NETWORKS AND COMMUNITY : feb 7, 1994 Networks and Community is devoted to encouraging LOCAL resource creation & GLOBAL resource sharing. compiler : Sam Sternberg The 6th report of 1994 is the 12th weekly survey. This special issue consists of a REPORT on the POWERING UP NORTH AMERICA conference - Feb 2 & 3 - Toronto Canada. ================================================ This conference - which cost $1,000. to attend - presented a very high power cross-section of the Information Network Business community. Fortunately for readers of this newsletter, almost everything said at the conference has been covered on the Internet previously. In particular, recipients of Gleason Sackman's netnews missed very little by not attending. I will summarize the items that were "news" and the describe the talks at the PUBLIC ACCESS panel. Extracts from two of those talks are also provided. The first extract is an excellent explanation of convergence - provided by Andrew Bjerring, President of Canarie, canada's nsf net equivalent. Mr. Bjerring can be reached at Bjerring@canarie.ca The second extract is from the talk on the future of community networks by Garth Graham, a TELECOMMUNITIES CANADA board member, and on the steering committee of the COALITON FOR PUBLIC INFORMATION. Mr. Graham's net address is aa127@freenet.carleton.ca ---------------------------------------------------------------- NEWS FROM THE CONFERENCE Most participants acknowledged that we are really dealing with a GLOBAL information infrastructure, a GII, but that political realities often lead to discussions from a national perspective. Minister John Manley - who opened the conference by appearing over the network from OTTAWA - asked participants to offer advice on what the game plan for Canada should be. Specificly he asked for comments on what type of government - industry collaboration was appropriate, what type of public access should be sought, how privacy rights could be defined and protected, and what kind of support should be provided to protect Canadian culture and soveriegnty. He did not indicate how that advice should be addressed to him. Near the close of the conference Minister Jon Gerrard announced that a advisory council is being formed and solicited suggestions for members. His net address is gerrard.jon@istc.ca . Dr. Michael Nelson - a Clinton-Gore Whitehouse advisor - Said the administration hopes to complete its legislative agenda within a year. They feel that it makes economic sense to allow the market to take care of the connect needs of 2/3rds of the citizenry. The additional 1/3 would require some form of assistance to meet the social goal of 100% access. He also mentioned that the Whitehouse had already begun assisting a few 3rd world countries in developing Internet access by using Foreign Aid funds. They hope to expand that program. He felt it was important for the U.S. and other countries to assist in bringing the entire world onto the global network. He also said the Whitehouse Internet document facilities had already DIRECTLY distributed over 100,000 copies of various documents. As you know that is usually just the begining of a distribution chain. This is probably the largest distribution of any government information since Chairman Mao's LITTLE RED BOOK got such good press in China. Ted Rogers - canada's primary cable system owner - announced that his company would be able to provide 2 way service on all its systems soon. 80% of his systems already are equiped for 2 way service. [ The following day his company announced a bid for the #2 cable provider in Canada. He is commiting his company to providing a full range of data and voice services over cable. In Canada, were 95% of homes are passed by a cable and 86% subscribe, this amounts to a virtual declaration of war on the Telco's. I personally believe that he is at least as interested in that company's business magazines. His staff are actively looking for publications to turn into CABLE CHANNELS. The company he is persuing owns over 150 business magazines many of which operate internationally. Potentially each magazine provides the "software" for a channel and comes with a built in stream of advertising revenue. Several years ago, well before the current battle over Paramount, Rogers tried to by a peice of "Hollywood" but failed to pull of the financing - ed ] Not to be outdone, Wes Scott, representing the alliance of phone companies in Canada, announced that by the end of the summer, Canada would have a national commercial ATM network in place. Every hospital is to be linked to the net for advanced medical services. [ Canada's socialized medicine system makes this much easier to do here than it would be in the U.S. ] George Gilder - a father of "supply-side economic policy" and proponent of the unrestrained regulation that lead to both rampent homelessness, and the Savings And Loan Disaster during the Reagan years - again demonstrated his unflappable wrongheadedness by predicting that the newspaper industry would be the primary beneficiary of the Information highway. As for most of the other speakers - what wasn't old news, was primarily promos for their particular company agenda. ----------------------------------------------- THE PUBLIC ACCESS SESSION Chaired by Brian Milton, National Director for Social Policy at Stentor; It was probably the most lively of all the panel sessions. Mr Milton - who appears not to have done much prior coordination with the participants - proposed a discussion agenda which was promptly ignored by all. He complained about that at end of the session. Ian Angus - who is one of the most knowlegable people in Canada on telecommunication policy issues spoke last - saying that Canadian phone companies have failed to diversify their service base because of their monopoly postion. He made the most interesting comment at the conference on hardware issues; describing TV as a poor vehicle for delivering information. He also said that the P.C was unsuitable for entertainment, though he felt it was overall the better of the two options.