The Amateur

Computerist

Winter/Spring 1996 Netizens and Online Access Volume 7 No. 1

“People need communication to represent themselves, and e-mail for that reason, as well as Netnews.”

from a post at the San Francisco Public Library during the NTIA online conference, Nov. 14-21, 1994

Table of Contents

Net Access: A Privilege or a Right?.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Page 1

Canadian Community Networking. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 4

Netizens and Community Networks. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 11

Letter to the Editor.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 15

Access For All FAQ. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 15

The Future of Democracy.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 26

Old Freedoms and New Technologies. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 35

Forming the Usenet Online Community. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 46

History of Cleveland Free-Net. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 52

Universal Access to E-Mail. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 56

Prototype for Policy Decisions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 59

In Honor of ‘Doc’ Wilson.. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Page 80

Will Access to the Net

Be a Privilege or a Right?

This issue of the Amateur Computerist is on the subject of Netizens

and Online Access. The issue discusses both the cooperative online

community and the effort to extend access to the online community. We

have included articles about the development of the online Usenet

community and about the challenges it faces. Also, this issue contains

articles about efforts to extend access to the Net (to Usenet, e-mail and

Webpage: http://www.ais.org/~jrh/acn/

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a text based browser like lynx), to those who are not yet online but who

want to contribute to the Net.

From the earliest days of networking developments, the vision

guiding networking pioneers was of a computer utility that everyone

would have access to. What is now becoming clear, however, is that for

networking access to be ubiquitous it has to be available free or at its

actual low cost (i.e. $4 to $8 per year per person). Such access should

not be limited by geographical or income factors.

The right of all to have access to the Net is not only an important

concern for the individuals involved, it is also a concern for those online

who will benefit from the broadest participation of all and their

contributions to the online community. Those who have to pay by the

hour or by the amount of data they use, are limited in what they are able

or willing to contribute. Also, commercial profit oriented access has led

to abuse of Usenet. While those connecting from academic or commu-

nity networking sites must often agree to act according to acceptable use

policies which prohibit advertising, chain letters, pyramid schemes, etc,

some commercial sites have been less willing to enforce acceptable use

policies to prevent such abuse.

In August of last year, the Telecommunities ’95 Conference was

held in Victoria, British Columbia. The slogan of the conference was

“Equity on the Internet.” The conference set as a goal, access of all in

Canada to Usenet and e-mail and local community information by the

year 2000. The commitment was stressed at the conference that there

was a need to protect the public online space. “Cyberspace *Is* public

space.... We each have a RIGHT to be there,” one of the speakers at the

conference emphasized.

A similar sentiment had been expressed in the US in November,

1994 during the online public hearing held by the National Telecommu-

nications Information Administration under the U.S. Department of

Commerce. The online conference requested citizen input into what

should be the future of the National Science Foundation (NSF) backbone

to the Internet. Many participants at the online conference expressed the

importance of having e-mail and Usenet access available for all and

there was a concern that the so called “free market” policy of network-

ing development would only exclude important sectors of U.S. society

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from access to these important new communication resources.

In the early days of Usenet and the ARPAnet, there was an

ARPAnet Mailing List known as Human-Nets. Those contributing to

Human-Nets recognized the importance of their participation in a new

form of communication. A goal of those on Human-Nets was to create

a World-Net, a worldwide computer and communications network.

Today that goal of a world-wide computer and communications network

has become a goal within reach, but the question of how to make access

to it available to all is still an unsolved public policy dilemma.

This issue of the Amateur Computerist is dedicated to examining

some of the efforts to take up this pubic policy goal, by examining the

creation of Cleveland Free-Net, reporting on the Community networking

movement in Canada and including the Access For All FAQ sent to us

from Germany. We hope this will provide a broader view of the issues

involved in developing the Internet than the limited commercial view

that dominates media attention in countries like the U.S. We also look

at how the early days of Usenet took on the problem of having a

democratic foundation as a basis for the creation of an ever growing and

expanding online community. In addition, we have included articles in

this issue about the potential of the Net to make direct democracy

feasible and available.

Crucial to the health of not only the online community, but also the

future of our society is the need to have the cooperative contributions to

the Net. These are only possible by having a healthy social policy

toward networking development and access. Though the U.S. govern-

ment is not currently pursuing this goal, there is a broad sentiment

within the U.S. and elsewhere that this is a crucial public policy issue

and these voices need to find a way to influence public policy both on

and off the Net.

[Editor’s Note: The U.S. Telecommunications Act of 1996 was passed

while this issue of the Amateur Computerist was going to press. The law

ignores the Freenet and community networking movement and lacks any

historical perspective of how the Net has developed and spread. For a

future issue we invite comments on the new law and views about what

it is necessary to do to influence what the U.S. government will do to

Page 3

implement the universal service provisions of the new law.]

Canadian Community Networking

Report From Telecommunities’95

Conference

by Jay Hauben

jrh29@columbia.edu

Something big is happening in the world. There is rapid develop-

ment and deployment of new technology making possible an incredibly

inexpensive global communications system. This is a report about a

grassroots effort across Canada that is attempting to insure participation

in the development and use of this technology by community level

people. The organization formed to coordinate this Canadian community

network movement is called Telecommunities Canada.

In February, 1995, a conference announcement appeared on

electronic mailing lists and Usenet newsgroups. It began, “Tele-

communities Canada is pleased to extend an invitation to Free and

Community Networks across Canada and around the world to attend the

International Community Networking Conference and First Annual

General Meeting of Telecommunities Canada.” The announcement

encouraged the widest possible attendance from participants in Freenets,

Community Networks and other forms of electronic community based

activities with the hope it would lead to the founding of an International

Telecommunities Organization to encourage the development of

community networking around the world. It also pointed to their vision

of ubiquitous access to electronic communications for all Canadians by

the year 2000.

The conference took place from Aug. 19–23, 1995 in Victoria,

British Columbia. Over 300 people attended the four days of tutorials,

speeches, concurrent sessions and a barbeque. Most of the participants

were Canadians, but also present were community networking people

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from the U.S., England, Australia, and a few other countries. Most of the

more than 30 operating Canadian community networks were represented

as were many of the 70 or so community networks that are in various

stages of organization. Since the first Canadian community network,

Victoria Free-Net, came online in November, 1992, over 200,000

Canadians or a little less than 1% of the Canadian population has gained

free or very low cost access to the Net via such networks.

The conference sessions were for the most part serious and many

pressing issues were discussed and debated. This report covers a few.

All Canadian community networks are staffed mostly by volunteers,

sometimes numbering in the hundreds. Most of the work of figuring out,

setting up and maintaining these networks is done by volunteers from

the communities or cities involved. In fact, one of the major purposes of

these community networks is to provide training for local community

people in electronic communications technology and network manage-

ment. In that way these communities hope they might participate in the

development of advanced technology and their people could take jobs

or participate in decisions which require such technical knowledge.

Many of the students, people between jobs, librarians, and senior

citizens who volunteer, do so with this purpose in mind. But how to

maintain a sufficient pool of such volunteers was a question for many of

the community networks. There was wide-spread sentiment that the

volunteers had to be offered quality training and skill upgrade opportuni-

ties, especially those with more skills offering help to those with less.

Also, some argued that care had to be taken to involve volunteers in all

aspects of the network’s decisions and operations both for the network’s

health and for retention of the volunteers. From what I heard at the

conference, it seemed that concern for retaining volunteers would

strengthen some community networks in their resolve not to allow any

commercial activity on their networks lest the volunteers see that

someone was profiting from their donated labor.

Even with most labor done by volunteers and most equipment

donated as it was for some of the community networks, there are still

ongoing costs to operate a community network. There was general

experience throughout Canada that the actual operating cost amounts to

about $8.00(U.S.) per member per year (mostly for phone line costs).

Page 5

Even that small cost per member, for a community net like National

Capital Free-Net in Ottawa with over 50,000 members necessitates an

annual budget of over $400,000. Participants from the Blue Sky

Community Network of Manitoba pointed out that $8.00 per year

amounts to about 70 cents per month and therefore should be covered by

the government which would save that much money just by making one

less paper mailing per month to each online citizen. People from

Edmonton FreeNet argued that it would not be unfair to charge each

member a $10 to $20 annual membership fee as they do. Many others

argued that even $10 per year might be a burden for some and that there

should be no economic obstacle to anyone participating. Most Canadian

community networks retain free access, covering their operating costs

by voluntary donations from their users and other fund raising mecha-

nisms. But the money question and the question of being sustainable

seemed on everyone’s agenda.

Speaking to the principles on which to base the money and other

decisions, Garth Graham one of the theoreticians of the Canadian

community network movement has written: “A community network is

electronic public space where ordinary people can meet and converse

about common concerns. Like parks, civic squares, sidewalks, wilder-

ness, and the sea, it’s an electronic commons shared by all, not a

cyberspace shopping mall.” To maintain their value as a public space,

Canadian community networks have rules that their members and users

agree to and can lose their accounts if they violate. Among the rules

presented at the conference was an acceptable use policy in effect at

some of the networks permitting: No corporate accounts, No advertising,

and No overt buying and selling. Other nets represented at the confer-

ence have made openings for commercial use of their networks by

establishing paid for higher levels of membership or sponsorship. But

many worried that such duel level membership would compromise the

public community essence of their networks.

One disappointment for the conferees was the failure to form an

international organization or put in motion steps in that direction. The

Canadian community network movement acknowledges its indebtedness

to and respect for Cleveland Freenet and there had been strong efforts

made to connect the Canadian community network and U.S. Freenet

Page 6

movements. Telecommunities Canada had hoped to work closely with

the U.S. National Public Telecommunications Network, known as the

NPTN, which had up until recently represented many of the U.S.

Freenets. During the conference, as an American I was asked often if I

had worked with the NPTN. I explained the problems I had encountered

with the NPTN. The Canadians listened politely but only at the end of

the conference did I learn that the NPTN had trademarked the name

Free-Net in Canada. The NPTN made it a condition of its participation

in the conference that each Canadian community network pay the NPTN

a $2000 membership fee. Telecommunities Canada offered to make a

token payment in the name of all the Canadian community networks but

the NPTN maintained that Canadian Freenets were using their trademark

illegally and the negotiations toward an international organization ended.

The result has been that a number of Canadian community networks

have taken Freenet out of their names while others have offered each

other legal support if the NPTN were to sue any of them over its use of

the name Freenet. Many people at the conference warmly welcomed me

and asked what they could do to help people in the U.S. move closer to

having more community networks. It was as if the presence of non-

Canadians helped keep the hope of an international organization alive.

Local content was presented by many as an important aspect of

community networks. But it was reported that most users log-on in order

to use e-mail or Usenet. This contradiction raised the question of what

was the proper role for a community network. Garth Graham quoting

another community network theoretician Jay Weston, phrased it this

way: Are community networks “providing something for the community

or caretakers of a space created by the community?” He argued at the

conference that if community networks saw their role as providing

something for the community, they had not gotten “beyond industrial

society models of how to structure organizations” and therefore did not

represent anything new and would soon be replaced by commercial ser-

vice providers. If on the other hand they adopted the role of safeguarding

a public space then community networks would be doing something

unique and important. Community people need community networks to

defend their right to access to the new communications technology at its

actual cost. Jay Weston writes: “The National Capital Freenet was an

Page 7

imagined public space, a dumb platform where all individuals, groups

and organizations could represent themselves, where conflict and

controversy could occur as manifestations of conflict and controversy

already occurring in the community.... Such a space could be con-

structed only by the community acting as a community, and not by any

public or private organization acting on behalf of the community.” His

argument is that the community must decide what is best for it. But who

in the community has the answer? Everyone with a genuine interest in

the community must be heard in order to figure that out. An open and

diverse electronic public space is needed for that debate and discussion

and that is what Usenet especially and e-mail allow for. I feel many

people at the conference did not fully understand the important role that

community networks play by making Usenet and e-mail available to

their users.

In Canada as opposed to the U. S., there are stated policies of

encouragement of community networks on the part of the Federal and

some of the provincial governments. For example, the British Columbia

Provincial government in a document called “The Electronic Highway

Accord” states: “Community networks and public points of access are

fundamental to affordable electronic access to services and broad com-

munity participation in the information society. A continuing commit-

ment to involving the public in developing the electronic highway is

essential.” It is recognized in Canada that the private sector will not

provide universal access at no or low cost to all Canadians. But most

community network activists were frustrated by how little financial

support had come so far from Canadian governments. The attendees at

the conference took up an active debate with the government officials

who had been sent to the conference. In most instances the government

programs prescribe the form that a network should take in order to

qualify for funding. The grassroots people fought to have a say in the

whole process of defining, structuring, and deciding which projects

would get government support. The Canadian Federal government has

earmarked $20,000,000 over three years for rural connectivity to the

Internet. Even those at the conference ready to give up on achieving

government financial support, took up to argue with the government

representatives why much of that money should end up supporting the

Page 8

community networking movement and not business connectivity. The

effort was to make the government live up to its mandate as the

promoter of the general welfare rather than the provider of welfare for

business interests. The end result at the conference was that the Federal

government representatives asked the Telecommunities Canada

organization to put a proposal on the table for the government to

consider.

Whereas government support was hard to make concrete, libraries

and librarians have played prominent parts in the community networks

that have come online in Canada. Many of the community network

efforts were initiated by librarians or library administrators. People

whose profession was to facilitate access to information saw the advent

of the Internet as a great leap forward and didn’t want their local library

users nor themselves left out. Also librarians realizing that they need

network skills are among the volunteers in many community networks.

Some library administrators also served as activists in the development

of local community networks. A community network can be a mecha-

nism by which a library’s online catalog is available by dialup from

homes without requiring the library itself to maintain the modem pool

and computers that are necessary. Also, many community networks

fulfill their obligation to have public access terminals by placing them

in libraries. So a community network can save libraries a good deal of

training effort, money and equipment costs and in Canada at least many

community networks and libraries are close partners.

In most communities, libraries do not consider community networks

competitors but relations in Canada between community networks and

commercial service providers are a problem. The community network

activists do not see themselves as competitive with the service providers.

They argued that the community networks with their basic capabilities

help to create customers for the commercial operations, introducing

people to networking and whetting the appetites of those who will be

willing to pay for higher level access. The service providers for their part

often oppose the community networks as unfair competition. There are

some service providers who have appeared helpful to the community

networks in their areas. Some conference attendees warned, however

that what appears as friendship in public is often the opposite behind

Page 9

Telecommunities Canada will hold its 1996 con-

ference in Edmonton, Alberta on August 16-20.

More information is available from:

tc96info@freenet.edmonton.ab.ca

closed doors. Also Roger’s cable company in Toronto is a major sponsor

of the Toronto Free-Net, but the finances and decision process there I

was told were not public in contrast to the normal practice in most other

Canadian community networks. When I asked people at the conference

what advice they would give to people who wanted to see a community

network develop, I was often told to look into who had a successful

community network, “Check out why National Capital Free-Net in

Ottawa is successful.” What I heard about National Capital Free-Net was

that there had been a year long planning effort spearheaded by some

faculty members from Carleton University who held meetings frequently

for more than a year before launching their community network. That all

decisions of importance are made in public with votes taken online on

the FreeNet and that the annual meeting setting policy for the coming

year is also online available to all and participated in by many.

I left the conference feeling that I had attended an important event.

It was a public conference that had discussed many issues important to

the successful operation of a community network. There were many dif-

ferences among the Canadians but for now it seemed to me they had a

genuine community network movement committed to safeguarding a

public space. I felt we in the U.S. have a very big job if we too want to

have the kind of universal free or very low cost access that the Canadi-

ans were aiming for. We here have yet to win government commitment

to a role in support of public participation spreading access to the

Internet. We have strong commercial interests who oppose any public

sector activity, and we haven’t even gained the kind of support from

libraries and librarians that seemed so important in Canada. But I felt

there were pioneers at work in Canada blazing the trail and wishing us

well and they had given us a push to keep going despite or in spite of the

difficulties.

Page 10

The Netizens and Community

Networks

by Michael F. Hauben

hauben@columbia.edu

[Editor’s Note: The following article is from a talk presented at the

Hypernetwork’95 Beppu Bay Conference in Oita Perfecture, Kyushu,

Japan on Nov. 24, 1995 as part of the Netizens section of the Confer-

ence]

The story of Netizens is an important one, and I am happy to

participate in a conference which acknowledges the value and role of

Netizens in the future of the Net. In conducting research 3 years ago on-

line to determine people’s uses for the global computer communications

network, I became aware that there was a new social institution, an

electronic commons, developing. It was exciting to explore this new

social institution. Others online shared this excitement. I discovered

from those who wrote me that the people I was writing about were

citizens of the Net, or Netizens.

At the age of 12 I had started using local BBSes in Michigan. That

was in 1985. After seven years of participation on both local hobbyist-

run computer bulletin boards systems, and global Usenet, I began to re-

search Usenet and the Internet. I found these online discussions to be

mentally invigorating and welcoming of thoughtful comments, questions

and discussion. People were also friendly and considerate of others and

their questions. This was a new environment for me. Little thoughtful

conversation was encouraged in my high school. Since my daily life did

not provide places and people to talk with about real issues and real

world topics, I wondered why the online experience encouraged such

discussions and consideration of others. Where did such a culture spring

from, and how did it develop? During my sophomore year of college in

1992, I was curious to explore and better understand this new online

Page 11

world.

