Kenneth Pigg

Analogies are useful tools for lots of things including national policy making. Federal universal service policy encouraging open access to the Information Superhighway uses the transportation infrastructure analogy extensively towards efforts associated with putting more hardware in place--wires, modems, servers, routers, etc.--just as the federal government invests trillions of dollars in concrete. However, in my view, there is one critical difference in the federal highway system that undermines the Information Superhighway analogy as a basis for universal service policy: The highway system is maintained by public tax revenues while the telecommunications system is basically privately-owned (and now being deregulated). Why then, do we take a supply-side approach and use federal and state funds to add more physical infrastructure to this privately owned system when a demand-side approach may be a far more effective and appropriate use of taxpayer's dollars?

Yet, regulatory language requires that nearly all funds be spent on hardware for "extending existing networks to new users," and "demonstrating new technologies for providing access." Very little can be spent on content development, awareness building or training. Are we to believe that government's basic assumption here is that the private sector would otherwise have no economic incentive to invest in this infrastructure?There are similar policies at work at the state level. In Missouri, the General Assembly and the Governor created three separate programs and appropriations to connect schools and libraries and create community information networks. In each instance, the use of the funding was limited to hardware purchases. Iowa went a step further and spent tax revenues on creating its own fiber optic network across the state to promote access and connectivity. A similar approach was followed in North Carolina as state revenues were used to purchase access for public institutions in many communities in the state. Our Canadian neighbors chose the same policy approach, using tax revenues--limited to $10,000 (Canadian) for each project award--to provide a high bandwidth connection in public places such as libraries and community centers to increase public access. Project winners in the Canadian Access Program generally have to provide the computer and any other hardware necessary to make the "access" really work. Nevertheless, several thousand such sites have been created across the provinces.

A better policy strategy and use of public tax revenues would be to focus on creating greater "demand" for this telecommunications infrastructure, and then rely on the commercial sector and market efficiencies to provide the hardware itself in recognition of this demand. Such a demand-side strategy would mean investing in something other than hardware for expanding the infrastructure. To be successful, a demand-side policy would have to acknowledge the existence of a "community information infrastructure" that exists in all communities and the need to establish a "collective" technological literacy (Pigg, '99).

Communities are vital social entities when there is an active, inclusive information infrastructure: mass media, gossip, community forums, friendly conversation on the street, and messages emanating from various organizations and agencies. CII is also characterized by a social network structure meaning that flows of information (communications) are "structured" by relationships, status and power. Community information networks that utilize electronic forms of communication may or may not reflect this community information infrastructure. Where they do, we may assume a new public sphere has come into being.

Understanding how these new public spheres can be created means policy makers must fully understand the role of information and its modes of communication in community. The assertion here is that information transmitted or exchanged is not sufficient to build/maintain "community." The community networking movement has provided access to technology intended to "build community," or contribute constructively to community development. Achieving these outcomes may depend on the degree to which the community network corresponds with the already existing community information infrastructure.

A wide variety of community-based projects have been launched to bring the benefits of electronic networks to citizens, students, government agencies, small businesses, libraries, schools, and non-profit groups. The purposes of these network projects varies, but often include: providing access for increased inclusiveness, strengthening the economic base of the community, enhancing life-long learning opportunities for citizens, increasing technological literacy among residents, and achieving general community building outcomes. One estimate indicates there are about 182 of these community or civic networks. They have taken many forms: Free-Nets, InfoZones, bulletin board systems, Tele-villages and smart cities (Borgstrom, 1999). David Miller at the University of Sheffield lists 54 community networking sites in the U.K. (http://panizzi.shef.ac.uk/community/uk.htm   and Peter Scott lists 59 in Canada ( www.lights.com/freenet/ ).

Investing public funds to increase the supply of hardware does not build demand by increasing collective technological literacy. It is important for policy makers to realize that the ability to achieve these kinds of collective purposes associated with community networks requires more than simple individual technological literacy. It requires a collective literacy, a comprehension of what the technology will support for bringing people and their community closer together, with higher quality interaction than exists in the usual CII.