[ he is right of course - computers may get you on the Internet, but they are no ones idea of a great family entertainment device. He did not speculate as to what an appropriate Mutimedia appliance might be. My own candidate is interactive high definition TV - HDTV. Their introduction is being held up by fierce behind the scenes international trade warfare.- ed ] He suggested that U.S. style regulatory reform designed to stimulate competition was neccessary. It should be accompanied by reduced rates for network access by schools, libraries, etc. Saying the Hiway is here already - he recommended that we pave the driveways since today we only have back roads to the home. Andrew Bjerring - from Canarie - reported satisfaction with its progress to date and delivered a fine explanation of the convergence issue - it is extracted below. [ At the end of the conference the Canarie Board met to decide if Canarie is to return to its roots as an Industrial research network or seriously undertake becoming the primary arm of the GII in Canada. That discussion results from the fact that the telco's are already commited to created a national hi speed data net before the year end, the Ostry reports saw Canarie as an inadaquate solution, and the present plans call for a 5 year wait for Canarie to reach traffic volumes and rates similar to those already available in the U.S. - I will report on their decision in a future issue ]. Garth Graham - who coordinated the First International Free-net Conference last August - delivered an inspiring speech on the future importance of community networks - which is summarized below. Barbara O'Conner - a california based Professor of Communications - presented the position of the U.S. based Alliance for Public Technology. That groups represents 40 non profits committed to universal access policies. In line with the Clinton administration they advocate a combination of regulated competition and social assistance funding as the best solution. Her suggestions on possible social funding mechanisms largely focused on the proposed creation of a Universal Service Fund - to be paid for by either a customer premise equipment tax, a fee included in the price of every "appliance" designed for net use, or a payment by access providers. All of those mechanisms are currently in use or proposed as the solution for other communication related issues. Joe Schmidt - President of the Business Telecommunication Alliance - delivered a standard discussion of the issues and opportunities this technology presents. His real strength is in his presentations before the CRTC. Were he ably represents the view of business consumers in a forum largely dominated by the Telecom Industry. During the Q & A session many of the usual questions were raised about censorship, protection of children, privacy, poor user interfaces, difficulties in finding access, and the hi cost of access. One audience member suggested communication stamps as a possible solution. Another echoing Garth Graham's themes worried about the devestation of the job market and the disruption of work that will result from the introduction of these technologies. ---------------------------------------------------------------- Garth Grahams talk : THE PUBLIC AWAKES: ANTICIPATING PUBLIC INTEREST AGENDAS IN AN INFORMATION SOCIETY -------------------------------------------------------------- TABLE OF CONTENTS: 1. INTRODUCTION: FINDING A COMMON VOCABULARY 2. EMERGENCE OF PUBLIC INTEREST GROUPS 3. THE PUBLIC INTEREST AGENDA - THE EXPECTED PUBLIC POLICY AGENDA - THE UNEXPECTED PUBLIC POLICY AGENDA a. Cyberspace is public space, not "infrastructure" b. Computer mediated communications is about talking c. Accelerate the flow of ideas, of knowing d. Drive governments toward open government e. Full public participation in the policy debate f. FreeNets as examples of public behaviour in an information society. 4. SOCIAL IMPACT: THE FUTURE OF WORK 5. ACTION CONTRIBUTING TO REAL PUBLIC PARTICIPATION 6. CLOSE: RESPONSIBLE CITIZENSHIP AND COMMUNITY ------------------------------------------------- THE PUBLIC AWAKES: ANTICIPATING PUBLIC INTEREST AGENDAS IN AN INFORMATION SOCIETY If you only take two words away from my presentation, those two words should be "community" and "citizen." If there's one word that acts as a red flag for you in the public policy debate, that word should be "consumer." .... [ .... means information deleted by the editor ] The transition to an Information Society is not about technology. It's about social change. ... We need to know much more about the social, political and economic consequences of the choices we make in our transition to an Information Society. The more I look into it, the more it seems to me that the language used to articulate the "vision" of a privately constructed electronic super highway is quite deliberate, quite consciously chosen, and quite wrong. The vocabulary of "constructed" superhighways and electronic "infrastructure" evokes ideas in people's minds that obscure the public interest. ... I want to change the language of debate. We need to coin new terms for our understanding of the issues we face in our use of Cyberspace. (OVERHEAD) - MY OBJECTIVES: * I want to change the language of public policy debate about our transition to an Information Society so that the public can frame the issues in a broader context than the production and consumption of electronic services. * I want better ways to ensure significant public participation in a debate that is fully open to anyone who wants to understand or influence the issues. In true Information Society, it is neither desirable nor possible to contain the learning that will occur in such a debate. * I want to anticipate what a true agenda for open public discussion will actually contain. .... 