As part of course work at Columbia University, I explored these

questions. One professor’s encouragement helped me to use Usenet and

the Internet as places to conduct research. My research was actual

participation in the online community by exploring how and why these

communications forums functioned. I posed questions on Usenet,

mailing lists and Free-Nets. Along with these questions, I attached some

worthwhile preliminary research. People respected my questions and

found the preliminary research helpful. The entire process was one of

mutual respect and sharing of research and ideas. A real notion of ‘com-

munity’ and ‘participation’ took place. On the Net, people willingly help

each other and work together to define and address issues important to

them. These are often issues which the conventional media would never

cover.

One response to my research came from a Netizen from Montreal,

Jean-Francois Messier. He commented on how his connection to the

world via the Internet changed how he viewed the world. He said, “...my

attitudes to other peoples, races and religions changed, since I had more

chances to talk with other peoples around the world. When first

exchanging mail with people from Yellowknife, Yukon, I had a real

strange feeling: Getting messages and chatting with people that far from

me. I noticed around me that a lot of people have opinions and positions

about politics that are for themselves, without knowing others.” (See

“The Net and The Netizens” in the Netizens Netbook)

He continued, “Because I have a much broader view of the world

now, I changed and am more conciliate and peaceful with other people.

Writing to someone you never saw, changes the way you write...

Telecommunications opened the world to me and changed my visions

of people and countries....” (ibid.)

My initial research concerned the origins and development of the

global discussion forum Usenet. Usenet developed out of the desire of

several graduate students in the United States to be part of a cooperative

technological community across campuses. As campus connected to

campus across state, across the nation, across the continent and then

across continents, a global Usenet communication network emerged.

People used Usenet because it is more powerful to be in a large

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community than in isolation; communication with others leads to

broader ideas and cooperative activity is more productive than compe-

tition. These principles emerged from the necessity of sharing knowl-

edge to successfully implement new technology; at the time it was Unix.

Much of the culture of open discussion and sharing of technical

experience spilled over into the non-technical discussion groups. These

basic principles were part of the evidence behind the discovery of

Netizens.

For my next paper, I wanted to explore the larger Net, what it was and

its significance. This is when my research uncovered the remaining

details that helped me to recognize the emergence of Netizens. Netizens

are the people who actively contribute online towards the development

of the Net. These people understand the value of collective work and the

communal aspects of public communications. These are the people who

actively discuss and debate topics in a constructive manner, who e-mail

answers to people and provide help to new-comers, who maintain FAQ

files and other public information repositories, who maintain mailing

lists, and so on. These are people who discuss the nature and role of this

new communications medium. However, these are not all the people.

Netizens are not just anyone who comes online, and they are especially

not people who come online for isolated gain or profit. They are not

people who come to the Net thinking it is a service. Rather they are

people who understand it takes effort and action on each and everyone’s

part to make the Net a regenerative and vibrant community and resource.

Netizens are people who decide to devote time and effort into making

the Net, this new part of our world, a better place. Lurkers are not

Netizens, and vanity home pages are not the work of Netizens. While

lurking or trivial home pages do not harm the Net, they do not contribute

either.

The term Netizen has spread widely. The genesis comes from net

culture based on the original newsgroup naming conventions. Network

wide Usenet groups included net.general for general discussion,

net.auto for automobile owners, net.bugs for discussion of Unix bug

reports, and so on. People who used Usenet would prefix things related

to the online world with the word “net” similar to the newsgroup termi-

nology. So there would be references to net.gods, net.cops or

Page 13

net.citizens. My research demonstrated that there were people active as

members of the network, which the term net citizen does not precisely

represent. The word citizen suggests a geographic or national definition

of social membership. The word Netizen reflects the new non-geo-

graphically based social membership. So I contracted the phrase net dot

citizen to netizen.

Two general uses of the term netizen have developed. The first is a

broad usage to refer to anyone who uses the Net, for whatever purpose.

Thus, the term netizen has been prefixed in some uses with the adjec-

tives good or bad. The second usage is closer to my understanding. This

definition is used to describe people who care about Usenet and the

bigger Net and work towards building the cooperative and collective

nature which benefits the larger world. These are people who work

towards developing the Net. In this second case, Netizen represents

positive activity, and no adjective need be used. Both uses have spread

from the online community appearing in newspapers, magazines,

television, books and other offline media. As more and more people join

the online community and contribute towards the nurturing of the Net

and toward the development of a great shared social wealth, the ideas

and values of Netizenship spread. But with the increasing commercial-

ization and privatization of the Net, Netizenship is being challenged.

During such a period it is valuable to look back at the pioneering vision

that has helped make the Net possible and examine what lessons it

provides.

References

J. C. R. Licklider and Robert Taylor. “The Computer as a Communication Device.”

In Science and Technology: For the Technical Man in Management, No. 76, April

1968, Pp. 21-31.

The quote from Jean Francois Messier is from the Netizens Netbook, which this speech

is adapted from.

The Netbook is available from:

http://www.columbia.edu/~hauben/netbook/.

Page 14

[Editor’s Note: An article about the author of this article and others who

attended the Beppu Bay Conference in November, 1995 appeared in the

New Year’s Day issue of the Nishi Nippon newspaper, Fukuoka, Japan.]

Letter to the Editor

Hi,

I want to use your newsletter to suggest to Apple and IBM and

Compaq, etc. that they make an “economy model” computer for those

of us with a limited income. I think it would be not only a great thing but

also a best selling item worldwide. Lest we forget what the Volkswagen

“Bug” did for its manufacturer as well as the West German economy. I

hear they either brought it back or they are thinking about making an

improved version. GMC, Ford and Chrysler ought to be working on

something like that, instead of making and trying to sell $20,000

lemons!

Thanks for your help.

Louis Dequesa

dequesa@library1.cpmc.columbia.edu

Access For All FAQ

by Volker Grassmuck

vgras[email protected]n-berlin.de

[Editor’s Note: The following Request For Comment was presented at

the Interstanding Conference, Nov. 23-25, 1995 at the National Library,

Tallinn, Estonia. We thank Wulf-Burkhard Goehmann for forwarding a

copy of it.]

Page 15

- RFC Draft 1.1 -

http://www.is.in.berlin.de/~vgrass/afa-faq.html

Q1: Access for All sounds great. What is it all about?

Q2: What are the concrete targets?

Q3: Why is it so important that everybody be on the Net?

Q4: What’s the time frame?

Q5: Microsoft, Burda, Time-Warner, German Telekom, and all these

other big companies also want access for all. What’s the difference?

Q6: Are there already examples of Access for All?

Q7: If all these people come online, won’t the lines be overloaded?

Q8: So the issue is first of all one of pricing and regulation, i.e.

telecommunications policy. What models are there?

Q9: Access to the pipes is great, but what good is it if all the useful stuff

I find there has a price tag attached? How about Access to Information?

Q10: What other problems are there to be solved?

Q11: Where does the Access for All movement start? What’s the

context?

Q1: Access for All sounds great. What is it all about?

A1: The Matrix has inherent potentials for empowerment of individuals

and small groups. Historically it was invented by its users, as a huge

experiment in ongoing collaboration in an open, distributed, non-

hierarchical environment. It was an economy-free enclave based on non-

proprietary technology where advertisements were prohibited by the

Acceptable Use Policy and despised by its inhabitants.

Now, these Old Internet cultures are becoming marginal, while

infrastructure-building capital takes over. An economy of desire meets

money economy.

Technically the potentials for open information exchange and

debate, shared creation and decision making, for an equality of voices

are still there, but they will not manifest themselves automatically. Like

anywhere else we will have to fight for our right to be on the Net, and

to be there in a way we choose. Access for All is a grassroots movement

Page 16

for bottom-up infrastructure building — technically, politically, artisti-

cally, socially.

Q2: What are the concrete targets?

A2: 1.) an open, distributed, heterogenous, packet-switched, two-way,

many-to-many network in which everybody can write as well as read.

2.) ubiquitous, 24-hour, flat-rate access to the pipes at the fastest

available speeds and at rates affordable to all.

3.) free access to all public information (analogous to the public library

in the Gutenberg Age), freedom of speech and assembly, privacy and

anonymity.

— We want it all, and we want it now!

Q3: Why is it so important that everybody be on the Net?

A3: The Matrix is turning into an educational, economic, political, social

infrastructure; a communicational place where jobs are offered, civic

and citizens’ action is taken, kids do their class projects, government

information on equitable opportunity programs is published, and public

debate is conducted on just about anything somebody deems relevant.

In such a world, anybody who is not present on the Net will be seriously

disadvantaged.

In his keynote speech at the Telecom ‘95 in Geneva, Nelson

Mandela argued that if the right to communications is understood as a

basic human right, then the difference between the information saturated

countries and the information have-nots has to be abolished.

Human rights are not granted, but have to be fought for. Also at

Telecom ‘95, Peking correspondent Francis Deron pointed out how

access restrictions are turning the Internet in China into another tool of

the power elite. In capitalist countries, the danger is more one of

trivializing the Matrix into a medium for teleshopping and video-on-

demand.

Understood as a public sphere, the Matrix is not an issue of

industrial policy, but of democracy. Not everybody has to be on the Net,

but everybody, regardless of location, know-how, and income, has to

Page 17

have the opportunity to be there. We’re all stakeholders.

Q4: What’s the time frame?

A4: This new platform for social intercourse is still in the process of

formation. Within the next year or two many decisions will be taken that

set the technical, economic, political, legal constraints within which the

network cultures will grow. In order not to leave these decisions to

experts lobbied by commercial interests, alternative, critical, artistic

circles have to be made aware of these issues. Precondition for opinion-

forming and participation is access to the Net. Solutions will be

negotiated inside and around the Net. The most urgent issue today is to

get the widest possible manyfold of perspectives to participate in this

process, i.e. Access for All.

Q5: Microsoft, Burda, Time-Warner, German Telekom, and all these

other big companies also want access for all. What’s the difference?

A5: Those enterprises are, by nature, interested in their own and not in

public benefit. The conglomerates of telephone, cable, publishing,

broadcasting, entertainment, merchandising, and retail companies pro-

duce a particular vision of what the Net is, thereby marginalizing

alternative usages. Their idea is one of TV with a minimal back-channel

for polling and ordering.

“For example, executives from Time-Warner, Inc. are proudly

showing a video about the ‘Full Service Network’ currently being tested

in Orlando, Florida. The video shows happy suburban families using

their set-top boxes to play games, watch movies, browse electronic

magazines, and order pizzas and bedroom sets. This supposed ‘Full

Service Network’ does not provide e-mail, bulletin-boards, or person-to-

person communication of any kind.... without e-mail, discussion groups,

or a means of entering text, the Time-Warner ‘Full-Service Network’

can’t possibly support participatory democracy.... the dominant com-

ponent on the Information Highway will be a highly commercial, top-

down, ‘pay-per’ system for delivering infotainment to consumers, and,

of course, taking their product orders. Most people won’t even *know*

Page 18

about alternative components, e.g., civic networks operated by non-

profit organizations, much less subscribe to them.” [Jeff Johnson

(Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility)]

What the Fortune 500 want is a controllable, centrally planned and

operated, unified network. They want set-top boxes as terminals not

computers, closed front-end networks to the Internet (MSN, Europe

Online) not straight Internet access. (not decided yet: Springer)

In contrast, the Internet as it evolved so far is a patchwork of

heterogenous islands internetworked through the regional cooperation

of the various operators, all with their own plant structures, clientele,

funding, organization, philosophies, and cultures. Access for All builds

on this diversity.

Another essential criterion for an open network that connects us

rather than targeting us is that of “reciprocity of voices”: in whichever

format you can read information, you should also be able to create and

provide your own. Therefore, tendencies that increase the division

between professional information providers and a receive-only general

audience have to be counteracted.

One way to do this is to put as much effort into advancing tools for

social intercourse (newsgroups, mailing lists, IRC, MUDs) as we see

being put into tools for information navigation (ftp, Gopher, WAIS,

WWW). [Sproull & Faraj]

Access for All wants to do two things. First develop grassroots

efforts for access that demonstrate that we do not depend on corporate

offerings. And second, it wants to start a public debate about the

significance of the Matrix as a public sphere, and about counteracting,

e.g. by regulation, the additional empowerment of the corporations.

Q6: Are there already examples of Access for All?

A6: Yes, during the time when access to the Internet proper was still

largely reserved for the academic world, BBSs provided community

networking. Places like The WELL in San Francisco, the Cleveland

FreeNet, or Coara in a small town on Japan’s southern main island of

Kyushu grew into geographically and thematically focused digital public

spheres. They spawned similar networks in other cities, and were finally

Page 19

gatewayed to the Internet at large.

Today, even in the tightly regulated telecom landscape of Germany,

alternative access models are coming up. The rooms in some student

dormitories are connected to the university LAN directly. An apartment

block in the federal state of Turinga uses the existing CATV system to

run IP. The city council of Münster decided to bring the town online,

offering free dial-in points and terminals at cafes and libraries. A final

example is Prenzelnet. The name is derived from Prenzlauer Berg, the

squatters’, students’, and artists’ ward in Berlin. Here a house will be

wired with an Ethernet from the cafe on the ground floor up to the last

bathroom where people might want to read online magazines. It will be

a model house with a cheap and dirty, but scalable network that can be

expanded to the whole neighborhood. The main cost advantage of these

models lies in circumventing the monopoly-priced Telekom lines, in

doing local access not over phone lines but own lines. The other main

point of local initiatives taking networking in their own hands is that the

systems grow out of the needs of a community, not out of commercial

considerations.

Local online communities provide a sense of affiliation, a shared

history. They turn information into meaning by placing it into a social

context. They allow for face-to-face checks, local sharing of resources

(scanners, printers, CD-ROM burners), and encourage self-help. Local

islands serve as ideal community front-ends to the Matrix at large,

following the WELL’s motto “Think global, act local.”

Q7: If all these people come online, won’t the lines be overloaded?

A7: New technologies are becoming available for digital transmission

on any channel and any part of the electromagnetic spectrum. Even good

old copper wire, the most extensive existing network on the planet, can

now be turned into broadband infrastructure. Recently, there was a

report that 52Mbps communications will be possible using copper wire.

[GLOCOM] ATM over copper wires provides hundreds of leased-line

quality virtual channels.

Also current CATV, with minimal capital investment for changing

broadcast architectures into two-way systems, can be turned into a

Page 20

cheap, high-speed local loop. Continental Cablevision and PSI offer 24-

hour high-speed Internet access at $125/month. In Tokyo, three CATV

companies announced telephony inside their cable islands at a flat rate

of $20/month.

Once deregulation makes it possible, extensive optical fiber lines

installed for internal use by local administrations, by railway and

electricity companies and the like will become generally available.

A wide range of wireless technologies from packet radio to

microwave links, from infrared to laser are becoming technically

feasible. These are especially attractive where there is no wire plant in

place.

A more exotic technology is the modulation of electricity lines

(Baby Phone).

One does not have to be a utopian to envision a time when

bandwidth is abundant, and connectivity is ubiquitous and cheap, just

like electricity and water today.

Technically, there are no problems, only a wealth of solutions.

Q8: So the issue is first of all one of pricing and regulation, i.e.

telecommunications policy. What models are there?

A8: There is a range of models from grassroots cooperatives

(Prenzelnet), via funding by sponsorship and donations (dds), to

government subsidies (Münster), and regular for-profit companies (The

WELL).

Networks afford immense economies of scale. For example, in 1993

the NSF financed its backbone at $1 per user per year [MacKie-Mason

& Varian, 273]. On the local level, Harvard University with 12,000 users

pays $4 per user per year for its connectivity. [Kahin, 12] The same

advantage of large institutions can also be achieved by buyers coopera-

tives of individual users that purchase bulk connectivity at favorable

conditions (like Individual Networks).

Public ownership, subsidies, and tax incentives should be part of the

access structure, at the very least to assist disadvantaged sectors of the

population, providing access through institutions such as libraries,

schools, and town halls. In the U.S., the National Telecommunications

Page 21

and Information Infrastructure Assistance Program offered $64 million

in fiscal year 1995 in matching funds for projects in education, com-

munity networking, health care, and public libraries. [Kahin, 15] Some

U.S. states linked the deregulation of telecommunications to the

establishment of a universal service fund into which the commercial

service providers have to pay contributions. [Civille, 196]

Finally we could imagine a radical departure from the American

market model. Today, former telecommunications monopolies are faced

with two incongruous demands. On the one hand, they have to compete

in certain areas like any other profit-making corporation. On the other,

they are still legally obliged to provide universal service. The struggles

between the New Common Carriers (NCCs) and NTT in Japan, and the

German Telekom’s decision to raise local call rates are resulting from

this contradictory situation. The latter is, in fact, a way to have German

Telekom’s competitiveness subsidized by customers who were not asked

and do not have a choice.

