From: MONTREUM@tp.istc.ca ("Montreuil, Mark: NM") To: aa127@freenet.carleton.ca (Garth Graham) Subject: Johnston Speech Date: Wed, 24 Aug Information Highway Advisory Council The Information Highway and Community Networks SPEAKING NOTES FOR DAVID JOHNSTON Chair of the Information Highway Advisory Council to The Canadian Community Networks Conference Carleton University Ottawa, Ontario August 15, 1994 Check Against Delivery Good evening, ladies and gentlemen: As an enthusiastic supporter of community networking, I am delighted to be here tonight to share that enthusiasm with so many like-minded people. And, as Chair of the federal government's information highway advisory council, I'm pleased to have an audience of networking enthusiasts. I'm accustomed to having to explain the importance of the Information Highway, but tonight I expect I may be preaching to the converted. I'm sure I have much more to learn from you than you do from me. It's also a rare pleasure for me to be able to participate in making history. That may sound overly grand, but I think that's what you are doing here at this Conference, and especially on Wednesday with the founding meeting of Telecommunities Canada. I feel a bit like Dean Acheson, who called his book on the founding of the United Nations Present at the Creation. I predict that one day, when the history of the birth of the Information Highway in Canada is written, this meeting will have a prominent place in the record. It has become a clich‚ to say that we live in a time of rapid change. In fact, we live in a state of constant change. Change is now the norm, not the exception. Some people this year are marking the 25th anniversary of Woodstock or the moon landing. But 1969 also saw the creation of ARPANET, the first U. S. networking community and the precursor to Internet. Ten years later, the first dial-up computer service, Telecomputing Corporation of America (TCA), was established. In 1986, the Cleveland FreeNet was established. The next year came the Youngstown, Ohio FreeNet, the same year the number of Internet hosts broke the 10,000 mark. Three years later, the number of Internet hosts broke 100,000. I think we'll agree that change isn't just constant, it's accelerating. Take the growth of community networks, for example. Only last year we saw the first two established in Canada: the National Capital FreeNet, here in Ottawa, and the Victoria FreeNet in B.C. Today we're attending the second Canadian Community Networks Conference, and across the country 25 other community networks are being developed. Those of us who live in Montreal passionately hope for our own FreeNet later this year. I met recently with a group to discuss the establishment of FreeNet Montreal and was able to offer them my enthusiastic support. Change is hapening so fast these days that a pioneer is someone who's been around a year or two. Soon that may fall to six months. It's only fitting that we're gathered here at Carleton, home of one of the real pioneers and guiding lights of community networking. Both as Carleton's Director of Computing and Communications Services and as President of National Capital FreeNet, David Sutherland has made an enormous contribution to the growth of community networking in Canada. When National Capital FreeNet hosted the first conference on community networking here a year ago, it was the first time anyone had brought together people interested in community networking. That conference recommended the establishment of a national organization that would reflect the grassroots spirits of the FreeNets. It s that grassroots spirit that sparks my enthusiasm for FreeNets. The movement to organize electronic community networks and FreeNets is spreading across North America, and it's driven by people like you -- people of energy and ideals who believe that this resource should be available to everyone. And you're right. The FreeNets have demonstrated that people can come together to determine their information needs, then meet these needs by linking with people around the world. Networking gives the slogan "think globally, act locally" a new twist, a twist that shows how the distinction between local and global is fading. If we are fortunate enough to have access to computers and a community network, we can connect with the world through the Internet. Yes, we can think globally. But now we can also act globally from within our own communities. FreeNets have proven that people want information services. Every time new lines are added, FreeNet usage exceeds their capacity. What's behind this phenomenal growth? I think it's esentially because community networks meet the real, on-going, everyday information needs of the people who use them. We re seeing the creation of the new village square, where people can come together to talk and discuss, no matter what their interest, whether it's the Information Highway itself, hobbies, education, legal and medical issues, or the arts. So what s happening here? Are we seeing the birth of the Information Age? Is this Marshall McLuhan's global village? One thing we can say with certainty, we're in the middle of a revolution, an information revolution. This revolution will have as great an impact on our society as the shift from hunting to farming or the harnessing of steam power had on earlier societies. But, and it's a big but, this revolution is happening virtually overnight, not over centuries and decades. Like other revolutions, this one promises much and threatens much. Those societies and communities that use these exciting technological tools wisely for the public good will benefit enormously. Those that cannot or will not will suffer. This is where the FreeNets and the information highway advisory council cross paths. The Information Highway is coming, and soon it will be more than just a catch phrase in the newspapers. It will be an advanced information and communications infrastructure and it's essential for Canada's emerging information economy. This infrastructure will become a "network of networks", linking Canadian homes, businesses, governments and institutions to a wide range of interactive services. Over time, this Information Highway will change the way we live. New information and communications technologies will force a radical change in the way we work, play, teach, communicate and deliver services. It will mean rethinking processes we've lived with for years. It will be more than video-on-demand or home shopping. It will affect everything from entertainment, education, cultural products and social services to data banks, computers, electronic commerce, banking and business services. But will people be ready? Will we all have access to this technology? Will people who live in rural and remote communities have the same access as people living in Ottawa or Victoria or Montreal? This is where people like you, acting through organizations like Telecommunities Canada, can play a crucial role in shaping the