1. Emergence of public interest groups. 2. The public interest agenda. 3. Social impact: the future of work 4. What is feasible as action contributing to real public participation. [ G G provides a list of public interest groups in Canada here ] What's still missing from this list are the social service, labour and environmental organizations that traditionally adopt social policy issues. But I believe that these organizations are now beginning to see through the obfuscations of technobabble and to understand the impact issues on their own terms. I think that very soon we'll be hearing from them. 3. THE PUBLIC INTEREST AGENDA I feel privileged to be present at the formation of a new dream in the national mythology. Never-the less I'm going to point out that it is a myth. There is no "electronic superhighway." Whatever "it" is, it isn't "infrastructure." We are not "building" a new national dream of a railroad to the Pacific of the imagination. Presently, there is no capacity within Canada to address social consequences. . There is great danger in viewing citizens as mere consumers of electronically delivered products and services ............. In a Knowledge-based economy, people will carry all the tools they need for thinking and connecting with others with them. Then they can move in Cyberspace to where the ideas are. But I don't think any of us has a very clear idea of where they will move in the physical landscape they actually inhabit. My best guess is, don't invest in office buildings. (OVERHEAD) - THE EXPECTED PUBLIC POLICY AGENDA: * Support all Canadians' right to learn and to know through a universally accessible and affordable Canadian communications and information infrastructure (CCII) * Information essential to citizenship must be free. * Ask what's CCII's impact on society, not just a sector of the economy * Ensure CCII's connection to the information infrastructures of other nations by resolving issues of access, cultural expression, convergence, security, censorship, tariffs, and privacy. * Guarantee the functional integrity of the CCII by establishing critical technical requirements including; public domain tools, ease of use, widespread availability, full functionality, high reliability, privacy protection, and evolutionary expansion. * Use electronic technologies to improve the work environment rather than dehumanize it, ensure that equity and nondiscriminatory practices form the core of work in the new information marketplace. * Provide public access to, and inter-active communications with, all levels of government, so that the boundaries dividing participating communities of interest and inhibiting the emergence of consensus can be transcended. * Promote a competitive marketplace in terms of the content of CCII. No one should control both the content and conduits into our homes. (OVERHEAD) - THE UNEXPECTED PUBLIC POLICY AGENDA: Here are some issues where you are going to get blind-sided. The public IS finding its way onto the Net and these new citizens of cyberspace see things differently from you. a. Cyberspace is public space, not "infrastructure" The gateways into it are the function of information technology, and therefore have a price. But the metaphor of "infrastructure" as used in NII and CCII suggests that cyberspace is NOT a place but a "thing" that we build. By the use of this metaphor, business is enclosing a public common for private gain. They occupying the transit lounges and shoreline properties for the oceans of imagination. b. Interactivity (Computer mediated communications) is about connecting and talking. It serves people and communities, not mass audiences. Universal access includes the freedom to communicate. Interactivity, or computer mediated communications (CMC) is about human connections. It's about talking. It serves a society that is egalitarian and decentralized. It serves individuals and communities, not mass audiences. We've got the bizarre notion that access to "information" is somehow about access to a bunch of value neutral "facts." Nothing could be further from the truth. Let's take the example of a teacher who has just got access to SchoolNet. She's fought with the Board and principal for a phone jack in the classroom. She thought that the big problem was connecting, but now she knows that over 1000 schools have done that already. It's late at night, and she's out surfing the Internet, and suddenly she realizes that the Internet is not what she thought. It's not a universe of facts. There's too much raw human imagination there, too much beliefs, opinions, perversions, darkness, cynicism and right shining passions to think about it in terms of passive facts. Anyone can and does imagine and express anything to anyone anywhere. And then she thinks of those 30 kids in her crowded class. Without parental authority, she's going to