An obvious solution would be to split the telco into a truly competi-

tive company and a nonprofit organization. The latter could be based on

a common pool of resources and funds. The former public telco brings

in its physical plant, the NCCs their backbones. Operating and invest-

ment funds would come from contributions of the value-added carriers,

the commercial content providers and network marketeers, and the

public hand. Mainly those who profit from the Net financially would

bear the cost. This could also be achieved by a tax on monetary

transactions over the Net. The pipes would be considered common good

and provided for free.

Economically, one could argue that as a precondition of any online

market, connectivity itself should be excluded from market forces.

Politically, one could draw an analogy to other common goods. In

order to vote, to go to school or a library, to go window shopping, or

meet friends at a public square I do not have to pay.

Socially, a truly universal, equal and equitable access for all

requires a national and international meta-structure that addresses the

disparity between metropolitan centers and rural areas, and between rich

and poor countries.

In an interpretation of Nelson Mandela’s right to communications,

Page 22

societies could proclaim a basic human right to be online.

Q9: Access to the pipes is great, but what good is it if all the useful stuff

I find there has a price tag attached? How about Access to Information?

A9: This is the crucial question to be addressed after access to the pipes.

An obvious model here is the public library. In the spirit of the Enlight-

enment, nations have taken the decision that all published information

should be accessible to everybody at no cost — a very radical decision

indeed. A debate should be started on how this value of access to

information translates into the Matrix.

Q10: What other problems are there to be solved?

A10: Lots. As a continuum from private sphere to public sphere, the

Matrix has a range of requirements from privacy, security, and anonym-

ity, to freedom of speech and — since the Matrix is a Third Place where

people can actually meet — also freedom of assembly. Related issues

concern censorship, access by minors, intellectual property rights, fair

use, and non-representational models of democratic decision making.

A current problem that we heard about from Marleen Sticker is the

attempt to hold access providers liable for the content of their customers.

The concept of “common carriage,” wherein transporters have no

control over — and no stake in — what is transmitted to whom is

endangered.

Answers to these questions will emerge from debates in the old

media, and through established societal channels like Non-Governmen-

tal Organizations (NGOs) lobbying activities (EFF). But the discussions

can only be substantial if they are based on first-hand experience, i.e. if

they are also led on the Net. Therefore the primary meta-goal is Access

for All.

Q11: Where does the Access for All movement start? What’s the

context?

A11: Access for All starts from existing crystallization points (dds, is,

Page 23

Prenzelnet, Zamir Network and Electronic Witches in former Yugosla-

via). By simply pooling these models, presenting them together, and for-

grounding Access for All, the issue will become visible for the first time.

The result could be a collection of pointers to Access for All

projects, of fact-sheets about the different approaches and technical

implementations, diary-style scenes from the local online cultures,

policy statements of these communities. Furthermore, forces can be

joined to help bootstrap other projects by sharing experiences, software,

know-how, and money (like the International City Federation).

Operating projects could adopt sister communities in other countries.

As a movement Access for All could be a contribution to the

Internet World Expo 1996, initiated by Carl Malamud after the example

of 19

century industrial world fairs. Among many fancy, advanced

projects showcased there, Access for All could be a bottom-up, trans-

European counterpoint.

Sources

GLOCOM, Information Technology and Communications Policy Forum of Japan,

Proposal on the Reform of the Information and Communications Industry,

http://ifrm.glocom.ac.jp/ipf/pr1/index.html

Jeff Johnson (Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility), “The Information

Hypeway: A Worst-Case Scenario”,

http://www.1010.org/Dynamo1010.cgi/LiveFrom1010/ team1/johnson.html

Prenzelnet,

http://fub46.zedat.fu-berlin.de/~huette/prenzelnet

Sproull & Faraj, in: Brian Kahin & James Keller (eds), Public Access to the Internet,

MIT Press 1995

MacKie-Mason & Varian, in Kahin, op.cit.

Kahin, in Kahin, op. cit.

Civille, in Kahin, op. cit.

Thanks to Sabine Helmers, Koji Ando, Ilona Marenbach, Frank Holzkamp,

Joachim Blank, Barbara Aselmeier.

Page 24

This FAQ also available at:

http://www.race.u-tokyo.ac.jp/RACE/TGM/tgm.html

[Editor’s Note: The above RFC on Access for All is a request for

comment. We welcome the article and felt it added a broad and helpful

perspective to the question of why universal access to the Net is such an

important social goal. However, previous issues of the Amateur

Computerist have documented the history of the origins and develop-

ment of the ARPAnet and the Internet. The past history demonstrates

that through government support for research into new technologies and

through government regulations like the Acceptable Use Policy (AUP)

that guided the development of the ARPAnet and Internet, there was the

needed support and direction for the technological development that

made the Net possible. In a similar way, Unix was developed at Bell

Labs as a research arm of the regulated AT&T. The RFC suggests that

deregulation will lead to the development of new technologies, while the

history of the development of the Net shows that enlightened regulation

is needed, not deregulation.]

The article “John Kemeny: BASIC and DTSS: Everyone a

Programmer” (Amateur Computerist Vol 5 no 1-2) was recently

reprinted in the book Computer Pioneers, edited by John A. N.

Lee and published by the IEEE Computer Society Press.

Page 25

Online Public Discussion

and the Future of Democracy

by Michael Hauben

hauben@columbia.edu

[Editor’s Note: The following article is also included in

Telecommunities ‘95 Conference Proceedings, Victoria, BC, August,

1995]

“What democracy requires is public debate, and not information. Of

course, it needs information, too, but the kind of information it needs can

be generated only by vigorous popular debate. We do not know what we

need to know until we ask the right questions, and we can identify the

right questions only by subjecting our own ideas about the world to the

test of public controversy.” — Christopher Lasch, “Journalism,

Publicity, and the Lost Art of Argument.”

“Throughout American history, the town meeting has been the

premier, and often the only, example of a direct democracy.... The issue

of whether the town meeting can be redesigned to empower ordinary

citizens, as it was intended to do, is of vital concern for the future.” —

Jeffrey B. Abramson, “Electronic Town Meetings: Proposals for

Democracy’s Future.”

Introduction

Democracy, or rule by the people, is by definition a popular form

of government. Writers throughout the ages have thought about

democracy, and understood the limitations imposed by various factors.

Today, computer communications networks, such as the Internet, are

technical innovations which make moving towards a true participatory

democracy more realistic.

James Mill, a political theorist from the early nineteenth century,

and the father of John Stuart Mill, wrote about democracy in his 1825

essay on “Government” for that years Supplement for the Encyclopedia

Britannica. Mill argues that democracy is the only governmental form

that is fair to the society as a whole. Although he does not trust

Page 26

representative government, he ends up advocating it. But he warns of its

dangers, “Whenever the powers of Government are placed in any hands

other than those of the community, whether those of one man, of a few,

or of several, those principles of human nature which imply that

Government is at all necessary, imply that those persons will make use

of them to defeat the very end for which Government exists.”

Democracy is a desirable form of government, but Mill found it to

be impossible to maintain. Mill lists two practical obstacles in his essay.

First, he finds it impossible for the whole people to assemble to perform

the duties of government. Citizens would have to leave their normal jobs

on a regular basis to help govern the community. Second, Mill argues

that an assembled body of differing interests would find it impossible to

come to any agreements. Mill speaks to this point in his essay, “In an

assembly, every thing must be done by speaking and assenting. But

where the assembly is numerous, so many persons desire to speak, and

feelings, by mutual inflammation, become so violent, that calm and

effectual deliberation is impossible.”

In lieu of participatory democracies, republics have arisen as the

actual form of government. Mill recognizes that an elected body of

representatives serves to facilitate the role of governing society in the

interests of the body politic. However, that representative body needs to

be overseen so as to not abuse its powers. Mill writes, “That whether

Government is entrusted to one or a few, they have not only motives

opposite to those ends, but motives which will carry them, if unchecked,

to inflict the greatest evils....”

A more recent scholar, the late Professor

Christopher Lasch of the University of Rochester, also had qualms with

representative government. In his essay, “Journalism, Publicity, and the

Lost Art of Argument,”

Lasch argued that any form of democracy

requires discourse and debate to function properly. His article is critical

of modern journalism failing in its role as a public forum to help raise

the needed questions of our society. Lasch recommended the recreation

of direct democracy when he wrote,

“Instead of dismissing direct democracy as irrelevant to modern

conditions, we need to recreate it on a large scale. And from this point

of view, the press serves as the equivalent of the town meeting.”

But the traditional town meeting had its limitations. Everyone

Page 27

should be allowed to speak, as long as they share a genuine common

interest in the well-being of the whole community, rather than in any

particular part. One scholar wrote that a “well-known study of a

surviving small Vermont town meeting traces the breaking apart of the

deliberative ideal once developers catering to tourism bought property

in a farming community; the farmers and developers had such opposed

interests about zoning ordinances that debate collapsed into angry

shouting matches.”

The twenty-six year development of the Internet (starting in 1969)

and the sixteen year development of Usenet (starting in 1979) is an

investment in a strong force toward making direct democracy a reality.

Mill’s observations of the obstacles preventing the implementation of

direct democracy have a chance of being overcome using these new

technologies. Online communication forums also make possible Lasch’s

desire to see the discussion necessary to identify today’s fundamental

questions. Mill could not foresee the successful assembly of the body

politic in person at one time. The Net

allows for a meeting which takes

place on each person’s own time, rather than all at one time. Usenet

newsgroups are discussion forums where questions are raised, and

people can leave comments when convenient, rather than at a particular

time and at a particular place. With computer discussion forums,

individuals can connect from their own computers, or from publicly

accessible computers across the nation to participate in a particular

debate. The discussion takes place in one concrete time and place, while

the discussants can be dispersed. Current Usenet newsgroups and

mailing lists prove that citizens can both do their daily jobs and

participate in discussions that interest them on their schedules.

Mill’s second observation was that people would not be able to

communicate peacefully after assembling. Online discussions do not

have the same characteristics as in-person meetings. As people connect

to the discussion forum when they wish, and when they have time, they

can be thoughtful in their responses to the discussion. In a traditional

meeting, participants have to think quickly to respond. In addition,

online discussions allow everyone to have a say, whereas finite length

meetings only allow a certain number of people to have their say. Online

meetings allow everyone to contribute their thoughts in a message,

Page 28

which is then accessible to whomever else is reading and participating

in the discussion.

These new communication technologies hold the potential for the

implementation of direct democracy in a country as long as the

necessary computer and communications infrastructure are installed.

Future advancement towards a more responsible government is possible

with these new technologies. While the future is discussed and planned

for, it will also be possible to use these technologies to assist in citizen

participation in government. Netizens

are watching various government

institutions on various newsgroups and mailing lists throughout the

global computer communications network. People’s thoughts about and

criticisms of their respective governments are being aired on the

currently uncensored networks.

These networks can revitalize the concept of a democratic “Town

Meeting” via online communication and discussion. Discussions involve

people interacting with others while voting only involves the isolated

thoughts of an individual on an issue, and then his or her acting on those

thoughts in a private vote. In society where people live together, it is

important for people to communicate with each other about their

situations to best understand the world from the broadest possible

viewpoint.

Public and open discussions and debates are grass-roots, bottom-up

situations which enable people to participate in democracy with

enthusiasm and interest more so than the current system of secret ballots

allows. Of course, at some point or other, votes might be taken, but only

after time has been given to air an issue in the commons.

The NTIA Virtual Conference

A recent example and prototype of this public and open discussion

was the Virtual Conference on Universal Service and Open Access to

the Telecommunications Network in late November 1994. The National

Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA)

, a branch

of the U.S. Department of Commerce sponsored this e-mail and news-

group conference and encouraged a few public access sites to allow

broad-based discussion. Several public libraries across the nation

provided the most visible public sites on the archives of the conference.

Page 29

This NTIA online conference is an example of an online “town meet-

ing.” This prototype of what the technology facilitates also demonstrated

some of the problems inherent in non-moderated computer communica-

tion. The NTIA conference was a new social form made possible by the

net and actually occurred as a prototype of one form of citizen online

discussion. It demonstrated an example of citizen-government interac-

tion through citizen debate over important public questions held in a

public forum with the support of public institutions. This is a viable

attempt to revitalize the democratic definition of government of and by

the people. This particular two-week forum displayed the following

points:

1) Public debate and its release of usually unheard voices.

2) A new form of politics involving the people in the real questions of

society.

3) The clarification of a public question in public.

4) The testing of new technological means to move society forward.

David J. Barram, the Deputy Secretary of the U.S. Department of

Commerce, closed the NTIA’s Virtual Conference on Universal and

Service and Open Access by stating the conference was: “...a tremen-

dous example of how our information infrastructure can allow greater

citizen participation in the development of government policies.”

To hear such a comment from a government representative is

important. Such a statement indicates that many users of the Net have

demonstrated to the U.S. Federal Government that they oppose the

recent conversion of the communications-based Internet into the

commerce-based National Information Infrastructure.

The goals of the two week conference, as stated in the Welcoming

Statement, also by David Barram, were as follows:

1) Garner opinions and views on universal telecommunications service

that may shape the legislative and regulatory debate.

2) Demonstrate how networking technology can broaden participation

in the development of government policies, specifically, universal

service telecommunications policy.

3) Illustrate the potential for using the NII to create an electronic

commons.

4) Create a network of individuals and institutions that will continue the

Page 30

dialog started by the conference, once the formal sponsorship is over.

The Welcoming Statement also highlighted the importance placed

in the active two-way process of communication by ending, “This

conference is an experiment in a new form of dialogue among citizens

and with their government. The conference is not a one-way, top down

approach, it is a conversation. It holds the promise of reworking the

compact between citizens and their government.”

Open discussion is powerful. Such exchange is much more

convincing then any propaganda. The forums on Availability and

Affordability and Redefining Universal Service and Open Access demon-

strated that the solution of the so-called “free market” is not a correct

solution for the problem of spreading network access to all. Voices

otherwise unheard sounded loud and clear; there is a strong need for

government to assure that online access is equally available to urban,

rural, disabled or poor citizens and to everyone else. The government

must step in to cover non-profitable situations that the so-called “free

market” would not touch. Non-governmental and non-profit organiza-

tions along with community representatives, college students, normal

everyday people and others made this clear in their contributions to the

discussion. The NTIA Virtual Conference was not advertised broadly

enough, but the organizers did establish 80 public access points across

the U.S. in places like public libraries and community centers. This

helped to include the opinions of people in the discussion who might not

have been heard otherwise.

Conclusion

That the NTIA conference was online meant that many more points

of view were heard than is normal. Prominent trade-off concerns were

that of so-called economic development versus universal service and

“free market” versus government regulation. Another issue which was

brought up was the importance of understanding that the NII will be an

extension of the Internet and not something completely new. As such,

it is important to acknowledge the origin and significance of the Internet,

and to properly study and understand the contribution the current global

computer communications network represents for society. The last

concern to point out was the hope that the government would be helpful

Page 31

to society at large in providing access to these networks to all who

would desire this access.

Despite the sentiments expressed during the NTIA conference in

November, the NSFnet (National Science Foundation Network) was put

to death quietly on May 1, 1995. Users heard about the shut down indi-

rectly. Universities and other providers who depended on the NSFnet

might have reported service disruptions the week or two before while

they re-established their network providers and routing tables. No larger

announcements were made about the transfer from a publicly subsidized

U.S. Internet backbone to a commercial backbone. The switch signaled

a change in priorities of what the Internet will be used for. May 1, 1995

was also the opening date of a national electronic open meeting

sponsored by the U.S. government on “People and their Governments in

the Information Age.” Apparently the U.S. government was sponsoring

this online meeting from various public access sites, and paying

commercial providers in the process. Something is deeply ironic in this

government-decided change to increase government expenses.

But also, on May 1, 1995, there was a presentation at a branch of the

New York Public Library which focused on the value of the Internet and

Usenet as a cooperative network where people could air their individual

voices and connect up with people around the world. The Internet and

Usenet have been networks where new voices were heard and the more

established voices of society would not be overwhelming. This May

First, traditionally a people’s holiday around the world, the domain of

the commons was sadly opened up to the commercial world. But the

commercial world already has a strong hold on all other broadcast

media, and these media have become of little or no value. The Internet

has been a social treasure for people in the U.S.A. and around the world.

It is important to value this treasure and protect it from commercial

interests. As such, this move by the U.S. government is disappointing,

especially considering the testimony presented by many Internet and

Usenet users who participated in the November 1994 NTIA Virtual

Conference on Universal Service and Open Access to the Telecommuni-

cations Network.

In order to make any socially useful policy concerning the National

Information Infrastructure (NII), it is necessary to bring the greatest

Page 32

possible number of people into the process of discussion and debate.

