I'm also interested in the interplay between Anderson's original theories and the new possibilities offered by the internet to spread unprecedented amounts of information to a worldwide audience with relative ease, and what the dissemination of virtual print (books, newspapers, etc.) means for "nationalism."

In the chapter "Cultural Roots," Anderson describes the effect of the mass-produced newspaper as having to do with the ceremony it produces: "the almost precisely simultaneous consumption ('imagining') of the newspaper-as-fiction" (35.) The trend today, however, is an increasing shift away from physical papers towards digital ones- which removes both temporal and spatial restrictions (to a point). Reading newspapers is no longer a "ceremonious" act, and is rather a practical matter that can, with the widespread availability of internet connections, be experienced at any time, in almost any part of the world. Is the significance of newspapers reduced, then, or is the only effect the loss of the temporal element of the ceremony- so that now, it's more a matter of "I'm reading something that many other people in my country have read or will read" instead of "I'm reading something that many other people in my country are reading at about this moment"? Anderson also mentions the aspect of seeing other people read the same newspaper that you consume; someone at a computer screen, however, could be looking at almost anything. I wonder, again, whether this has any significant impact?

Also, with the advent and proliferation of news blogs (or at least blogs that feature news), there is a great proliferation of individualized news sources that are not necessarily connected to any greater whole. The increased availability of these digital sources across national boundaries also seems like it might contribute to some sort of fragmentation of the reading populace.

Or, against all this, does language still act as a barrier against a possible "international consciousness" that could supersede national ones (or possibly strengthen this barrier)? For example, to native speakers of French, English is once-removed (it is, in a certain way, "other"), so it would stand that English language newspapers, be they online or not, are (linguistically) once-removed, too.