Category: Summer 2009

By Fernando Firmino da Silva

Mobile communication studies have expanded from within various disciplinary areas (in sociology, communication, cyberculture and cultural studies, for example), instigated by they way that practices arising from the emergence of new digital mobile technologies1 and wireless connections2 give rise to new communications phenomena. These phenomena generate real research problems with questions that need to be addressed in order to identify and understand the economic and socio-cultural implications of mobile technologies for contemporary life.

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By Fabio B. Josgrilberg

Over the last few years, the provision of wireless broadband internet access has become part of governmental agendas at all levels, and in many different locations (Middleton & Crow, 2008). This inclusion of yet another ‘new technology’ on the political agenda, however, belies its roots in an old problem and debate: uneven public access to society’s technological developments. As the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article XVII, states: “everyone has the right freely to participate in the cultural life of the community, to enjoy the arts and to share in scientific advancement and its benefits” (UN, 1948).

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By Sergio Amadeu da Silveira

Low income communities and individuals in Brazil are now grasping the importance of the Internet. The boom in blogs and user-friendly databases worldwide have greatly expanded hypertextual writing and the production of news and information across the web. Even television programs disseminate news about the advantages and benefits of the World Wide Web, spurring Brazilians to take an interest in its potential. Yet the unequal concentration of income, and the poverty experienced by most of Brazil’s population, represents an enormous obstacle in the expansion of the Internet and its services in country.

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