The NTIA online conference is a prototype of possible future online

meetings leading to direct democracy. There are several steps that need

to be taken for the online media to function for a direct democracy. First,

of all, it would be necessary to make access easily available, including

establishing permanent public Internet access computer locations

throughout the country along with local phone numbers to allow citizens

to connect their personal computers to the Net. Secondly, it is wrong to

encourage people to participate in online discussions about government,

and then ask them to pay for that participation. Rather, it would be

important to be able to figure out some system of paying people who

participate in their government. Payment for participation is not an easy

issue to decide, but it is a necessary step forward in order to facilitate

more participation by people.

The archives of the NTIA avail forum and the NTIA redefus forum

make for very important reading. It would be valuable if they were

available in print form and available to those involved with policy de-

cisions on the NII and for people around the U.S.A. and world who are

interested in the future of the Net. This virtual conference was an

important landmark in the study towards the development of the NII.

However, it should not only stand only as a landmark, rather it should

set a precedent for future conferences which could serve as the basis of

a new social contract between the American people and government.

References

1. Essays on Government, Jurisprudence, Liberty of the Press and Law of Nations,

reprint, Kelley Publishers, New York, 1986, p. 8.

2. ibid., p. 6.

3. ibid., p. 13.

4. “Journalism, Publicity, and the Lost Art of Argument,” Media Studies Journal, vol

9 no 1, Winter 1995, p. 81.

5. ibid., p. 89.

Page 33

6. Jeffrey B. Abramson’s “Electronic Town Meetings: Proposals for Democracy’s

Future,” prepared for the Aspen Institute Communications and Society Program.

7. The Net being: the Internet, Usenet news, Mailing Lists, etc.

8. Netizens are Net Citizens. See the URL:

http://www.columbia.edu/~hauben/text/WhatIsNetizen.html

9. The NTIA virtual conference was co-sponsored by the National Telecommunications

Information Administration (NTIA) and the Information Infrastructure Task Force

(IITF), as part of the Administration’s National Information Infrastructure initiative.

10. The NTIA Virtual Archives are available via the World Wide Web at:

http://ntiaunix2.ntia.doc.gov:70/11s/virtual

11. See the opening speech by C. P. Snow in Management and the Computer of the

Future, Martin Greenberger, MIT Press, 1962.

Bibliography

Abramson, Jeffrey B. “Electronic Town Meetings: Proposals for Democracy’s Future.”

Aspen Institute Communications and Society Program

Greenberger, Martin ed. Management and the Computer of the Future MIT Press.

Cambridge, MA, 1962.

Hauben, Michael and Ronda Hauben. “The Netizens and the Wonderful World of the

Net: On the History and the Impact of the Internet and Usenet News.” Unpublished

manuscript available via the World Wide Web at:

http://www.columbia.edu/~hauben/project_book.html

Kahin, B. “Commercialization of the Internet: Summary Report” Internet Request for

Comments 1192. November 1990.

Lasch, Christopher. “Journalism, Publicity, and the Lost Art of Argument.” Media

Studies Journal Winter 1995 Vol 9 No 1, p. 81.

Lasch, Christopher. The Revolt of the Elites and the Betrayal of Democracy. W. W.

Norton and Company, New York, 1995.

Mill, James. Essays on Government, Jurisprudence, Liberty of the Press and Law of

Nations. Augustus Kelley Publishers, NY, 1986.

Page 34

Proceedings of the NTIA Virtual Conference. Available via the World Wide Web at:

http://ntiaunix2.ntia.doc.gov:70/11s/virtual

Old Freedoms and New Technologies:

The Evolution of Community

Networking

by Jay Weston

jweston@ccs.carleton.ca

This paper, with only minor variations, was delivered as a talk at the

FREE SPEECH AND PRIVACY IN THE INFORMATION AGE

Symposium, University of Waterloo, Canada, November 26, 1994.

©Copyright: This text is released to the public domain. No copyright

restrictions apply. J. Weston

North American society has had a lot to say on the distributed

public media that we call the Internet, or simply the Net. And, in the past

year or so, we have started to have a lot to say about what we’ve been

saying. However, we haven’t quite heard what we’ve been saying. We

haven’t heard because we are inexperienced in listening to each other

this way. We are listening to the wrong things. Or, as Karl Popper once

put it, we have been “like my dog, staring at my finger when I point to

the door.”

But, we can be forgiven for our misplaced attention to the

Net.

Since it was first observed that there just was not enough available

bandwidth to let everybody send smoke signals or bang drums, we’ve

been organizing and reorganizing to determine who would, and who

would not, get their hands on the blankets and the drums — and the

presses, the microphones, and the cameras. As we moved through a few

millennia, successive public communication technologies either began

as, or very quickly were made to conform to, the extreme send: receive

imbalances that, somewhere along the line, we started calling the mass

Page 35

media, or simply the media.

It would be pedantic in the extreme to do more than note that these

access restrictions now define all of the social relations of modern

societies. Whole disciplines are organized around the understanding that

all public and private institutions, all local and external spaces are bent

by the constricted and compressed discourses of the mass media.

Whether the analyses are celebratory or critical, whether their mass

media interdependencies are made explicit or not, all analyses of modern

society take the access constraints of the mass media as immutable.

Public access to these media is simply not problematical. On the one

hand, there are the media and, on the other, there are their audiences,

consumers, constituents, and publics.

Until very recently, there was no reason to imagine that questions

would ever have to be asked about societies with abundant access to the

means of media production, exhibition, distribution, and reproduction of

cultural offerings. Suddenly, it is time to start imagining the questions.

That is what the Internet is about.

Some usually astute observers, among them Internet Society

President Vinton Cerf and Microsoft CEO Bill Gates, are predicting that

the twenty million now on the Net is only the beginning. Cerf predicts

100 million by 1998

and Gates, in a recent interview, confided that his

big mistake so far had been in underestimating the importance of the

Internet.

If they are right, if the hordes are going to start beating their

drums in public, absolutely everything about the existing social order is

about to be challenged. Not simply the mass media institutions, but all

institutions. Everything is at stake. [If they are wrong, if the Internet is

only the latest gizmology, then there is nothing to get intellectually

excited about. We’ve been there before. For, as exciting or as terrifying

as the prospect of a tiny 500 channel universe may be, it is just mass

media business as usual, albeit new and unusual business.]

Whether or not there will be 100 million or so people on the Internet

by 1998 or so, will depend first, upon whether they want to be there and

secondly, if they do, who will likely be trying to stop them, why will

they be trying to stop them, and how will they be trying to stop them.

As to the question of whether they will want to be, the Internet

growth figures are familiar to us all. Steeply up to the right and getting

Page 36

steeper. This should be more than enough evidence that, given a chance,

people are eager to be there. Curiously, this inconceivable growth has

occurred despite the equally familiar observations that the Internet is

difficult to access, hard to use, slow to respond and, what is mostly to be

found there is banal or otherwise offensive, and hopelessly disorganized.

This apparent contradiction of millions actively embracing

cyberjunk cannot be resolved within the vocabulary of the mass media

with their well-organized, familiar, marvelously honed content pack-

ages, that are so quickly and effortlessly available. Dismissive state-

ments about the potential of the Internet that are based on the quality and

delivery of content, cannot be resolved by debates about whether such

statements are accurate or inaccurate. For some, judging the Internet by

its content, the quality of its information, and the accuracy of its

databases, is relevant and for others it is not.

For those for whom it is not, the Internet is less about information

or content, and more about relations. For the mass media, it is always

just the opposite. The mass media are almost pure content, the relation-

ship a rigidly frozen non-transaction, that insulates the few content

producers or information providers from their audiences. This is how we

experience and understand the mass media. If it were not so, we would

not call them the mass media. Five hundred or 5,000 more un-switched,

asymmetrical, “smart” channels will not change that.

It is, on the other hand, impossible to understand much about the

Internet’s appeal by analyzing its content. The Internet is mostly about

people finding their voice, speaking for themselves in a public way, and

the content that carries this new relationship is of separate, even

secondary, importance. The Internet is about people saying “Here I am

and there you are.” Even the expression of disagreement and hostility,

the “flames” as they are called, at least says “You exist. I may disagree

with you, or even dislike you, but you do exist.” Mass media do not

confirm existence, and cannot. The market audience exists, but the

reader, listener or viewer does not.

This is not to argue that the content of the Internet is irrelevant. The

content defines the relationship. People not only want to represent

themselves, they ordinarily want to present themselves as well as they

can. It would be cynical in the extreme to devalue these representations,

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the texts, the exhibited cultural products of tens of millions. It is rather

to argue that the relational aspects of the transactions qualify and define

the content in ways that need to be understood if the Internet it to be

comprehended.

Whatever the reason for millions speaking publicly, this condition

was not part of the mass media problematic. It is unreasonable to think

that merely tinkering with paradigms grounded in technologies of

restricted access will permit a rich interrogation of the range of social

relations provided for by technologies of unrestricted access.

This call for a vocabulary that directly addresses the centrality of

distributed public media is not a suggestion that paradigms that centrally

situate mass media are somehow of less importance than they once were.

If anything, their questions of access, production and representation are

more critical, and even more challenging, than they were before

distributed media raised the complexity of social relations. However, an

expanded universe of mass media discourse that merely attempts to

overlay distributed public networks upon the structured relationships of

a mass mediated society, will lead us to misunderstand a society evolv-

ing with distributed public media.

It is well-understood that, all social institutions have their relative

certainties made possible by the centralizing power of the technologies

of mass communication. The relative certainties that accompany

attenuated access to the means of symbolic production is welded into the

fabric of all institutional policies and practices. Assuming, then, that

access to the means of cultural expression will be increasingly distri-

buted, it follows that all of the institutions of modern society will be

threatened or at least inconvenienced by this development. While

expressions like “public involvement,” and “participative democracy,”

are imbedded in our rhetorical traditions, their unquestionable accept-

ability has always been conditional upon their equally unquestionable

non-attainability. The technologies of mass communication always en-

sured that involvement and participation would not be overdone.

When the institutions that rose to power in the wake of the industrial

revolution began to speak of the “information revolution,” they only

meant to digitize the modern industrial state. This non-revolution was

Phase II of the old boys’ operation, another remodeling of the modern

Page 38

apparatus. The “Information Highway” is the updated codeword for the

modern retrofit. This was not supposed to be about a technological

adventure that would reconfigure social relations or blur the well-

constructed boundaries between the public and the private ground. This

was supposed to be about a five hundred, not a one hundred million

channel universe.

The becoming Internet, this decentered polity, is an accident that

happens to expand the locus of direct, self-mediated, daily political

involvement. Those who previously had to make themselves presentable

to the agencies of mass communication technologies in order to be

represented by the technologies, have begun to publicly represent

themselves. What was previously local, domestic, idiosyncratic and

private can, for the first time, become external and public. This is an

abrupt reversal of the mass media’s progressive appropriation of the

idiosyncratic and private for their own institutional purposes.

Since this reversal was unimaginable, no contingency plans had

been imagined for dealing with it. But, to the extent that the expansion

of the public ground challenges become identified for any segment of

the established order, these challenges will be met. It is axiomatic that

the Internet and, by extension, public community networks can expect

massive pressure to diminish or eliminate the identified destabalizing

influences that these distributed media exert. If the Internet, with its

changed relations of production and related exigencies, is signaling a

coming Accidental Revolution, the contests and the casualties will be

enormous.

This symposium is about the skirmishes, battles and wars that have

already started. All of these encounters are around the legitimacy of

public self-expression, assembly, examination and privacy. These are the

problematic of distributed public media, not of the mass media. Beyond

our noting that they were lamentably unimportant, the concerns relating

to freedom of speech were not central to a mass mediated society. Our

familiarity with freedom of speech was almost entirely abstracted from

the mass media accounts of their own experiences and the performances

of their own legal departments. The mass media tested the limits of those

freedoms for the speechless public.

We are now in the beginning stages of defining the legitimacy of

Page 39

self-expression for ourselves. This represents a new set of concerns

about the circumstance and substance of distributed media texts in all of

their modes, the bases upon how it comes to happen that people ‘speak’

publicly, and what it is that they ‘say.’ The idea of ‘assembly’ and how

it will happen that groups come to occupy territory and how they are

distributed globally and locally assumes original importance, as

decisions get made about what ‘virtual communities’ will be, and where

they will situate. The privacy puzzles about the availability and use of

all those sophisticated watching, listening, storing, sifting and intrusive

devices are a humbling reminder of just how much our reach has

exceeded our understanding of these technologies. How these matters

are resolved will shape the distributed media and decide their social

relevance.

Community networks are contributing a broader distribution of

voices as these puzzles begin to get worked out on the distributed media

themselves, rather than only in the exclusive enclaves of special

interests. This must continue and expand or the awakening of self-

representation will be short lived. It would be wise to assume that there

are not yet any ‘rights,’ or that the old freedoms that were often hard

won by the mass media, are now enshrined and will automatically

transfer to distributed public media.

Situating Community Networks

If, as Bruce Sterling observed in the Afterward to his earlier work

The Hacker Crackdown, “Three years in cyberspace is like thirty years

anyplace real”

and, as events from thirty years past are often dimmed

or forgotten, I hope you can forgive me for reminding you this morning

that way back in November, 1991 the Canadian public had no access to

the Internet. Moreover, there were no signs that the public would have

any access.

The steepness, even then, of that now overly familiar Internet

growth curve was entirely attributable to new users from within their

formal institutional settings. The universities, research institutes of the

telecommunication giants, and a few government departments had the

Internet as their private preserve and tightly controlled access to it, often

denying entry to even their own.

This control existed, even although the

Page 40

administration of these institutions were still marvelously unaware of

what was going on in their basements. Though unintentional, the

Internet was still a well-kept secret, its threat to the status quo still

largely unrecognized.

The commercial online services were busily avoiding the Internet,

still building the firewalls around their own proprietary networks. Their

fees were so high, and their services so meager, that they were providing

little incentive for the general public to even begin to experiment with

their narrow networking offerings.

The recurring telco dream of local metered service was a constant

reminder that the Canadian public might never experience the Internet.

Failure of poorly conceived commercial network services like Bell

Canada’s “Alex” and Australia Telecom’s “Discovery” had convinced

the telcos that not even the business community was ready for network

services.

The Canadian Network for the Advancement of Research, Industry

and Education (CANARIE), as its name implied, betrayed no awareness

that there might be people in this country. Even by the end of 1992 when

CANARIE released its business and marketing plans, the hundreds of

written pages devoted to its vision made almost no reference to the

Internet, and carefully avoided the ‘public’ as serious participants in

what the partners had in mind for the country.

These are but a few isolated examples of the evidence that the

Internet had either not yet penetrated the collective institutional

consciousness or was enjoying a brief period of benign neglect. For

those who had experienced the Internet and begun to internalize even a

small amount of what was happening, the general inattention seemed

amazing, even eerie.

One thing was very clear. With no public or private restrictive

policies in place, if there was ever a brief moment when it might be

possible to unleash the Internet in Canada, to really unconditionally

distribute this distributed capability to the Canadian public, it was 1991.

(The National Capital Free-Net and the Victoria Free-Net were not

actually unleashed until late 1992, but the idea was developing in the

autumn of 1991.)

The full stories of how the first Canadian community networks

Page 41

managed to uncage the Internet should probably be told some day. These

stories need to be told to fill in the historical record, and to preempt any

misconceptions that the development was simply blind luck or simply

technology running its inevitable course. For now, it is enough to say

that the Free-Net initiative in Canada was understood and intended from

the very beginning as political action. At least, it was in the instance of

the National Capital FreeNet, the community network where I live and,

about which I am best able to speak.

It was understood from the first, for instance, that the relatively

narrow and concrete act of having electronic mail and Usenet

newsgroups available, and at their real cost to the community, would

ensure widespread acceptance, and that the acceptance rate would be

stunning. It was also understood that once these were made freely

available, it would be difficult to take global electronic mail away, or to

introduce it at the leisurely rate and higher tariffs that are customary

with market driven services.

More importantly, it was understood that the inclusionary ideals and

vocabulary of the FreeNet would both protect and sustain the initiative

after the private sector realized that a public market for networked

services was being created for them.

The National Capital FreeNet was an imagined public space, a

dumb platform where all individuals, groups and organizations could

represent themselves, where conflict and controversy could occur as the

manifestation of conflict and controversy already occurring within the

community. As a public space, no one, and certainly no group or

institution, would be held responsible for another’s ideology, moral

standards, expectations or motivations. On the other hand, each person

or organization would be accountable for themselves. Such a space

could be constructed only by the community acting as a community, and

not by any public or private organization acting on behalf of the

community. At least that was the idea in 1991.

Just three years later, the Net situation has changed dramatically.

Although still unreasonably expensive, commercial Internet access is

fairly readily available, and very shortly community networks like the

National Capital FreeNet will not be needed, or even wanted, as Internet

access points. FreeNets will have to become the vital, local public spaces

Page 42

they originally promised to be.

Just calling the facility a community network does not make it one.

The label does not ensure an unconditional public terrain where the

whole community can celebrate its commonalities and diversities, and

work through its differences. In 1991, there was not much urgency to

focus on these ideals. Access to the existing and emerging Internet

services, and at no involuntary cost, was enough to ensure a community

network’s success. It was not then understood by the community

networks that this powerful Internet access lever would slip away so

quickly.