Information Highway. How? First, by being there. By enabling Canadians to discover and use networks, you are already encouraging them to acquire computer and network skills. By creating community networks, you are demonstrating some of the possible uses for this technology and encouraging people to think about it. But you can do much more. The Information Highway may be coming, but it won't arrive on its own. You have the expertise and the resources to be significant players in its evolution. You can share that knowledge and expertise. You can ask the tough questions about who is going to drive on the Information Highway, how they are going to get on, and what they are going to find there. And you can do more than ask the questions; you can come up with some possible answers. I'm asking you tonight to start thinking about these issues. More than that, I'm asking you to come back to me with recommendations, through David Sutherland, before the advisory council meets at the end of September. I guarantee we'll give your recommendations the consideration they deserve. We know that FreeNets may well be laying the foundation for the Information Highway. We want to give you an opportunity to play a central role in its development. We know that FreeNets are facing some tough challenges, particularly about how they are going to support themselves. I know that this is a contentious subject, but community networks must establish a sustainable funding base that is not dependent on grants. We live in an era of fiscal restraint. It is no longer realistic to expect governments to foot the bill. This new reality calls for new approaches, different from what we've known in the past, when government played a large role. Remember, the first task of any organism is to survive, then to grow, then to reproduce. And it's important that you do survive. True, we have other networks, like CA*net, CANARIE and Schoolnet, and they do important work, but none have the grassroots outreach that is shown by the FreeNets. So where does government fit in with all this grassroots energy? Traditionally, Canada has considered strong communications networks -- owned and controlled by Canadians -- to be essential for competitiveness, cultural vitality and national sovereignty. The federal government has actively supported these networks, from the Trans-Canada Telephone System to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation to domestic communications satellites, cellular telephone services and fibre optic networks. We expect the Government of Canada will play a role in the development of the Information Highway, but it won't be the role governments played in the past. I've already touched on the need for fiscal restraint, and it applies to the private sector as well as the public. We can no longer expect governments to help pave the way as they have in the past. Governments today operate more as facilitators and less as doers. An example of government's facilitating role can be found in the way Industry Canada has contributed to the development of community networks. Not with dollars for start-up or operational expenses, but by supporting software development, national studies and conferences like this one, and by bringing together people who are interested in participating in these projects. As a result, individuals, businesses both small and large, and communities will have to get together to pool their resources and work in cooperative networks, rather than looking to government to simply write a cheque. That said, the federal government has been quite explicit in its intention to implement a Canadian strategy for an Information Highway. Canada has a head start in building the Information Highway because we have one of the world's most advanced, extensive and universally accessible communications infrastructures. Now we need a Canadian strategy, one made in Canada by Canadians and for Canadians. It must be flexible enough to help us adapt to a complex and rapidly changing environment, and it must be consistent with our regulatory history, our economic realities, our industry structures and our unique cultural and sovereignty requirements. The information highway advisory council was set up to make recommendations to the Minister on a national strategy for the Information Highway. We have 30 members and 26 participants representing industry, labour, consumer and public interest groups serving on its five working groups. The advisory council holds monthly meetings to report on progress, discuss issues and agree on recommendations to the government. So far we've had three meetings, and, by the way, the minutes are available on FreeNet via Internet (by gopher at debra.dgbt.doc.ca, port 70, and the same address by FTP, in /pub/info-highway). The working groups meet to develop options and assess their impact on various issues. They are focusing on issues outlined in the report, The Canadian Information Highway: Building Canada's Information and Communications Infrastructure, which I recommend if you re interested in knowing how the federal government is thinking about these issues. The strategy we are working on has three objectives: Job creation through investment and innovation; Promotion of Canadian sovereignty and cultural identity; and Universal access at an affordable cost. This strategy will follow four operating principles: We must move rapidly to an interconnected and inter-operable network of networks. We believe that collaborative public/private sector development is crucial. We endorse healthy competition in facilities, products and services. We are committed to privacy protection and network security. Ladies and gentlement, the federal government intends to provide the national leadership needed to make the Information Highway a reality. But it will take all of us working together to ensure that all Canadians reap the many benefits offered by this amazing technology. There can be no doubt that organizing electronic community networks and FreeNets has become a social movement in Canada. And, despite the popular image of computer hackers pounding on keyboards, it's a movement centered on people and their needs, not on technology for its own sake. Canada needs your enthusiasm, your understanding of the issues, your expertise and your participation to make the Information Highway a reality and to ensure that it benefits all Canadians. I urge you to make your voices heard. Get together, weigh the issues, come up with some recommendations that respect the realities of government in the nineties, and get back to us in a month. If they are recommendations we can work with, if they fit within the framework of fiscal constraint and government's new role as facilitator, we'll give them our most serious consideration. Thank you. -- Garth Graham aa127@freenet.carleton.ca Coordinator, Canadian Community Networks Conference, and founding meeting, Telecommunities Canada, Aug. 15-17, 1994 Box 86, Ashton, Ont., K0A 1B0, 613-253-3497