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This should be the national investment
agenda for countries such as the UK, and Australia.
These days, workers don't have to use
the public transport system to get themselves to work; they
don't have to catch a plane to deliver the goods to the
other side of the world. Now that e-business is growing
so quickly and workers can "go to work on the internet"
or "deliver the products online", it's clear where
government infrastructure priorities should lie.
Unfortunately too many of our non-digital
policy makers and leaders just don't get it.
They still think that computers (and
internet connections) are an option - for individuals. And
while they remain keen to promote (and pay for) the latest
railway line across the Australian desert, or the latest
airport upgrade etc., they are shocked at the very idea
that everyone should have a computer and an ISP.
They just can't comprehend the need
for the entire population to be provided with telecommuting
facilities - and that it makes good sense for this to be
a government responsibility.
Some governments have got the message.
In Sweden for example, more than 60% of the total population
will have a PC by the end of 1999; and more than one third
of these purchases are being made on a government sponsored
scheme. So there are no prizes for guessing how well Sweden
will do in finding jobs for the workforce, and design services
for the global market place. Here comes the IKEA successor.
In a digital society, everyone must
have a digital connection; digital citizenship demands nothing
less. Providing such a coordinated information infrastructure
calls for a mind change; it isn't an accounting exercise.
Because telephones have been part of
the industrial economy, they have become readily available,
and you don't normally have to buy them. In Australia, for
example, Telstra "rents" out the handset - and
you pay for your calls. And many mobile phone companies
"give away" the phone - and sell the customer
their service plans.
One US company has already caught on.
Hardware is cheap, they say. They too "give away"
the computer. You buy the connection and the customer service.
Such a strategy might not put an instant
end to the two-class system of information haves and have-nots,
but it is certainly a move in the right direction.
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