Wired Into the Future

[David Farber <farber () central cis upenn edu>]

San Francisco Chronicle
Editorial November 13


Wired Into the Future


Pacific Bell's $16 billion commitment to lay the virtual concrete of an
information superhighway through 5 million California homes, beginning
next spring, puts California on the fast track to a future that most of
us can barely imagine.


It is a future that, we are told, holds the key to global competitiveness
in 21st century technologies, and one in which profound changes are
inevitable in the way we work, relax, communicate, shop, learn--live
almost all aspects of our lives.


That's a lot to claim for a thin little piece of fiber-optic cable--
the stuff with which PacBell plans to wire us into the full-blown
information age.  And like earlier claims for the personal computer
revolution (which was supposed to create a paperless office, cook
our dinners and water the lawn while paying our taxes), it may well
be an exaggeration.


If the main product delivered by the fiber-optic superhighway is
nothing more than 500 TV channels of shopping shows, reruns and
never-should-have-runs, it will be worse than an exaggeration.


It will be a cruel hoax.


Presumably, it will amount to more than a not-so-entertaining overload.


If it creates real competition between cable TV operators, where none
exist today, it could result in a surge of innovative, narrow-focus
entertainment and education programming by a vast array of small and
large production companies offering tens of thousands of good jobs.


If the highway is cheap and easy to get on and off, it could also
accelerate the emerging promises of telecommuting; dispersed,
interactive education; distant health care; and anytime/anywhere
communications.


And if it is a genuinely two-way thoroughfare, and if access is
guaranteed to all, it could speed us forward into the hazy but
fascinating promises of work and life in cyberspace:  workplaces and
relationships and collaborations that span distance, culture and
time.


So far, though, the if's and the but's of an information superhighway
still seem clearer than the promised realitites.


What that tells us is that we had better get a grip on the technology
before the technology gets a grip on us.


It may be that the traditional rules and regulations that have
governed communications monopolies, broadcasting, phone services,
computer communications and even retailing will have to be changed
to accomodate the arrival of the one-wire information thoroughfare.


But in making those changes, we must insist that the highway remains
open to us all, that it will not invade the privacy of our homes or
offices, and that it will stimulate--not suppress--competition and
innovation.  PacBell's ambitious move into the next century could and
should be good news for all Californians--all the more so if we understand
its implications rather than sit back passively and let the traffic roll
through our homes.