Community networks must now understand that they must be

community networks. This means that they cannot be financed or run for

the community by one or another institution. Although networks run by

such organizations as universities, hospitals, telephone companies, or

governments, often do not charge a fee, and always provide an array of

valuable services, these are not the criteria by which community network

can be usefully defined.

Community networks run by other organizations are always

conditionally invested with the values, missions, mandates, policies and

procedures and other constraints necessarily imposed by the host

institutions and, therefore, cannot ever provide a public terrain. No

institution has a primary mandate to provide a public space where public

opinion can be under construction. When freedom of expression is a

secondary add-on, it is just that, and will be encouraged only so long as

it is not in conflict with what the institution is primarily about.

Today’s youthful community networks, are better than they have

any right to be this soon and are still our best hope, maybe our only

hope, for a more participative, more self-representative democracy. It is

too bad that they will have to mature so quickly if they are to reach

adulthood. While they are still critical Internet access points, still the

bridge between the vast diversity of the Internet and the more homoge-

neous organic community, they must take that opportunity to learn how

to celebrate the vast diversity that is also the local community. The local

community is where people live their social and political lives and that

is where differences must be publicly worked through. This is most

important where the differences are the most acute and where the

Page 43

latitudes of tolerance are the narrowest. Community networks must be

up to letting everyone speak, as painful as this will be for some, some of

the time.

Children, and others unequipped to make safe judgments when

encountering the most extreme clashes of values, opinions and advo-

cacy, must be protected from these conflicts, but the community network

cannot be their guardian. The family, the school, the place of worship

and other societal structures are their guardians.

Finally, and most importantly, the part-time, short-term stewards of

the community networks, usually called the ‘board,’ must understand

that the public terrain is not their institution, and not their moral pre-

serve. The construction of Public Sphere, Inc. is a betrayal of the

promise community networks have for becoming a public terrain. As

community networks develop and mature, they are becoming more ex-

clusionary, more restrictive, more like any other organization. They

begin to see themselves as providing something for the community,

rather than as caretakers of a space created by the community. This

needs to be reversed. A commitment to defending and expanding this

public ground will determine whether community networks will survive

more than a few more years and, what is more, whether their survival

will be a matter of importance.

Endnotes

1. Popper made the statement at a public lecture at Michigan State University in the

mid-sixties. Ironically, he was arguing that the then popular social science translations

of the electrical engineering ‘information theory’ model were misguided attempts to

understand social communication by what he termed ‘bucket theories,’ where the

transactions are comprehended only as buckets of content, devoid of any human

consideration.

2. Written testimony to United States House of Representatives, Committee on Science,

Space and Technology, March 23, 1993. When asked what he thought about the

reliability of Cerf’s estimate of 100 million Internet users by 1998, Gerry Miller,

Chairman of CA*net, the non-profit company that manages and operates the Canadian

Internet backbone network, responded wryly “Try 100 million hosts.” While Miller

might not have meant that literally, it was clear that he felt Cerf’s earlier estimate to

Page 44

now be a significant underestimate of expected Internet growth. Private conversation,

Ottawa, November, 1994.

3. PC Magazine, “Bill Gates Ponders the Internet” by Michael Miller, October 11,

Volume 13, Number 17, 1994 p 79.

4. An explication of framing human communication as the inevitable interplay of

content and relational components of symbolic transaction was provided by Paul

Watzlawick, Janet Beavin and Don Jackson in Pragmatics Of Human Communication.

This 1967 monograph has attracted little attention from media scholars and other social

theorists, probably because the unidirectional producer/consumer relationship between

the mass media and their audiences is fixed, thereby eliminating or greatly inhibiting

the meta-communication interplay.

5. Bruce Sterling, “Afterwards: The Hacker Crackdown Three Years Later”, January

1, 1994. Found on the WELLgopher URL:

gopher://gopher.well.sf.ca.us:70/11/Publications/authors/ Sterling

6. For example, undergraduate students in most programs at most Canadian universities

could not get computer accounts in 1991. Also, many of the first cohort of National

Capital Free-Net subscribers were federal civil servants from departments and min-

istries where Internet access was available, but only to a selected few.

7. CANARIE Associates, “CANARIE Business Plan” and “CANARIE Marketing

Plan”, July 15, 1992.

8. The National Capital Freenet was inspired by the Cleveland Freenet, founded in 1986

by Tom Grundner at Case Western Reserve University. “Freenet” is a registered

servicemark of the National Public Telecomputing Network.

Page 45

Forming the Usenet Online

Community

by Ronda Hauben

au329@cleveland.freenet.edu

[Editor’s Note: The following article is based on a talk presented at the

Mid-Manhattan Branch of the New York Public Library, December 11,

1995.]

In order to figure out how and why to form community networks

which will make Usenet discussion groups and e-mail available to all in

a community or city, it is helpful to be familiar with the experiences and

principles that gave birth to the early online Usenet community. Many

people online have found Usenet to be an important new communica-

tions medium which is helping people to change their lives in surprising

and important ways. As a result, many of those online feel it worthwhile

to contribute to the development of Usenet so that it will grow and

flourish. They identify as Net citizens, or Netizens in a way similar to

how people in the past have identified as citizens of a particular nation.

Today, however, there are still many people who do not know what

this valuable online experience is, either because they don’t have

computers or modems or because they can’t afford the hourly or

monthly charges of commercial service providers and they aren’t

connected at a university, community, or work site. Also there are many

online who know very little about the early days of the Net and how the

principles then established have helped set a firm foundation for Usenet

and the Internet to develop.

Writing in 1990, Lauren Weinstein, one of the pioneers of the

Usenet online community, observed: “Without a historical perspective,

it’s quite easy to get the wrong impression of how all this came to pass.

It is the result of the work of a large number of individuals, some of

whom have been at it for the past 20 years.”

Lauren is describing the hard work and daily efforts made by large

numbers of online pioneers who have given the world the ever growing

set of online discussion newsgroups which make up Usenet.

Page 46

Usenet was born in 1979. It has grown from a design conceived of

by two graduate students, Tom Truscott and James Ellis, into a network

that today links millions of people and computers to over 14,000

different newsgroups and millions of bytes of articles available at any

given time at an ever growing number of sites around the world.

In reading through posts from the early days of Usenet, one sees

that one of the defining characteristics of Usenet is that the early online

pioneers were willing and eager to discuss a broad ranging set of topics.

In one of the posts appearing on Usenet during this early period, the

writer explained: “The net represents a wide spectrum of interest

(everything from the latest kill-the-millions-hardware to the latest Sci-Fi

movies). All these people seem to have one thing in common,” he

continued, “— the willingness to discuss any idea, whether it is related

to war, peace, politics, science, technology, philosophy (ethics!), science

fiction, literature, etc. While there is a lot of flame [which then meant

impassioned disagreements –ed] the discussion usually consists of well

thought out replies to meaningful questions.” And he gave examples

such as “Should the Postal Service be allowed to control electronic

mail?....”

But he added, “I am told that a lot of traffic on the net is not

discussion, but real honest-to-goodness work ([writing computer] code,

applications, ideas, and such.)”

He also noted the broad range of sites on Usenet, “The participants

of the net,” he wrote, “include major (and not so major) universities,

corporations, think tanks, research centers, and the like.”

By 1982, those on Usenet were mainly at sites using the Unix

operating system. However, there were also connections to sites that

were on the ARPAnet, which was the research network for those with

U.S. Department of Defense contracts. A March 1982 Usenet post

explains: “Usenet is an international network of Unix sites with hookups

into the ARPA network, too. It is basically a fancy electronic Bulletin

Board System. Numerous BTL [Bell Telephone Labs] machines are

connected.... In addition, there are major sites at universities: University

of California at Berkeley, Duke, U Waterloo, and so on (...). And at

industry nationwide: DEC, Tektronics, Microsoft, Intel, etc. There are

numerous bulletin board categories, set up in a hierarchy.”

Page 47

The article describes how the newsgroups on Usenet “can reach a

very large user community....”

For example, there was discussion on early Usenet about the

implications of world-wide ubiquitous networking. This network of the

future was referred to as World-Net. The discussion was on the Usenet

newsgroup known as Human-Nets. One of the pioneers of Usenet, Tom

Truscott, writes that the discussion on Human-Nets “was...very

interesting... and possible only due to the ability of the network itself to

permit those interested in this obscure topic to communicate.”

A description of Human-Nets, during this period, notes that it “has

discussed many topics, all of them related in some way to the theme of

a world-wide computer and communications network usually called

World-Net. The topics have ranged very widely from something like

tutorials, to state of the art discussions, to rampant speculations about

technology and its impact.”

Mark Horton, a Usenet pioneer from the University of California at

Berkeley and later Bell Labs, who played an important role in the

development of Usenet, explained in a 1981 post that Usenet was a

network of sites running the Usenet software known as Netnews: “For

those of you who don’t know, Usenet is a logical network of sites

running Netnews. Netnews is a network oriented bulletin board, making

it very easy to broadcast a query to a large base of people. Usenet

currently has about 50 sites and is growing rapidly.”

Horton emphasized that Usenet is a users’ network. He explained:

“Usenet, exists for and by the users, and should respond to the needs of

those users.”

He also noted that in these early days “Usenet is a cashless net-

work.” This meant that “No person or organization may charge another

organization for news, except that by prearrangement.” He explained

that a site could charge only for the extra expenses incurred in sending

Usenet to another site. And almost every site that received news had to

be willing to forward it to at least two additional sites.

Horton’s description included the mechanism for maintaining a set

of standards for Usenet and for dealing with those who violated these

standards. Horton wrote that articles should be of high quality, signed,

and that offensive articles shouldn’t be posted. “Peer pressure,” he

Page 48

proposed, “via direct electronic mail will, hopefully, prevent any further

distasteful or offensive articles. Repeated violations,” he noted, “can be

grounds for removing a user or site from the network.”

Common to many of the posts in these early years, is the encourage-

ment that users participate and voice their concerns and opinions, both

in the ongoing discussion in various newsgroups, as well as in determ-

ining the practices and policies guiding how Usenet functions. For

example, Adam Buchsbaum, a high school student who played an

important role in early Usenet, started the NET.columbia newsgroup, a

newsgroup about space issues. He posted the following opening message

inviting participation: “Greetings fellow space enthusiasts! This

newsgroup was designed to inform people on developments in our space

program. Although named ‘columbia,’ it will contain articles about the

entire space program, including the shuttle for which it is named. Please

feel free to reply, comment, criticize, and submit your articles. Also, I

hope this will serve as an open ground for discussion about events in the

space program. Comments, etc. can be mailed to myself (...) or

submitted directly into the newsgroup. In all, I hope that this will

provide an atmosphere for people who are interested in the space

program to discuss it and be informed of new events.”

Such articles on Usenet, welcoming contributions from all partici-

pants, helped to set a firm foundation for interesting and lively discus-

sion.

Usenet pioneers describe how even though Usenet was a good place

for a user who wanted to sell a used car, commercial advertising was

greatly frowned upon. The story is told about how a certain AT&T site

played a large role in helping to transport Usenet and e-mail, but after

a supervisor at AT&T discovered that a commercial vendor was using

the AT&T site to help him get e-mail to support his commercial product,

the AT&T site was no longer allowed to play the same role. Since the

contributions to Usenet were voluntary, and often contributed by the

users, commercial use of Usenet was strictly limited. Also, during a

more recent period much of Usenet was transported over the National

Science Foundation (NSF) backbone of the Internet. The U.S. govern-

ment had an Acceptable Use Policy which forbid for profit activity for

projects funded by or making use of NSF funding. This helped to limit

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commercial abuse on Usenet until the NSF recently turned the NSF

backbone of the Internet over to private entities.

From the time I got access to Usenet in January 1992 via the

Cleveland Freenet, I have found that there continue to be serious

discussions on Usenet though they are less concentrated today than in

the early years of Usenet. Also, I found that it was possible to get help

with real problems like medical problems as at the St. Silicon Sports

Medicine Clinic on Cleveland Freenet, or with problems dealing with

workman’s compensation or tenant rights or consumer problems and

similar issues via the discussions that occur in relevant newsgroups on

Usenet. Helpful comments and perspective have been provided locally

from users in response to posts on local newsgroups like nyc.general,

or from users around the U.S., as in responses to posts on

soc.culture.usa, or from users on other continents like Australia or Asia

as in posts on sci.econ, alt.amate ur-comp, soc.culture.japan,

soc.culture.german, etc.

Also, posts on Usenet asking for help with computer problems to

newsgroups like comp.misc or comp.os.linux.hardware or for advice

about what computers people found reliable when planning on getting

a new laptop as on comp.laptops have gotten helpful responses that it

would be difficult to get elsewhere.

But just as in the early days of Usenet, today there are serious

problems being discussed online. The U.S. government has promoted

commercial use of the Internet and Usenet rather than supporting a

system of Freenets or community networks with acceptable use polices

around the U.S. The result is that there are ads and other junk posts

flowing across Usenet, and users are too often getting junk mail from

vendors, instead of helpful comments from other users. But the prin-

ciples that were established while Usenet was first developed are

proving helpful again today. People online have been discussing their

different views of the causes of the problems and in the process working

together to find ways to tackle these problems. There is a common desire

among many that Usenet continue to be a valuable communications

medium for an ever growing number of people. Since Usenet was

created as a user’s network for discussion and communication, many

people participate because they like to discuss issues and to read what

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others contribute. But even more importantly, many users have found

that when they have a problem, they can post it and get help from others.

In return they provide help whenever they can. In the process, all benefit

from the cooperative online community that Usenet has made possible.

This kind of discussion and cooperative effort is needed today by

people who are not yet online as well as those who are online to deal

with the hard problems of our times. That is why it is important that all

have access to the global computer network that the pioneers of Usenet

created which makes it possible to communicate with people around the

world and so get a refreshing and helpful perspective from others.

Community networks which make free access to Usenet and e-mail

available to the folks of a community, town or city, are needed today

more than ever. And the lessons and principles of the pioneers of Usenet

and of the Netizens from around the world who have found that the

communication that Usenet makes possible is crucial to their lives will

hopefully provide the needed foundation to solve the problems to create

free community networks in those areas that don’t yet have them in the

near future.

Notes:

1. NET.news, wolfvax.53, net.news, wolfvax!jcz, Mon Nov 2 21:47:32 1981, Net

Names, In Real Life: Carl Zeigler, Location NCSU, Raleigh.

2. ucbarpa.1182, net.sources, Subject: ARPAVAX: Usenet, Tue, Apr 20, 19:50:48

1982, misc/newsinfo, from eiss!ladm, Fri Mar 19 16:20:27.

3. Mark Horton, fa.unix-wizards, ucbvax.4080, Sun Sep 27 22:04:41 1981, Usenet

membership.

4. NET.news, cbosgd.794, Wed Dec 23 21:28:32 1981, Subject: Proposed Usenet

policies.

5. net.columbia, research!sjb, Thu Sep 17 07:28:50 1981. Adam Buchsbaum also kept

the official list of newsgroups and published it regularly to the Net for several years in

the mid 1980s.

Page 51

A Brief History of

Cleveland Freenet

by Jay Hauben

jrh29@columbia.edu

[Editor’s Note: The following article is taken from a talk presented at the

Mid-Manhattan Branch of the New York Public Library, July 10, 1995.]

The Cleveland Freenet computer networking system is often cited

as the grandfather of the worldwide community computer networking

movement. This movement takes as its goal the provision by community

networks of free or at-cost dial-up and public terminal access to

community and world wide communication. Cleveland Freenet and

other community networks are made possible by volunteers from all

sectors of the community. In 1992, Cleveland FreeNet had well over

40,000 registered users making more than 10,000 accesses per day. Over

250 volunteer system operators maintained and upgraded the system and

kept the information fresh or got answers to questions posted by users.

This model is proving attractive to citizens around the world. It is worth

looking at how the first Freenet got started in Cleveland.

Cleveland Freenet traces its origin to 1984 when an education

professor, Tom Grundner, was involved in monitoring the quality of

education offered to medical students and interns who were spread over

five Cleveland hospitals and clinics. He devised a system that used an

Apple II+ computer and a 300 baud modem to receive questions over

phone lines from the medical students and interns who had access to a

microcomputer or a computer terminal with a modem. The questioners

were provided within a reasonable time, with answers from relevant

doctors. The system was eventually called Doc-in-the-Box. Within a

week of starting up the system, the telephone number to reach the central

Apple II+ computer had gotten out and lay people started to leave

medical questions with the hope the doctors would answer them also.

The doctors answered all questions. What was in many cases quality

medical advice was available to some who ordinarily might not have

been able to afford the usual fee or find a doctor for such advice. It

Page 52

dawned on those involved that a new medium for dispensing medical

information was opening up.

