Fountain of Knowledge or Web of Deceit? A Look at Some Moroccan Students’ Use of the Internet

The paper presents a preliminary investigation of some Moroccan students' use of the Internet, finding that they are more concerned with obtaining everyday information and communicating with their peers rather than exploring new horizons, and that they often fail to discriminate valid information from hoaxes. It is therefore argued that the impact of the Internet as a diffuser of knowledge and an enhancer of intercultural understanding cannot be taken for granted. The Internet and the World Wide Web are constantly be- ing hailed as one of the greatest revolutions in social history. We can distinguish two major reasons for this. Metaphors describing the web as an information superhighway, a foun- tain of knowledge, or a gateway to the world reflect some of the ways in which its possibilities have been perceived. One of the pervading images used to describe the impact of Inter- net use on the world is the notion of the democracy of information (Friedman, 1999) - the idea that the net has made accessible to the masses a wealth of information that formerly was available only to an elite. To quote Kofi Anan, as far back as 1998: 'The quantity and quality of available information is changing dramatically every day, in every country, in every corner of the world. Citizens are gaining greater access to information, too.' (UN Press Release, 1998). A second set of images are those which focus on the Internet as a meeting place, a means of crossing frontiers and bridging oceans, facilitating communication between individuals around the world and supposedly thereby enhancing intercultural understanding. A corollary of this second idea is the often expressed view that Internet communication can be exploited as an educational tool for promoting intercultural awareness and communication skills. For instance, many studies have recommended the use of emailing and participation in Internet forums as part of courses in language and communication (see, for instance, Chen, 1998). However, these strong claims may well need to be tem- pered. The Internet does indeed give access to a seemingly unlimited amount of accurate, up-to-date and authoritative information. Unfortunately, it also offers an unrivalled col- lection of outdated, distorted and downright false informa- tion. Some of this is only unintentionally misleading (old web pages, personal websites and blogs which represent only their authors' views). But alongside this is the extensive use of the Internet to disseminate propaganda, disinformation and misinformation for purposes which may range from the merely ludic to the seriously malevolent. As Internet com- munication has expanded, Internet hoaxes have proliferated, to be followed, fortunately, by a host of sites like Snopes and Hoaxbusters, aimed at exposing them. There are also numer-