give them this window into every recess of the human mind! Suddenly, they too can know anything they want to know, imagine any possibility, but also find someone somewhere that wants to talk about it. And she knows that the institution she represents is consciously designed to channel and control children's' thinking. She knows it's present purpose is to socialize them in the direction of acceptable social behaviour. Now here, through the interface, is the entire panoply of possible human behaviour. Here are ideas that, in the old social order, we'd never in our wildest flights of fancy imagine were possible. Some so dark they plunge you into despair. some so exciting they change the direction of your life....WHAT IS SHE GOING TO DO? Teachers call this the "content" problem, and they are terrified. The National Capital FreeNet on-line annual general meeting ( a demonstration of faith in electronic democracy underway at this moment) actually has a teachers' motion on the table to allow for group memberships. The intention of the motion to control access in classrooms is anathema to the open access spirit of individual responsibility inherent in FreeNets. c. Accelerate the flow of ideas, of knowing - Knowledge, as such, cannot be commodified. When we speak about the necessity of learning organizations we aren't about the significance of that objective. Any organization established to satisfy wants and needs to know will reconfigure its socio-structural matrix (ie. its human connections) around different principles. It must accelerate rather than control the flow of ideas. Here is a truism of the information society: universal access means access to knowledge generating systems, not just to the goods and services distribution systems. We are moving into an economy of intangibles that commodifies artificial experience. People will pay to experience "implied' realities. Forget about economics and call this "imaginomics." But how will we know that we're wealthy, when there's no quantum of knowledge to allow us to quantify value, no measurable chunk of information? ............... d. Drive governments, kicking and screaming, toward open systems as a means of achieving open government. The significant "infrastructure" change would be to connect the networks of similar types of programs in municipal, regional, provincial and federal levels of government. This would de-layer the management of public services toward the point of service delivery. Then the "best provider" at whatever level of government it appeared could do it all. Andy Macdonald, as the federal government's first Chief Information Officer, represents an approach to the electronic delivery of government services that is driven by technology management. He's focussed on the reduction of costs through the automation of shared common administrative services. That most certainly will reduce costs. But it concentrates on what government does to itself internally, not on what government actually does with and for the people of Canada. The way we express needs will drive our technological evolution toward open government: * Do we talk about governing in an Information Society, or about electronic delivery of government services? They are not the same thing. A change agenda that was driven by "governing" would first focus on understanding what government actually does, not on how it does it. * .... Talking to the people who actually receive the service sounds idealistic, but, if you do this, the service then evolves pragmatically from experience .... (ie. the system of service "learns"). Cutting administrative costs through sharing common services sounds rational, until you discover there's no "why?" There's no first premises related to socio-political implications (ie. the system manages, it is preoccupied by management methods to the exclusion of real results). * The open government approach identifies what everyone involved in a system of service wants or needs to know. The "citizen" is the client for the total system of program delivery. The "electronic delivery of government services" approach doesn't care what you know. It just moves the data. It sees "programs," not citizens, as the clients for systems of administrative services. e. Full public participation in the policy debate, not just the "circling of one wagon" as now. If you told the Canadian public that the intention of the "superhighway" was to put control of government back in their hands, they would definitely support it. f. FreeNets as examples of public behaviour in an information society. We have a concrete example of how the public will behave in the Information Society. It's called FreeNet. I think we should be promoting community networks as keys to self governance, to revitalizing communities and to meeting the public interest in network access. In the Ottawa Citizen, January 25/94, there was an article with the title, "HIGH-TECH HIGHWAY GATHERS SPEED: QUEBEC PROJECT TO LINK 34,000 HOMES TO ELECTRONIC NETWORK BY NEXT YEAR." The article states this is, the FIRST test-run on Canada' electronic superhighway, which will cost $750 million over the next decade. I'd suggest that this Videotron Group project is not really the first test-run. National Capital Freenet was, and it isn't going to cost $750 million per decade. It's going to cost $4 million per decade. You might call NCF an "application," but the people who are in them see community networks as a social movement. We think that support for community networks has the biggest social and political payoff of any strategy for