In 1985 Grundner expanded this system which was intended

especially for medical students and interns to a new system open to all

who had a medical question and a computer and modem. He called the

new system Saint Silicon’s Hospital and Information Dispensary. Saint

Silicon operated in some ways like a real hospital. When you used your

modem to dial up, the first question on the screen was, “Have you been

a patient here before?” If you answered No, the next screen had the title,

“Admitting Desk” and required you to provide some information about

yourself. Then you could post medically related questions in the

message area of the system called the Clinic to be answered by a doctor

within 24 hours. A doctor would read the question and post the question

and his answer on the system so all who dialed in to Saint Silicon could

read them. Within a few weeks of the launch of Saint Silicon, a steady

average of more than 300 calls were being received per week, saturating

the one line system.

Grundner wrote up the Saint Silicon experience in an article for the

New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM).* At about the same time,

representatives of American Telephone and Telegraph (AT&T) offered

to donate an AT&T 3B2-400 Unix based minicomputer to support the

operation and expansion of Grundner’s experimental system. Unix is a

multitasking, time-sharing computer operating system and the AT&T

3B2-400 was a much more powerful computer then the Apple II+. With

the better equipment, Grundner designed a system based on the net-

working software used to make the newsgroup system know as Usenet

possible. The new system was intended for the posting of questions and

answers across the whole spectrum of areas that make up a community.

Grundner envisioned an electronic city with a post office, government

house, library, court house for legal questions, etc., in addition to a

hospital. Eventually the system would also have hobbyist areas, special

interest areas, and kiosks and coffee shops for people to meet at and

have discussions. This was Freenet 1, the first version of Cleveland

Freenet (1985-1989). The sections of Freenet were staffed by doctors,

lawyers, hobbyists, etc., each contributing as part of his or her job or

voluntarily. People who dialed into Cleveland FreeNet were never

Page 53

charged to use the system nor did those who provided information or

their expertise get paid by the Freenet.

The museums and parks and theaters and clubs of Cleveland

voluntarily provided the information about themselves and some staff

time and in exchange that information was readily accessible by the

users of the Freenet. Doctors, lawyers, car mechanics, etc. volunteered

in large numbers. One incentive being that Freenet users satisfied with

the online answers to relevant questions often became paying clients and

customers. Someone I know is no longer on crutches because a doctor

who showed a genuine understanding of her condition by his response

to her post on Cleveland Freenet was chosen by her to do an operation.

The success of that operation solved a condition doctors in her own state

said was permanent.

In 1989, Case Western Reserve University became the dominant

sponsor of Cleveland Freenet. It supported development of the software

and eventually took over the system, now Freenet 2, the Cleveland

Freenet that exists today. This Freenet includes many areas of active

discussion, some for senior citizens, some for teenagers, some for any

group with a common interest. Also, by giving its users access to Usenet

newsgroups, Freenet makes it possible for people in Cleveland to be

communicating and interacting with Usenet users all over the world.

Cleveland Freenet serves as a means of limited free Internet access for

its users who each get a sizable electronic mail storage area, limited file

handling and transfer capability, and connectivity to other Freenets in

the U. S. and around the world. For many people, Cleveland Freenet has

served as the starting point for their online activities. And as an example

Cleveland Freenet has given impetus to a global community computer

networking movement. By 1995 there were at least 150 similar

community networking systems up or soon to be up around the world

and many more in some stage of planning. There are organizing com-

mittees in at least 40 U.S. States, all across Canada and in 10 or more

other countries.

Some of the guiding vision behind the community networking

movement is that every community will benefit if all the citizens of that

community have free access to global communication technology and

to information about community resources. If access has to be paid for

Page 54

by the users, some segment of the community will be left out both from

use of the resources but also as a resource. For many community

networks the name Freenet conveys their principle that access has to be

free of cost to the user. Some communities like Seattle, Washington

provide terminals or computers in public libraries to fulfill this require-

ment. In most communities where community networks are being

organized there is however opposition from some who want to charge

for access. Also, there are expenses involved for the equipment and

especially for leasing phone lines even if all the staffing and admin-

istration is done by volunteers. A widely verified assessment is that in

North America the line leasing expense amounts to about $8 to $12 per

user per year (roughly $1.00 per user per month). The challenge to each

organizing or operating committee is to solve these and similar

problems. Even Cleveland Freenet is currently facing the problem that

Case Western Reserve University may withdraw some of the $50,000

annual budget that has been its sponsorship contribution in the last few

years.

There are many active community oriented people and some

government bodies throughout the world who see some level of

community provided access to community based computer network

information and communication as crucial to modern life. There are

people in many cities and rural areas who are looking to a community

network or Freenet as a first step into the telecommunications revolu-

tion. Cleveland Freenet has been an inspiration to many such people.

*“Interactive Medical Telecomputing: An Alternative Approach to Community Health

Education,” NEJM, Vol 314 no 15, April 10, 1986, pp. 982-985.

Note: The sources of information for this article were help from some people on

Cleveland Freenet (telnet free-net-in-a.cwru.edu), an e-mail correspondence from Tom

Grundner, the NEJM article, and a chapter in The On-Line User’s Encyclopedia:

Bulletin Boards and Beyond, by Bernard Adoba, Addison-Wesley, Reading, MA.,

1993.

[Author’s Note: In late 1995 it was reported that Tom Grundner

resigned as Director of the National Public Telecommunications

Network. Subsequently, it was reported that the Deputy Director also

Page 55

resigned. The NPTN had been formed by Grundner in September 1989

to coordinate the activities of the Freenets that formed on the model of

Cleveland Freenet.

On the mailing list serving members of the NPTN affiliated

Freenets, questions were raised as to what was happening. The new

leadership responded that it will take a little while to put the finances

back in order and would not answer the questions until then. Many

subscribers to the list were not satisfied and requested a national meeting

to discuss the crisis, assess the situation and propose ways forward.

When the new leadership turned down that proposal, there were sub-

missions to the list documenting a long history of top down unhelpful

NPTN practices and the lack of democratic forms within NPTN to deal

with the crisis. In a similar way, the recently formed NPTN affiliated

New York City Freenet Organizing Committee has held no public

meetings nor shared with those interested any of its inner workings or

documents.]

Universal Access to E-Mail

Benton Foundation

benton@benton.org

[Editor’s Note: We are reprinting the following announcement from an

e-mail message on an Internet mailing list]

On November 21, 1995, RAND, a nonprofit policy research and

analysis organization, released a report called Universal Access to E-

Mail: Feasibility and Societal Implications. The report includes the

following policy recommendations:

* that the United States address the ever-widening gaps in access to

e-mail.

* that we develop simple means to provide e-mail to every citizen.

* that we create incentives to develop multiple access points (home,

work, schools, kiosks) to e-mail.

Page 56

* that we support development of noncommercial activities via e-

mail and the Internet (i.e. civic participation).

* that we emphasize two-way communication on the National

Information Infrastructure as a hook for increasing democratic participa-

tion and increased use of all Internet services.

The report concludes that this goal is both reachable and vital for

increased democratic participation and economic development. The

report is available from the National Book Network (800.462.6420) —

use reference number MR-650-MF.

The book is also available from:

RAND Distribution Services

PO Box 2138

Santa Monica, CA 90407-2138

(310)451-7002, (fax (310)451-6915)

E-mail: order@rand.org

World Wide Web: http://www.rand.org

[Editor’s Comment: The RAND Report, funded by a grant from the

Markle Foundation, described many of the benefits that would result

from all in the U.S. having access to e-mail. It recognizes that “market”

forces in the U.S. are not able to provide for ubiquitous e-mail. It

concludes that there needs to be government intervention for ubiquitous

e-mail to become reality soon.

The RAND Report on the need for universal access to e-mail is one

of the first signs in U.S. policy circles that there is a need for public

policy provisions to provide for universal access to the Internet.

However, the RAND Report fails to acknowledge the importance of

Usenet newsgroups or the potential they hold for making more demo-

cratic participation in civic life possible for those who gain access to the

Internet and Usenet. Also, the Report is practically silent on the

development of the Freenet movement in North America and around the

world. It chooses instead to look at several particular examples of

networks that charge for access, like the Blacksburg Electronic Village,

in Virginia, Playing to Win in New York City, and LatinoNet. The

relatively recently created Seattle Community Net based its development

on the Free-Net model but the RAND Report ignores the longer standing

Page 57

and important Freenets such as the Cleveland Freenet. Also, some of the

examples mentioned in the Report like the Public Electronic Network

(PEN), in Santa Monica, CA, do not offer access to the Internet, but only

to local public discussions about local issues.

The recommendations provided by the RAND Report to implement

its policy proposals are disappointing. Instead of supporting the

volunteer organizations which have worked so hard to create the Free-

Nets across the U.S., or the academic institutions like Case Western

University in Cleveland, which have reached out to the surrounding

community and supported Freenets like the Cleveland Freenet, the

RAND Report recommends subsidizing for-profit service providers to

provide accounts for those who can’t afford Internet Access. It projects

paying a public subsidy to these service providers of one billion dollars

a year to make such access possible.

The Report appeared one year after the NTIA online meeting [See

next article –ed] where people around the U.S. and abroad discussed and

supported the need for online access to Usenet and e-mail for all. Many

participants in this online meeting urged government action to make

online access possible. Surprisingly, the RAND researchers do not make

any references to this online public policy meeting. It is hard to

understand how these researchers cannot be aware of this important

prototype online hearing and of the sentiments that were expressed there

on the future of the Net.

Despite such weaknesses in the RAND Report, it is good that there

is some effort toward examining why and how to make online access

available to all in the U.S. However, it is also necessary that such policy

discussion include an examination of how the Internet and Usenet were

developed and encouraged, and how the Freenet movement built on

these origins. It would be good to see further studies and public

discussion of this important issue.]

Page 58

An Online Prototype for

Policy Decisions

by Ronda Hauben

au329@cleveland.freenet.edu

[Editor’s Note: The following article, with small changes, was delivered

as a talk at the Telecommunities ‘95 Conference, Victoria, BC, August,

1995.]

PART I

In spring, 1995, a special issue of Scientific American appeared,

exploring the advance that the computer and communications revolution

is having for our times.

In the introduction to the issue was a cartoon.

The cartoon shows several paleontologists on the trail of a major new

discovery. The caption reads: “Well, I don’t see any point in looking any

further. It was probably just one of those wild rumors.” They are about

to turn back as they feel they aren’t finding what they are looking for.

The cartoon shows they are standing in the midst of a huge footprint.

However, because it is so large, they don’t see it.

This cartoon is a helpful analogy to our situation today. There have

been very significant computer networking developments in the past 30

years, but these advances are so grand that it is easy to miss them, and

to begin to turn back, just like the paleontologists. It is important to

understand what these advances are, so we can recognize them, and

learn in what direction the footprints point, rather than turning back.

Today we are at a turning point in terms of what the future direction

of the Global Computer Network will be. Changes are being made in

U.S. policy and in the policy of countries around the world regarding the

Net and Net access and thus there are important issues being raised

about what the new policy will and should be.

In response to criticisms in the U.S. that the online community was

not being involved enough in the setting of the new policy, an online

conference was held November 14-23, 1994, by the U.S. National

Telecommunications Information Administration — the NTIA. The

NTIA virtual conference was co-sponsored by the National Telecommu-

Page 59

nications Information Administration and the Information Infrastructure

Task Force (IITF), as part of the U. S. government’s National Infor-

mation Infrastructure Initiative. The conference gave people both in the

U.S. and around the world a chance to discuss their concerns about

government policy on expanding access to the Net.

People needed a computer to take part or could participate at a

limited number of public access sites that were set up around the U.S. in

public libraries and other public places. The online conference was

available via a mailing list, where all the posts were sent to the sub-

scriber’s e-mail mailbox, or as a Usenet newsgroup on a limited number

of sites. Also a World Wide Web site was set up so one could read the

posts, without being able to participate. There were several conferences

on different topics, two of which discussed increasing access to the Net

to a broader sector of the U.S. population.*

One paper posted to the online conferences described the social and

technical advance that the Global Computer Communications Network

makes possible. The author of the paper wrote: “Welcome to the 21

century. You are a Netizen, or a Net Citizen, and you exist as a citizen

of the world thanks to the global connectivity that the Net makes

possible. You consider everyone as your compatriot. You physically live

in one country but you are in contact with much of the world via the

global computer network.”

“The situation I describe is only a prediction of the future, but a

large part of the necessary infrastructure currently exists.... Every day

more computers attach to the existing network and every new computer

adds to the user base — at least twenty five million people are intercon-

nected today....”

“We are seeing a revitalization of society. The frameworks are

being redesigned from the bottom up. A new more democratic world is

becoming possible.”

This paper was one of the many contributions in response to the

NTIA statement welcoming participants to the online conference. The

NTIA listed several purposes for the conference. Among those purposes

were:

“1) Garner opinions and views on universal telecommunications

service that may shape the legislative and regulatory debate.

Page 60

2) Demonstrate how networking technology can broaden participa-

tion in the development of government policies, specifically, universal

service telecommunications policy.

3) Illustrate the potential for using the NII to create an electronic

commons.

4) Create a network of individuals and institutions that will continue

the dialog started by the conference, once the formal sponsorship is

over.”

“This conference,” the NTIA explained, “is an experiment in a new

form of dialog among citizens and with their government. The confer-

ence is not a one-way, top down approach, it is a conversation. It holds

the promise of reworking the compact between citizens and their

government.”

What was the response to the call? In the process of the week long

discussions a number of voices complained about the commercial

entities that were slated to take over the U.S. portion of the backbone of

the Internet. Many expressed concern that government intervention was

needed to make access to the Net broadly available in the U.S. They

gave experiences and examples to demonstrate that leaving the problem

of expanded access to commercial entities would not solve the problems

that expanded access required be solved.

For example, one participant wrote: “I want to add my voice to

those favoring greater, not less, government intervention... to protect the

interest of the people against the narrow sectarian interests of large

telecommunications industries. Why the federal government gave up its

part ownership in the Internet backbone is a mystery to me. An active

interventionist government is essential to assure universal access at

affordable prices (for)... people living in (the) heart of cities or in the

Upper Peninsula of Michigan.”

A number of people from rural and remote areas participated and

explained their concern that they not be left out of the online future

because connecting them to the Net would not be profitable.

In response to a post from someone in Oregon, a librarian from a

remote area of Michigan wrote: “I’d like to hear more from the Oregon

edge of the world. Being from a small, rural library in the Upper Penin-

sula of Michigan, with a very small tax base...faced with geographical

Page 61

isolation and no clout...how do we get our voices heard and assure our

patrons equal and universal access to these new and wonderful ser-

vices... we have no local nodes... every hook up is a long distance call.

What are you doing over there?”

A participant working with a scientific foundation echoed this

concern. He wrote: “When faced with the resources and persuasive

power (legal and otherwise) of enormous multinational corporations

with annual incomes that are orders of magnitude greater than some of

the territories they serve, only a capable and committed national

guarantee of access, and a national cost pool can provide access to these

new technology resources.”

“And THE INTERNET IS SPECIALLY IMPORTANT to areas

with limited access to technical and scientific resources. As one of the

leading non-profit educational foundations devoted to the environmental

problems of small tropical islands, we (Islands Resources Foundation)

are amazed at the richness of the Internet resource, and terribly

concerned that our constituents throughout all of the world’s oceans are

going to (be) closed off from access to this resource because of

monopoly pricing policies.” (To the NTIA, he urged, “we ask careful

attention to the equity issues of access, and a federal guarantee of access

and availability.”)

Recognizing that people without computers or net access wouldn’t

be able to participate in this conference because they didn’t have

computers and modems already available, a limited number of public

access sites had been set up. One poster from San Francisco explained

how this made it possible to participate. The person wrote: “I am sitting

in the corner of the card catalogue room at the San Francisco main

library,(...) doing what I hope I will be able to do for the rest of my

years: use computers freely. Internet, online discourse, rather is

invaluable; the role of the computer-friendly mind is becoming ever

greater and the need to communicate within this medium needs to

remain open to all. If not, we will fall into the abyss of the isolated

world.... We could become isolated in a cubicle existing only through

our computer.... I would choose otherwise. Keep computers part of the

schools and libraries, and definitely make (the) Internet free to any who

wish to use it. Otherwise we are doomed.”

Page 62

Another poster expressed support for library access and participa-

tion. He cautioned: “If things go as it looks they are going now, libraries

will lose out to business in the war for the net. Yes, this means that we

will be drowning in a deluge of what big business tells us we want to

hear and the magic of the net will vanish in a poof of monied interests.

Some estimates that I have read say that it should cost no more than $10

a year per user for universal access to the national network, including

library sites so that those without phones or home computers have

access. The NSF has decided against funding the Internet anymore and

all the talk of (...)(late) is about the privatizing of the net. No one seems

to get the point involved (or, worse: They *do* get the point.). The

backbone of the net should be retained by the government. The cost is

relatively inexpensive and the benefits are grand. Paying large fees

(some plans call for charges based on the amount of data consumed and

others by time spent net-surfing) defeats the nature of the net. We have

possibilities for direct democracy. At the very least, for representation

of mentally distinct groups as opposed to physical. That is, now we are

represented in Congress by geographical area, not what our opinions

support....”

