MARYLAND OFFERS FREE INTERNET

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

Parts of this announcement distributed under fair use doctrine .. djf
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SUBJECT:  MARYLAND OFFERS FREE INTERNET
SOURCE:   The Associated Press via First! by INDIVIDUAL, Inc.
DATE:     June 23, 1994
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  BALTIMORE - The Associated Press via First! : Job listings. Stock market
reports. Travel advisories. Updates on bills in Congress. Marylanders will
soon be able to find them all through their home computers.


  -   Later this summer, Maryland is to become the first state to offer
residents free access to the Internet, connecting more than 18,000 computer
networks used by an estimated 20 million people.


..


  -   But Maryland is the first to do it on a statewide basis, according to
the American Library Association. The state is also offering the service not
just to people who come into a library, but to anyone with a computer and a
modem.


  -   Through a state-run navigational tool named Sailor, Marylanders will
be connected to the Internet and given a menu of choices to find the
information they need.


...


  -   The access is not without limits. The system is only capable of
handling 192 dial-in users at a time.


,,,


  -   But Daniel Weitzner, deputy policy director of the Electronic Frontier
Foundation, a Washington-based nonprofit public policy group, sees some
problems ahead.


  -   The private sector can often provide a better service at less cost
than the government, Weitzner said. State involvement also opens the door to
possible censorship, he said.


  -   ``There are always going to be political pressures on publicly funded
networks to censor. You see this in libraries today,'' he said.


  -   Ms. Sass [ MD coordinator .. djf] said there will be no censorship. [
want to bet .. djf]