transition to the Information Society. Jay Weston's CRTC "Comment" on telephone rates calls for: - universal access - flat rates, forget about time-distance pricing or local measured services If, as Tip O'Neil said, "All politics is local," how will we govern in a society where anyone can connect to anyone else, anywhere on earth. What dimension of locality will you use to define your politics? On the Internet, there are communities of "interest" that are located in the mix of ideas, conflicts and issues surrounding specific social concerns. The people that belong to them feel that virtual communities of common interests ARE communities. Net-based discussion groups are inherently political arenas where the exercise of politics lies in being able to shift opinion in the context of the conversation. (OVERHEAD) - COMMUNITY NETWORK DESIGN PRINCIPLES ..... this also can be read as a set of design principles for community itself. These are as much principles for the design of community as they are specifications for the functions of community networking technology: * Does it encourage universal access to a new global conversation and universal participation in shaping its content. * Does it promote reciprocity in learning and the flow of knowledge? * Is it self-governing? * Does it support skills in imagining and building physical and virtual communities? * Does it leave the power in the hands of individual users? * Does it grant "on-line" access as a right, not a privilege? * Does it leave control of community communications technologies in the hands of communities? * Are conversations open to everyone, not just to those making claims of representation? * Does the choice to act or not act, speak or not speak, reside with the chooser? 4. SOCIAL IMPACT: THE FUTURE OF WORK (OVERHEAD) - CARTOON: SALARY FOR THE ROBOT (OVERHEAD) - UNEMPLOYMENT PER DECADE, 1950 - 2010 (OVERHEAD) - THE FUTURE OF WORK The future of work is not in the cycle of production and consumption. We've been using "work" as the mechanism for the distribution of wealth. We all work to produce, so that we can have money to consume. But now we've solved the production problem. Not only are labour and capital being replaced by process knowledge, but wetware is being replaced by software. It no longer takes very many people to produce goods and services. This gives us a crisis of consumption. We don't need producers to produce, but we do need consumers to consume. How do the surplus non- producers get any wealth to exchange for the products, so they can continue to fuel the economy? Now that jobs don't distribute wealth, what will? Early in the next century, we'll only have 15% of the "workforce" involved in what we've traditionally thought of as work. What do we think the other 85% will be doing? They won't just die, at least not without trying to avoid it. We don't really know how to measure an economy of intangibles, where the real "commodity" becomes packaged experiences (ie "virtual realities as learning spaces, anticipatory models, feedback systems and entertainment). Do any of you really know what those knowledge worker jobs in the Information Society will really do? Given that the majority of my partners in crime are sustained by the Internet, and that I independently contract on a per project basis, I suppose I am one. I will, by reflex, share anything I know to gain an edge in learning more. No secrets, no copyright, no proprietary information. I know that I have to stimulate the learning of others in order to become a nodal switch point in an issue. But your existing organizations don't really like people like me. We are oblivious to authority and arbitrary status. We are loyal only to the good idea. We are free to question what the actual parameters of a problem really might be rather than accept the context you define. 5. WHAT IS FEASIBLE AS ACTION CONTRIBUTING TO REAL PUBLIC PARTICIPATION. Allowing "representatives" of the public interest on closed "advisory panel" discussions is just NOT meaningful participation. (OVERHEAD) - DEMOCRATIZE CITIZEN PARTICIPATION IN MAKING TECHNOLOGY POLICY BY: * Consensus conferences, public forums and workshops * Citizen advisory boards * Community research centers / participatory research * Social and political impact statements * Use the Internet to bypass media based manipulation of opinion * Lobbying * Tax credits for research or investment advancing social objectives * Worker involvement in design and management of workplace technology * Designate 3% of technological project budgets for studies of social implications Help people in low income neighborhoods understand and influence economic development * Match local production to local demand, complementing the tilt toward global markets Counterbalance ties of universities and governments to business, by participating in local social issues and citizens' concerns * Educate students, via internships and volunteer work, for independent social criticism and responsible citizenship These are quite conventional examples of traditional community development options for action. By including this checklist here, I'm serving notice that these sorts of tactics are going to start appearing in Cyberspace 6. CLOSE: RESPONSIBLE CITIZENSHIP AND COMMUNITY Electronic infrastructure.....Electronic super highways In the name of economic necessity, these expressions depersonalize actions that have profoundly personal consequences. Some of those consequences are exciting, some are appalling. But we are using them to translate the practice of citizenship into the art