Several people complained how Net access was not only difficult

because of the cost of modem connections, but that for many people it

was a financial hardship to even own a computer. As one poster from

Virginia explained: “As a newcomer to the net, I don’t feel I have much

relevant to say. All this chatter about Info Superhighways strikes me as

so much political double talk. The highway exists. But to drive on the

damn thing you need a car. Computers (Macs or PCs, etc.) are not items

that someone making 6 or 7 dollars an hour can easily obtain.”

Other posters described the efforts in their areas to provide public

access to the Net. In Seattle, we learned that the Seattle Public Library

and the Seattle branch of Computer Professions for Social Responsibility

had set up a system that made e-mail access and an e-mail mailbox

available to anyone in Seattle who wanted it.

We learned that in Blacksburg, Virginia, federal funds had helped

to set up the Blacksburg Electronic Village by installing fiber optic cable

to all new apartments being built so the people would have direct access

to the Internet.

Page 63

Canadian posters described how the Blue Sky Free-Net in Manitoba

Canada was providing access to all of Manitoba with no extra long

distance phone charges to small rural areas. We were told that in

Manitoba, “They have basically a hub in each of the different calling

areas...some places will be piggy-backing on CBC radio waves, others

on satellite connections.”

Also proposals were made to provide access to other forgotten

segments of the society like the homeless. A poster from San Francisco

proposed that terminals with network access be installed in homeless

shelters. The person explained: “Provide homeless shelters with online

systems frozen into Netnews and e-mail, or e-mail and gopher. A 386

terminal running Linux, Xwindows and Netscape, and linked into a user

group such as e-mail and gopher, etc., would permit defining the lowest

level of involvement. People need communication to represent them-

selves, and e-mail for that reason, as well as Netnews.”

People from

other countries also contributed to the discussion providing a broader

perspective than might normally be available in a national policy

discussion.

From the Netherlands came the following observation: “After

attending the Virtual Conference for two days now, I would like to give

my first (contribution) to the discussion. Since I work for the gov-

ernment of the Netherlands, at the Central Bureau of Statistics, which is

part of the Department of Economic Affairs, the question of availability

of statistical figures intrigues me. As a result of safety-precautions there

is no online connection possible with our network. There should,

however, be a source for the public to get our data from, we get paid by

community-money so the community should benefit (from) the results

of our efforts. I am wondering how these matters are regulated in the

other countries who participate in the Virtual Conference.” “With kind

greetings,” he ended.

And a Psychology Professor from Moscow State University in

Russia wrote: “Hi, netters: (He explained how he had subscribed to the

two mailing lists dealing with network access, since he didn’t think there

would be many messages so it wouldn’t require much time.) “I’m glad

I’m wrong,” he admitted. “I can’t follow the massive traffic of discus-

sions. Sometimes my English is too poor to grasp the essence, some-

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times I don’t know the realities, legislation etc. Some themes I’m greatly

pleased with.... I agree gladly with Larry Irving — (of the NTIA who

had said he was-ed) thrilled with the volume of traffic & quality of

discussion. I am, too. Perhaps I’ll find more time later to read the

messages more attentively. I shall not un-subscribe, though.” “The

people in the 2

& 3

worlds,” he continued, “are just now trying to find

our own ways to use the Internet facilities & pleasures. I am interested

in (the -ed) investigation of these ways, in teaching and helping them in

this kind of activity. Besides, my group is working on bibliographic

database construction and letting...remote access to it. For several days

only we got an IP access to the WWW, we are not experienced yet to

access. So I use ordinary e-mail. Good luck to all subscribers,” he ended.

“I wish you success.”

As part of the discussion several participants discussed how they

felt the ability to communicate was the real advance represented by the

Global Computer Network, rather than the means of providing informa-

tion as others have maintained.

Titling her message, “Not just information — Communication,” a

participant from Palo Alto, California wrote, “...the NTIA is building a

one-way highway to a dead end when they take the word Telecom-

munications out of their rhetoric.” She listed several points for people

to consider, among which were:

“1. Information is always old already.

2. Tele-communications, properly algorithmed, provides dynamic

information about who we are as the human race....

3. Telecommunications is the road to direct democracy and a future for

this planet.

4. Down-stream bandwidth is just another broadcast medium.

Upstream bandwidth is power for the people.”

In a similar vein, another participant who was a college student

wrote: “To start off, I take issue with the term “service.” As I have

stated...the terminology being used is being adopted from an out-dated

model of a Top-Down communications system. The new era of

interconnection and many-to-many communication afforded by Netnews

and Mailing lists (...) brings to the forefront a model of bottom-up rather

than top-down communication and information. It is time to re-examine

Page 65

society and welcome the democratizing trends of many-to-many

communication over the one-to-many models as represented by

broadcast television, radio, newspapers and other media. Rather than

service, I would propose that we examine what “forms of communica-

tion” should be available. So instead of talking about “Universal

Service” we should consider “Universal Interconnection to forms of

communication.”

These were just some of the many concerns raised in this week long

online conference supported and sponsored by a branch of the U.S.

government. The people participating raised serious questions as to

whether the real issues needed to make access possible for the many

rather than a multimedia plaything for the few, would be considered and

examined.

Many were concerned for those who didn’t now have access to the

Net, either because they didn’t have modems or even more fundamen-

tally because they couldn’t afford computers. Thus there was a signif-

icant sentiment that computers with network access be made available

in public places where people could have access, like public libraries.

One participant noted that current policy was favoring a few people

having video connections rather than the many having e-mail capability.

He requested that we: “Redirect some of the funding for high end

technology into getting the mainstream public onto the net. Instead of

funding an hour of video between two users, we should use the money

to let 100,000 users send an e-mail message.”

Summing up the sentiment expressed during the conference, a

participant wrote: “I find it hard to believe a state can function in the 21

century without a solid information infrastructure and citizens with

enough technological savvy to use it.”

The conference was a very significant event. From cities to rural

and remote areas, people made the hard effort to express their concern

and commitment to having everyone have access and to protest the U.S.

government policy of giving commercial entities the Net as a policy that

is in conflict with the public and social goal of universal network access

for all. Despite hardships that people experienced to participate — mail-

boxes got clogged with the volume of e-mail that people couldn’t keep

up with, newsgroups appeared late on Usenet and at very few sites so it

Page 66

was hard to get access to them, the lack of publicity meant that many

didn’t find out till the conference was almost over, etc., the people who

participated did what they could to contribute to and speak up for the

means for everyone to be able to be part of the net as a contributor not

just as a listener. A new government form was created which is very

different from what has existed thus far.

This online conference made clear that the hard problems of our

time can be solved only if the most advanced technology is used to

involve the largest possible number of people in the decisions that will

affect their lives.

PART II

In trying to determine the significance of this conference for solving

the problems of the future of the Net, it is helpful, however, to look back

at how a similar problem was explored 30 years ago and see if there are

lessons that can be applied to the problem of today.

In Spring of 1961 an important event occurred. MIT, a pioneering

engineering institution was to celebrate its 100th birthday. A call went

out, for suggestions for what would be an appropriate celebration.

Martin Greenberger, then a young MIT faculty member, describes how

he responded to the request and proposed a series of lectures on the

Computer and the Future.

“We threw open the hatches,” Greenberger remembered,”and got

together the best people we could assemble — whatever their fields. We

asked these thinkers to project ahead and help us to understand what was

in store.”

One of the invited speakers was the British writer Sir Charles Percy

Snow (better known as C. P. Snow). His talk on “Scientists and Decision

Making” opened the conference. In 1961, working computers were only

17 years old. One of the first working computers was the ENIAC which

was created in 1945. The computer pioneers and enthusiasts who

gathered at the MIT conference, however, recognized the enormous

impact that computers could have on society in the future, particularly

on the university of the future if the computer could be made more

accessible. This was a period when computers were very expensive and

not very available. When one did have access to a computer, it was most

Page 67

likely to something like an IBM mainframe, which was being operated

in batch processor mode. This meant that one delivered one’s program

on a stack of punch cards to the computer center and some hours or days

later, returned for a printout of the computer results.

Those at MIT and at other academic institutions recognized that

there would be a great and important change in computer science, in

particular, and in university education, in general, if every student could

have access to a computer for at least 2 hours a day and if the computer

could be used increasingly by educators and researchers.

Though these were important issues on the minds of the MIT

faculty in 1961, the opening talk at the centennial conference took a

different direction. C. P. Snow described the period that they were living

in, saying: “We happen to be living at a time of a major scientific

revolution, probably more important in its consequences than the first

industrial revolution.”

He predicted that the significance of the changes would be

something “we shall see in full force in the very near future.” And he

raised the question: Will the challenge represented by the emergence of

the computer be treated seriously by society?

Snow explained that when important decisions were made by a

society, they were more likely to be good decisions if a large number of

people were involved in the decision making process. He gave examples

of decisions made by the British government during and after World

War II. One of the decisions was to undertake strategic bombing, that is

the bombing of civilian populations, as part of the British War effort. C.

P. Snow explained how he felt this decision was made by a very small

number of people and that in his view, it lengthened the war and was a

harmful decision to the British people. He also described the decision in

Great Britain to introduce National Health Care. That decision involved

the discussion of many people at many levels of British society. Such

broad public discussion, he believed, managed to filter up to the

government, and led to legislation that was of great benefit to British

society. Snow was fearful that a small number of people would be

making the needed decisions regarding the computer and he warned, “A

handful of people, having no relation to the will of society, having no

communication with the rest of society, will be taking decisions in secret

Page 68

which are going to affect our lives in the deepest sense.”

He also cautioned against having government officials without the

adequate scientific or technical background, making decisions that

would determine the future of the computer. It was necessary, he main-

tained, that those who understood the depths of the arguments of the

issues being dealt with, be involved with government policy concerning

computers.

Others at the conference explored how the computer would impact

on diverse areas of society. John Kemeny, who later became one of the

creators of the BASIC programming language and the DTSS time-

sharing system, explored how the computer could affect the library of

the future. Alan Perlis, another speaker at the conference, explored how

the computer might change the university of the future. J. C. R.

Licklider, who was to become the head of the soon to be created

Information Processing Techniques Office under ARPA (The Advanced

Project Agency of the U.S. Department of Defense) also attended the

conference. He had recently published a thought provoking article, “Man

Computer Symbiosis”, exploring how computers would change

intellectual processes. In his contributions to the conference, J. C. R.

Licklider examined the human-computer partnership and cautioned that

the human must not so clutter his mind with codes and formats that he

cannot think about his substantiative problem. He projected that in the

future the computer would aid intellectual development, explaining, “In

due course it will be part of the formulation of problems, part of

real-time thinking, problem solving, doing of research, conducting of

experiments, getting into the literature and finding references.... And it

will mediate and facilitate communication among human beings.”

He proposed that the most important function of the digital

computer in the university, should be as a catalysis for the development

of computer science.

Other participants at the conference included Claude Shannon and

Norbert Wiener. Both had been instrumental in putting the study of

engineering and communication on a scientific footing. At the con-

ference, Wiener observed that “a computing machine is a

general-purpose device that can be programmed to do many specific

jobs. But, if you fail to give a necessary instruction to a computer, you

Page 69

cannot expect the machine itself to think of this restriction. An unsafe

act, thus,” Wiener warned, “may not show its danger until it is too late.”

Wiener cautioned that humans had to oversee the computer, that the

computer required more human intellect, not less. “They involve more

thought,” he explained, “and not less thought. They may save certain

parts of our efforts, but they do not eliminate the need for intelligence.”

One of the most important presentations at the conference was by

the young MIT faculty member, John McCarthy. McCarthy spoke as a

representative of a committee set up by the MIT administration, to make

recommendations about the future computer needs of MIT. McCarthy

described a new form of computing that was called time-sharing and the

vision for the future that it represented. He explained how a computer

time-sharing system was one that interacts with many simultaneous

users through a number of remote consoles. With time-sharing, multiple

users could work interactively with a computer, by taking advantage of

the faster speed the computer functioned at, as opposed to humans.

Several users could work at terminals sharing a computer, but they

would each have the illusion that they were the sole user of the com-

puter.

At the end of the conference, the linguist Yehuda Bar-Hillel

concluded that it was hard to predict what the future of the computer

would be in the long term, or even in the short term. However, he

recommended that it was important to decide what type of future it

would be worthwhile to encourage and to work to make that future a

reality.

The conference marked an important turning point in the develop-

ment of the computer. It represented in effect, the passing of the torch

from those like Claude Shannon and Norbert Wiener who had developed

information and communication theory and those like John Maunchly

and Grace Hopper who had helped create the working computer and

functioning software. They were passing the torch, so to speak, to those

who would pioneer a new form of computing, that of the time-sharing

of computers. The development of time-sharing would in time lead to

the creation of online communities of computer users, and then to the

linking of such online communities into a supercommunity of online

communities, which eventually became the development of a Global

Page 70

Computer Network.

The MIT faculty member who presented the talk on time-sharing at

the Centennial Conference, John McCarthy, described the technical

change that was on the horizon in 1961.

McCarthy realized that a new

form of computing would become possible and that MIT could help to

make the needed technological leap. This was just at the time of the

change from vacuum tubes to transistorized computers.

Another participant at the MIT Conference was Robert Fano, a

senior faculty member at MIT, who had contributed to the information

theory developed by Wiener and Shannon. In the summer of 1961, Fano

took a sabbatical to work at Lincoln Labs because he hoped to learn

more about digital computers there. He felt one had to begin thinking

about communication in the general purpose way that the digital

computer was making possible.

Also, in the summer of 1961 Fernando Corbato, then the assistant

director of the MIT Computation Center, along with several other

programmers from the Center, were “in the heat of trying to work out

the intricacies of the software problems to create a primitive prototype

for a time-sharing system” which they called the Compatible

Time-Sharing System or CTSS.

Though they gave a demonstration of

a crude prototype time-sharing system in November, 1961, they couldn’t

develop CTSS until the spring of 1962 when the more advanced

hardware, the IBM 7090, the first transistorized computer in the IBM

family, arrived.

Corbato, McCarthy, Fano and Licklider were part of a group of

scientists and engineers who had become convinced that interactive

computing and time-sharing had to be developed and it would need to

replace the batch processing mode of computing that commercial

companies like IBM projected as the future of the computer.

Licklider had gone to work at the acoustical research company Bolt

Beranek and Newman, known as BBN. He had been able to try out one

of the earliest time-sharing systems there. Licklider describes the sen-

timent of the group of researchers who were determined to make the

leap to time-sharing, explaining: “Well, it turned out that these guys at

MIT and BBN. We’d all gotten really excited about interactive com-

puting and we had a kind of little religion growing here about how this

Page 71

was going to be totally different from batch processing.”

By the Fall of 1962, Licklider had accepted a position with ARPA,

to support the development of time-sharing and interactive computing.

One of the first projects that Licklider funded was Project MAC, a re-

search project at MIT, headed by Robert Fano, to achieve 3 goals:

1) time-sharing

2) a community using it

3) education which meant supporting research projects

Out of the work done by Project MAC, a time-sharing system was

developed and an online community of computer users grew up.

Members of the community not only participated in the system, but also

contributed the programs and data to help the system grow and regener-

ate.

Describing the surprise that the creation of this online community

represented to the researchers who had pioneered time-sharing, Fano

observed: “Friends being born out of using somebody else’s program,

people communicating through the system and then meeting by accident

and saying ‘Oh, that’s you.’ All sorts of things. It was a nonreproducable

community phenomenon.”

In addition, the creation of such time-sharing systems provided the

model for a more expansive online community, for the online super

community that would be developed through linking together the various

time-sharing communities that had developed. In 1968, Licklider and

Robert Taylor described the networking model that had developed from

time-sharing, the supercommunity of time-sharing communities, which

provided the vision for what was to become the ARPAnet, and then the

Internet, and then the Global Computer Network of our times. De-

scribing online time-sharing communities of 1968, they observed that

these communities were learning how to cooperate and mutually support

each other and they were producing large and growing resources of

programs, data and know-how which they felt was only the beginning

of the kind of online networking supercommunity of the future.

Also, building on the work done creating the Compatible

Time-Sharing System at MIT in the early 1960s, Bell Labs programmers

Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie and others developed the Unix Time-

sharing system in 1969.

Page 72

Their goal, similar to that of the Project MAC pioneers, was to

create a community of programmers. Reviewing the achievements of

CTSS, Fano described one of the important but un-met goals. He

explained, “One of our goals was to make the computer truly accessible

to people wherever they were. We did not succeed. For people who lived

in the community that used the system, it was fine. In any system like

that, you keep learning things, you keep using new things, and so you

keep having troubles. If you can go next door and say, ‘Hey, I was doing

this and something strange happened, do you know what I did wrong?’

Usually somebody in your neighborhood will be able to help you. If

instead, you are far away, you are stuck.... We tried to develop some

way of helping remote users.... Well, we never did. So in fact, we failed

to make the computer truly accessible regardless of the location of the

user.”

