Americans are hard at work turning the dream of an information society into reality.
Using the same technologies that have transformed the world of work, we are laying the foundation for new economic growth, particularly in our inner cities and rural areas. Schools and universities are offering students new learning and career opportunities. Health care providers are finding cost-effective ways to care for geographically-isolated patients. Governments and nonprofit agencies are developing techniques to make their services more effective and more readily available. Law enforcement agencies are strengthening their hand in the fight against crime. Communities are pulling together to address common concerns and share common values.
The job is far from finished. While 40 percent of Americans have computers at home and 60 percent are exposed to some form of information technology at work, many of us still lack access to this basic tool of the information age. Some believe they never will have access, and others, while eager to acquire technological skills for themselves and advanced communications networks for their communities, are overwhelmed by the financial and technical hurdles.
The growing number of experiments around the country, however, including the 332 projects that have received grants from the Telecommunications and Information Infrastructure Assistance Program (TIIAP) since 1994, show that information technology is for everybody. It is for the inner- city teenager building a future career as a World Wide Web designer in East Palo Alto, California, and for the elderly diabetic in rural Kansas who hopes that daily electronic visits by a nurse will make it possible to stay out of a nursing home. It is for the Native Americans teaching their children about rainforests in barren Ignacio, Colorado, and for parents trying to keep their kids safe and healthy in Newark, New Jersey. It is for the municipal police forces trying to keep track of jurisdiction-jumping criminals in Pennsylvania and for the nonprofit organization trying to help poor families find their way through the maze of social service agencies in New Hampshire. And it is for the community network seeking to ensure that all citizens have access to information networks in New Orleans, Louisiana, and for the city government of Phoenix, Arizona, trying to make its own services more accessible to the public.
The case studies in this report describe early experiments in building and using the information infrastructure. Collective wisdom is emerging from them concerning the challenges involved in developing a more seamless and universal information system, and in sustaining projects that enrich the community. In keeping with TIIAP's priorities, the projects emphasize efforts to use telecommunications tools to benefit society and to extend those benefits to disadvantaged individuals and communities. They also reflect TIIAP's conviction that efforts to build the information infrastructure must involve numerous partners and enlist broad community support.
In addition to demonstrating the benefits that new technology can bring, these and other telecommunications and information infrastructure projects inform us about a wide range of technologies including not only the standard telephone-based communications links used in many areas, but also numerous alternatives such as a digital cellular communications system used by public safety agencies in Utah, high-speed cable modems used for Internet access in Aberdeen, South Dakota, and more.
More important, these projects offer guidance concerning the human aspects of creating an information infrastructure. How do you bring disparate institutions together to create an integrated communications system for a community? What works and what doesn't, when it comes to training people how to use the new information tools?
Clearly an enormous need exists throughout the United States and the world for the answers to these questions. Indeed, such information is especially important because the Information Superhighway, unlike the Interstate Highway System to which it so often is compared, is being built not by the federal government according to a single master plan but by countless partners in individual communities. With limited resources, we all gain by building on the knowledge developed by those persons pioneering new technologies or innovation applications. Much that is described here can be sustained and replicated in other places.
Finally, these profiles demonstrate the energy and enthusiasm that these projects have unleashed, as well as the strong commitment by numerous partners, both public and private, to ensure that the information revolution reaches all corners of society and achieves its promise of bringing us richer lives, greater economic opportunity, and stronger communities.
Source: U.S. Department of Commerce
National Telecommunications and Information Administration
Office of Telecommunications and Information Applications
Last Modified: 18 Dec 97