of shopping. The public needs to take back the language of discourse. An "electronic superhighway" sounds both high tech engineering and also imaginary. It sounds like a concept we can ignore. But this concept, however described, is having a socio-economic impact on physical geography and spatial relationships that far exceeds all the hydro dams, pipelines or roads to resources that we've ever built. Where's the socio-economic impact statement? It's far past time that we knew who benefits and who pays. >From the experience of FreeNets, there are four assumptions about the public interest in the Information Society that I find important, but very difficult to communicate. An awareness of their significance doesn't really occur until you've wandered into cyberspace. That is to say, they are reports from the other side. They represent important choices for everyone, but choices that are more apparent to those who have already made a conscious transition to an Information Society. (OVERHEAD) - THESE TRUTHS ABOUT CYBERSPACE I HOLD TO BE SELF EVIDENT: 1. We can develop "community" with information technology. 2. Networks are more about conversations mediated by computer communications than they are about access to information. 3. To make the networks function as the neurons of social connection, it is essential that the technologies be designed to place all of the power to connect and to communicate into the hands of the individual. 4. In the view of economics, all that is left of our social role in public life is our duty to consume. In an Information Society, there is a very real possibility of regaining the role of citizen. My own vision of the Information Society includes a positive push toward social change in the direction of communities that are less "representative" and more participative, based on individual responsibility. I'm not in FreeNet to gain access to more electronic toys, and in the process give my hard earned money to those who already have more than I do. I'm in it because of the potential to discuss, understand and act on common problems with my real and virtual neighbours. If our emerging "Knowledge Society" merely defines everybody as "consumers" of information then we fail. There's much more at stake in cultural survival than the success of markets. Universal access to that new global conversation means universal participation in shaping its content. That's the mission and purpose of community networks. ...... <---- information deleted by the editor Garth Graham aa127@freenet.carleton.ca <<< NGL/CANIS (Community Access Network Information Services) >>> Box 86, Ashton, Ont., K0A 1B0 613-253-3497 ================================================================= Andrew Bjerrings talk included this outline for his explanation of UNDERSTANDING CONVERGENCE ON THE INFORMATION HIGHWAY [ I will attempt to flesh it out a bit. ed ] Three Starting Paradigms Telcos Internet Cable Each has the following unique characteristics Appliance: Telephone Computer Television [ what you use ] Application: Voice Call E-mail T.V. Channel Network: Switched Routing Broadcast Circuit Hierarchy "Islands" Business: Private Volunteer Entrepr'n. Monopoly Organization Planning: Closed- Open- Closed- Centralized Decentralized Decentralized Customer: Home/ Universities/ Home Business Research Instn. Allies: Governments Schools/ Information Communities Industries Information Carrier of A universal A "500 Highway wide range of peer-to-peer Channel Goal info. services network universe ----------------------------------------------------------------- [ each of these models is completely different and the owners don't understand each others universes ] INFORMATION HIGHWAY Towards Convergence [ Mr Bjerring now goes on to suggest that in convergence the following characteristics will dominate; and each characteristic derives from one of the distinct models listed above ] Closest Current Property - Prototype will come form Local Ubiquity: Telcos Global Reach: Telcos/Internet Open Architecture: Internet Ease-of-use: Telcos/cable Capacity/bandwidth: Cable (one-way) Intelligent Appliances: Internet Interactivity: Telcos/Internet Info. Services Provision: Cable/Internet Affordability: Telcos Diversity of Applications: Internet Flexibility: Internet Business Organization: Telcos [ Its a hard to capture in this form but he feels that each of the above characteristics will be part of our future and the closed current model for that future characteristic is listed accross form it. As you can see he proposes the each of the now distinct system will provide some of the FEEL of the coming system. ] ============================================== NETWORKS and COMMUNITY is a public service of FUTURE DATA; a partnership of researchers and research system designers. For commercial services contact Gwyneth Store - circa@io.org Net facilities for the preparation of this newsletter are provided by the DISTRIBUTED KNOWLEDGE PROJECT - York University - Canada Back issues are archived through the kindness of the staff at the WELL : gopher ----> well.sf.ca.us ->networks -->community "subscriptions" are available through the generosity of the listowner for the RRE NEWS SERVICE: subscribe by sending e-mail to rre-request@weber.ucsd.edu) with a SUBJECT LINE reading "subscribe ". Additional distribution is assisted by the managers and owners of NET-HAPPENINGS, COMMUNET, & the CANADIAN FREENET listservs This newsletter is in the PUBLIC DOMAIN and may be used as you see fit. To contribute items or enguire about this newsletter contact Sam Sternberg .