Other computer networking efforts like the creation of the

ARPAnet, of Usenet, and of the uucpnet that transported it, the

gatewaying of Usenet with the ARPAnet, and the creation of the NSF

backbone for the Internet, helped to solve the important problem left

unsolved by Project MAC. This growing network, and particularly the

Usenet newsgroups and IRC chat give computer folk who have access

to them a way to post their problems, to get help, and to share the

solutions they have figured out, so people can benefit from others

experiences. Usenet and IRC chat have thus followed in the footsteps of

Project MAC and other early time-sharing systems and have created an

online supercommunity of communities of computer users. What the

Centennial conference at MIT and the early time-sharing work (along

with subsequent developments like Unix and Usenet) show, is that the

creation of the current global computer network is not the result of some

science fiction dream. Rather the global network is the result of

scientific and engineering experimentation and the creation of models

based on the real world prototypes that the experimental mode produces.

What then is the value of identifying the real roots of the Net in trying

to determine the future of the Global Computer Communications

Network? How can knowing this past history help to guide the work for

the future?

Recalling the admonition of C. P. Snow at the MIT Centennial

Page 73

conference, that the more people involved in trying to solve important

social problems, the more likely the solution will be beneficial to so-

ciety, rather than harmful, reminds us that there is a need to involve the

broadest possible number of people in the problem of expanding and

determining the future of the Net. Also, the legacy of the MIT pioneers

of time-sharing is not only the development of time-sharing, it is also the

lesson that it is important to create the prototype of what one is trying to

develop, and to build one’s vision for the future on what the real models

show is possible. Fortunately, such prototypes have been created.

The NTIA conference, using mailing lists and Usenet newsgroups,

to have a broad reaching online discussion, created a prototype for how

ubiquitous networking can be achieved more broadly within the U.S. and

elsewhere.

The NTIA conference demonstrated that in the involvement of the

many the important problems of our times can be analyzed so they can

be solved. And the Internet and Usenet news, vital components of the

Global Computer Network, are providing important means for the

people of our society to contribute to the needed discussion to determine

what decisions will be helpful or harmful concerning the future of the

Net.

Even though the NTIA conference meant a much broader section of

people than ever before were able to participate in the policy discussion

over the future of the Net, one of the participants explained why this

process was only a prototype of what was needed. He wrote: “I think this

conference was accessible to more than just “elite technocrats. I, for

instance, am a graduate student at the U of MN. I have access because

everyone who attends the University has access, and can apply their

access via numerous computer labs that are open to all students. I think

a lot of people don’t realize that we’re at a very critical point with

determining the future of resources such as the Internet. I join you in

hoping that no irreversible decisions are made on the basis of this

conference — there needs to be a much wider opportunity for public

comment.”

Epilogue

What was the significance of the NTIA conference toward helping

Page 74

to determine what direction government policy should take regarding the

future of the Net?

When the NTIA conference was held in Nov. 1994, many of the

participants expressed their dissatisfaction with the plan of the U.S.

government to turn the backbone of the U.S. portion of the Internet over

to private and commercial interests by May 1, 1995. Despite the many

questions raised about the objectives of U.S. policy by those participat-

ing in the online conference, and despite the fact that the stated goal of

the conference was to involve citizens in helping to formulate policy

objectives, the U.S. government ignored the concerns and voices raised

during the online conference, and went ahead with their plans to

privatize the U.S. portion of the backbone of the Internet.

The plans for the policy the U.S. government carried out had been

formulated at a by-invitation-only meeting at the J. F. K. School of

Government in March 1990.** This points up the discrepancy between

the stated NTIA objectives of opening policy decisions up to public

discussion and input versus the actual deeds of the U.S. government of

implementing a policy which had been formulated at a private by-

invitation-only meeting and which ignored the concerns and needs of the

people the policy would affect. Also, on May 1, 1995, there was a public

program at the Mid-Manhattan branch of the New York Public Library.

The program was about the importance of the Net to people around the

world and about the future potential of this new means of communica-

tion.

At that meeting, people expressed their concern that the U.S.

government would try to impede access to this important resource, rather

than help to make it more broadly available. Also, many urged that

another meeting be set up to discuss what to do to make this important

new resource available to a broader sector of the population.

One of the difficult dilemmas of our times is how to deal with the

disparity between government words that they want input into policy

decisions, and their actions of ignoring that input. The 1961 MIT

Conference on the Future of the Computer, however, which occurred at

a similar turning point in the development of the computer, provides

helpful perspective. When one doesn’t know what the future will be in

the short term or the long term, as one participant at that conference

Page 75

pointed out, it is especially important to decide what type of future it

was to encourage and to work to make that future a reality. Also at the

MIT Conference, C.P. Snow emphasized the importance of having im-

portant policy issues discussed by a large number of people and he

expressed the conviction that such discussion would eventually have an

effect on policy. In addition, those at the MIT Conference expressed a

concern that when governments deal with important matters regarding

technology and computers, those who have some understanding of the

important issues at stake be involved in the decision making process.

The NTIA conference achieved two important results. It clarified

that when people have online access and are invited to participate in a

public policy discussion of an important issue, they will contribute in a

way that identifies the important principles to shape that public policy.

The second result was that it demonstrated that the U.S. government

policy of privatizing the U.S. portion of the Internet is at odds with the

principles clarified during the NTIA online conference called to provide

public input into that policy. The online conference also demonstrated

that there is a need to take up the challenge to make the future one that

will serve the principles of broad and ubiquitous access. The online

conference established the principles, but there is now a need to

maintain an ever widening public discussion of these issues and to work

to determine how to implement those principles.

References

1. “The Computer in the 21

s t

Century”, Scientific American, Special Issue, 1995, p. 4.

(Cartoon by Charles Addams, The New Yorker Magazine, 1952, 1980.)

2. Date: Wed, 23 Nov 1994 00:49:16 -0500

From: Michael Hauben <hauben@columbia.edu>

To: redefus@virtconf.ntia.doc.gov

Cc: avail@virtconf.ntia.doc.gov

Subject: Netizen Speech

Message-ID:

<199411230549.AA14335@aloha.cc.columbia.edu>

3. Date: Mon, 14 Nov 1994 09:07:56 -0800

From: NTIA Virtual Conference <ntia>

Page 76

Message-Id: <199411141707.JAA06933@virtconf.digex.net>

To: avail, intellec, opnacces, privacy, redefus, standard

Subject: NTIA Virtual Conference KeyNote Address

4. James McDonough, ep@access.digex.net,

Message-Id:

<Pine.SUN.3.91.941116094225.11331A-100000@access2. digex.net>

5. From: “Cynthia S. Terwilliger” <twigs@umich.edu>

Date: Nov 15 20:42:07 1994

Subject: Re: [AVAIL:32]

Re: Key Issues of Affordability and Availability

Message-ID:

<Pine.3.89.9411152007.B7150-0100000@sils.umich.edu>

6. Date: Tue, 15 Nov 1994 00:27:42 GMT

From: ab368@virgin.uvi.edu (Bruce Potter)

Message-ID: <1994Nov15.002742.7646@virgin.uvi.edu>

To: avail@virtconf.ntia.doc.gov

Subject: Need for Federal Oversight of Access and

Availability (For Island Resources Foundation,

iresource@aol.com)

7. San Francisco Public Library,

“SFPL::NTIA_PUB”@DRANET.DRA.COM

Message-Id:

<941116184335.20212906@DRANET.DRA.COM>

8. From: Sean <sconnell@silver.ucs.indiana.edu>

Subject: Re: [AVAIL:41] my question

Date: Wed, 16 Nov 1994 00:33:24 -0500 (EST)

Message-Id: <199411160841.AAA27213@virtconf.digex.net>

9. From: jdyer@Hopper.ITC.Virginia.EDU (Jamie Dyer)

Subject: Internet Broadcasting Corp

Message-ID: <CzIIDo.96q@murdoch.acc.Virginia.EDU>

Organization: University of Virginia

Date: Sat, 19 Nov 1994 11:25:00GMT

10. From: bsummers@vt.edu Wed Nov 16 19:59:39 1994

Message-Id: <199411170359.TAA09478@virtconf.digex.net>

11. From: az908@freenet.carleton.ca (Paul Holden)

Page 77

Newsgroups: alt.ntia.redefus

Subject: Universal Access and the Feds...

Reply-To: redefus@virtconf.ntia.doc.gov

Date: Wed Nov 23 22:01:42 1994

12. San Francisco Public Library,

“SFPL::NTIA_PUB”@DRANET.DRA.COM

13. Frank D. Bastiaans, Statistical Analyser, Division Trade and Transport

Date: 16 Nov 1994 16:35:56 MET

Subject: Availability of statistics

Reply-To: FBSS@cbs.nl

Message-Id: <81430000.00000000006A.FBSS.Z9H374IJ>

14. From: Alexander Voiskounsky <vae@motiv.cogsci.msu .su> Psychology

Department, Moscow State University

Newsgroups: alt.ntia.redefus

Subject: Re: [AVAIL & REDEFUS]

Date: Sat Nov 19 09:24:42 1994

15. From: evote@netcom.com (Marilyn Davis)

Message-Id:

<199411150111.RAA27335@netcom12.netcom.com>

Subject: Not Information ---> COMMUNICATION

To: redefus@virtconf.ntia.doc.gov

Date: Mon, 14 Nov 1994 17:11:07 -0800 (PST)

16. From: Michael Hauben <hauben@columbia.edu>

Newsgroups: alt.ntia.avail

Subject: Need to stress concept of active communication and interconnection

Reply-To: avail@virtconf.ntia.doc.gov

Date: Tue Nov 22 05:03:13 1994

17. From: “W. Curtiss Priest”

<BMSLIB@MITVMA.MIT.EDU>

18. From: Lew McDaniel

<MCDANIEL@wvuadmin3.csc.wvu.edu>

19. IEEE Annals of the History of Computing, vol 14 no 2, 1992, p. 15.

20. C. P. Snow, “Scientists and Decision Making,” in Management and the Computer

of the Future, (Martin Greenberger, ed.), M.I.T. Press, Cambridge, MA, 1962, p. 8.

Page 78

21. ibid., p. 9.

22. J. C. R. Licklider, discussant, “The Computer in the University,” in Management

and the Computer of the Future, (Martin Greenberger, ed.), M.I.T. Press, Cambridge,

MA, 1962, p. 206.

23. Management and the Computer of the Future, p. 32.

24. See “John McCarthy’s 1959 Memorandum,” in Annals, vol 14 no 1, 1992, p. 20.

25. Annals, vol 14 no 2, 1992, p. 20.

26. Annals, vol 14 no 1, 1992, p. 44.

27. Annals, vol 14 no 2, 1992, p. 16.

28. ibid., p. 31.

29. ibid.

30. From: “Chris Silker” <silke001@maroon.tc.umn.edu>

* The NTIA Virtual Archives are available via the World Wide Web at:

http://ntiaunix2.ntia.doc.gov:70/11s/virtual.

** RFC 1192 “Commercialization of the Internet: Summary Report”, Nov. 1990,

describes the by-invitation-only meeting that was held at the Kennedy School of

Government in March 1990 to set plans for the commercialization and privatization of

the Internet.

Page 79

In Honor of ‘Doc’ Wilson (1910-1995)

[Editor’s Note: Cartoons by ‘Doc’ Wilson have appeared in various

issues of the Amateur Computerist. Sadly, ‘Doc’ died on July 29, 1995.

The following article with minor changes was originally printed in the

Searchlight, newspaper of UAW Local 659, May 25, 1984. It also was

included in the booklet Tough Cookies: Pioneers of the Flint Labor

Press, in 1985, which contains 22 of ‘Doc’ Wilson’s cartoons.]

THE TRADITION OF LABOR CARTOONING AND

DOC WILSON

The labor cartoons drawn over the years by Doc Wilson chronicle

how the struggle for industrial unionism has been an ongoing and

relentless battle. It was in the depression days of 1933 when the notice

to start work at GM arrived at the Wilson home. Doc had come home

tired after tramping the streets all afternoon in search of work. He hadn’t

had a steady job for two or three years.

When he hired in at Chevrolet on July 13, 1933, working conditions

were awful. “It was slave labor,” remembered Doc during an interview.

“Of course,” he explained, “the auto industry was still in its infancy –

you had to start somewhere. But it got worse. It got to the point where

people had to rebel.”

Doc worked as a truck driver for GM. His own working situation

wasn’t so bad, but he saw the conditions in the plants and knew there

had to be some change. “The day of the strike,” Doc recalled, “I came

in with a load from Bay City. I knew what was coming, but I didn’t

know when. After I unloaded, I clocked out and went to the union

headquarters.”

Doc helped to put out Punch Press, the newsletter which appeared

during the Flint Sit-Down Strike of 1936-37 to keep supporters of the

strike informed of what was happening. Doc’s first published cartoons

had to appear anonymously. “I really couldn’t sign ‘em in those days,”

he explained. “They could still fire you too easy.”

By the mid 1940s, signed cartoons, like one criticizing the “No

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Strike Pledge” appeared in Doc’s local union newspaper The Search-

light. Doc’s cartoons were regularly featured in other Flint labor papers

like The Headlight, (newspaper of UAW-Local 599), and The Flint

Weekly Review. Sometimes the cartoon was reprinted, but the caption

changed to reflect a slightly different situation. Doc’s cartoons were

copied and reprinted in labor papers around the country, “Published in

more than 200 newspapers at one time or another,” noted Doc.

In 1948, Doc Wilson started a regular cartoon series that he called

“Plant Life.” The chief protagonist of the series is Perry, a “graduate

cum laude from the school of hard knocks in factory life.” Through his

hero, Perry, the cartoonist was able to comment on the dangers and

frustrations of factory life. “Sometimes,” Doc explained, “the ideas for

Plant Life came straight from experience.”

Many of Doc Wilson’s cartoons were critical of corporate policies

and practices. Other cartoons, however, took up to comment on union

questions. One cartoon captioned “Just Pin Money” opposed a dues

increase. It got Doc into hot water with the International Union. Another

cartoon captioned “It Still Smells” shows a dissatisfied worker throwing

a newly negotiated Ford Pension Agreement into the trash and holding

his nose. This cartoon again drew the ire of the International Officers of

the UAW. “Oh, it was about the time we got our first retirement plan,”

Doc explained. “It wasn’t quite as good as I thought it should be.”

Despite such difficulties, Doc persisted. He went on with constant and

sustained efforts via his cartoons, until pensions, and then the “30 and

Out” retirement program had been won for UAW retirees. “I guess I

realized the need for it years before our leaders did,” he explained.

Through it all, Doc Wilson contributed to a rich tradition of labor

cartooning, one that he helped to develop and spread. Bob Travis, a

pioneer organizer and one of the founders of the UAW, commented on

the importance of Doc’s cartoons in the development of the UAW in a

letter he wrote to one of Flint’s labor papers. “Doc,” wrote Travis, “was

the cartoonist for the original Auto Worker – way back, over forty years

ago. I’ve always felt that his cartoons contributed significantly to our

victory. To Doc, I’d like to suggest that he publish a book carrying his

cartoons chronologically. It would really show the rise of the UAW and

the history of all our struggles.” (from The Headlight, May 31, 1978)

Page 81

Doc looked back fondly on his years of cartooning while working

as a truck driver at Chevrolet. “Sometimes,” he admitted, “I miss my

days drawing cartoons .... Sometimes I’d sit up half the night making

sketches and then get up to go to work the next morning. But I loved

every minute of it.”

Doc retired from Chevrolet in 1968 on the UAW pension that he

was so active in fighting for. Upon his retirement, the staff of The

Searchlight made him an honorary lifetime member of the Local’s

Publicity Committee so that he “be allowed to continue to work with

future committees in the years ahead.” (See resolution The Searchlight,

Feb. 29, 1968, p. 2) Doc tried to pull together the many cartoons he drew

over the years to put them into some more permanent form. “You

know,” he said, “a lot of these could still be used today ‘cause there’s

still a lot of people suffering.”

It is appropriate that pioneers like ‘Doc’ Wilson be remembered and

their contribution be studied. One lesson that the Flint labor pioneers

like ‘Doc’ never tired of repeating is, if you don’t fight you can’t win.

‘Doc’ Wilson always put his cartooning skill into the fight. Cartoons by

‘Doc’ Wilson have enhanced the Amateur Computerist. We will miss

him a lot and still hope to see his cartoons properly collected into a big

book.

Page 82

Page 83

The opinions expressed in articles are those of their

authors and not necessarily the opinions of the

Amateur Computerist newsletter. We welcome sub-

missions from a spectrum of viewpoints.

Page 84

EDITORIAL STAFF

Ronda Hauben

William Rohler

Norman O. Thompson

Michael Hauben (1973-2001)

Jay Hauben

The Amateur Computerist invites submissions.

Articles can be submitted via e-mail:

jrh@ais.org

Permission is given to reprint articles from this issue in a

non profit publication provided credit is given, with name

of author and source of article cited.

ELECTRONIC EDITION

ACN Webpage:

http://www.ais.org/~jrh/acn/

All issues of the Amateur Computerist are on-line.

Back issues of the Amateur Computerist are available at:

http://www.ais.org/~jrh/acn/Back_Issues/

All issues can be accessed from the Index at:

http://www.ais.org/~jrh/acn/NewIndex.pdf

Page 85