefs: http://www.judicialwatch.org/cheney.shtml
10. ibid., Judicial Watch.
11. cf. CitationS. Jones (2000) or Jones' intellectual inspiration Harold CitationInnis (1951). The Bias of Communication. 1951. Intro. Marshall McLuhan. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1964.
12. www.gao.gov/aug17let.pdf. Accessed March 1, 2004.
13. See the Judicial Watch website (ibid.) for specific legal arguments pertaining to executive (White House) privileges and protections.
14. www.house.gov/reform/min/pdfs/pdf_inves/pdf_energy_bill_rep.pdf. Accessed March 3, 2004.
16. Some 10–12 months (May 2002) after the policy debate and hyperlink analysis was performed for this paper the administration was forced by a federal judge to release heavily edited documents pertaining to the energy policy process. According to the NRDC (later confirmed by the New York Times and a host of other news outlets), the fossil fuel industries' specific language was adopted in the final report of the energy policy group. Cf. http://www.nrdc.org/air/energy/taskforce/docs.asp and http://foi.missouri.edu/usenergypolicies/cheney/both accessed August 2005.
18. … and approximately nine months after the online research performed for this paper.
23. The report notes that “Highly specific provisions appear to benefit particular companies. For example, one provision would allow the Secretary of Interior to suspend the term of existing subsalt leases, which would benefit Houston-based Anadarko Petroleum” (ibid, p. 4).
24. Future research might make use of like-minded methods, such as the website “The Rule” www.theyrule.net, to chart the personal networks across corporate, university, and other governmental boards.
25. A handful of network-designed search tools have emerged, but as yet their broader influence, use, and methods are questionable. cf. Kartoo.com
26. Google query conducted February 21, 2006.
27. http://ted.hyperland.com/notherview. Accessed July 3, 2003.
28. http://www.w3.org/designissues/architecture.html. Accessed June 5, 2003.
29. Even the popular “web ring” tool takes the surfer through the click of an outgoing link, one by one through like-minded sites.
30. For other discussions of hyperlink network analysis, see CitationRichard Rogers' (2000), Preferred Placement: Knowledge Politics on the Web.
31. Though the phenomenon of “deep linking” to proprietorial services has been taken up by the courts, cf. http://www.w3.org/2001/tag/doc/deeplinking.html.
32. A copy of this software can be downloaded at http://www.klingt.org/∼c/netlocator. The netlocator accepts up to seven starting points—URLs that it subsequently crawls. After the program has found the common links among the starting points, it then produces a network map that depicts the incoming and outgoing links between pages. Initially conceived and written in 1999, at the time of writing there are now a host of similar hyperlink analysis programs: SocSciBot 3<socscibot.wlv.ac.uk>, ucinet <www.analytictech.com/ucinet.htm>, iknow <www.spcomm.uiuc.edu/Projects/TECLAB/IKNOW/>, loglinearp <www.psych.uiuc.edu/people/faculty/wasserman.html>, pajek <vlado.fmf.uni-lj.si/pub/networks/pajek/>, and Siena <stat.gamma.rug.nl/siena.html>.
33. Cf. CitationRogers and Zelman (2002) for a lengthy discussion of this problematic.
34. The next generation of software developed by Govcomorg has greatly diminished the possible bias of starting points by facilitating the input of over 30 starting points and up to three iterations of hyperlink crawls.
35. www.cerf.org/iie/resource.htm, www.ecee.org/links.htm. www.nrdc.org/reference/topics/air.asp (all accessed June 1, 2003).
36. For a list of some of the more significant maps see http://www.govcom.org/drafts_old.html.
