Jan 29 - Feb 5, 1998

Dear Friends and colleagues:

Hello, I'm Jim Johnson, the US coordinator for the Nikkei Net Conference. Among other things, I serve as deputy director for the Global Information Infrastructure Commission, which is a co-sponsor of this project.

May I join Waichi Sekiguchi and Nikkei in welcoming you to the first Nikkei sponsored global Net Conference. This is an experiment in global conversation, and we very much appreciate your willingness to express you thoughts about the three topical areas that have been identified: Asia and the information age; electronic commerce; and the Network society.

I nominated many of your to participate because I know you have some very interesting thoughts which have arisen out of very important experiences. Your ideas will become the basis for further discussion at the Nikkei Global Information Summit on March 10 in Tokyo. And we hope that this conversation will continue.

As you may know there is a simultaneous conversation among our Japanese speaking colleagues, and one among English speakers. If you are bi-lingual we invite you to join in both.

As a starting point, one of our colleagues, Ernest Wilson of the University of Maryland has suggested that, 'Experience in private firms, NGOs and government shows conclusively that the critical elements to successful use of IT is not the IT, but the LEADERSHIP, VISION AND THE INSTITUTIONAL CHANGES necessary to apply the most appropriate technologies to societal needs.'

What do you think? Are we really facing a global revolution? Is information technology going to have such a dramatic impact on our world? Or can this be managed as a transitional change which becomes absorbed into various aspects of our lives, like the telephone or television did? How do we balance the call for LEADERSHIP with the idea that the NET is a grass roots movement with lots of nodes, but no apex?

Let's hear from you.

In response to Mr. Johnson's challenge, I offer the following comments:

1. Yes, we are facing a global revolution. What makes this decade and the coming years so remarkable is the substantial equality of opportunity that is available to acquire the essential technologies, knowledge and human resources and develop competitive, world-class solutions. There is little question that enormous disparities continue to exist with respect to all of these ingredients, but what is impressive is the capacity of Southeast Asia, India, Europe, Russia and North America to produce and compete with regard to content, software and the additional products by which the revolution's impact will be measured.

This challenges the process of change in a way that will not allow historic patterns of accommodating new technology to succeed. We will require different architectures for sustaining the economic, technological and political shifts that will result from this revolution. Building these different architectures--particularly in how we convene and develop governance and rule-making--is important especially if we are to successfully avoid one of the other traditional tools of responding to new wealth or new tools within society--warfare and conquest. Without conspicuously committing to avoiding those consequences, there is concern that the revolution will prove to be more 'traditional' than desired.

2. Because of the fact that development and innovation is occurring in so many venues, and across so many different formulations of cooperation among government, commerce and academe, it is easy to dismiss the calls for leadership as impossible to accommodate, no matter how compelling the rhetoric. But what has quickly occurred is that the 'grass-roots' diversity of innovation which characterized the first generation of the Internet has shifted to the traditional alliances of power--innovation is now being subsidized by commerce and government as investments the success of which, unfortunately, may be ultimately measured by traditional means.

The leadership required must be focused differently--the investments must be encouraged, but different means of measuring success must also be advocated. As the Net fosters cross-cultural exchanges, improves the dissemination of global knowledge, establishes new international trade and fosters inter-dependency, we must collectively stress the importance of these measures of success as companions to more traditional measures. The 'apex' of which Mr. Johnson inquires will be found in the evolution of a global community that provides leadership in valuing the inherent potential of technology to achieve these objectives.

My name is Ronda Hauben I am coauthor of 'Netizens: On the History and Impact of Usenet and the Internet' which is online in a draft edition and has been published in a print edition in both English and Japanese.

I have been active both doing research online about the development of the Net, and participating in Usenet and the Internet.

My concerns are:

1) How to continue to research and document how Usenet and the Internet have developed and what their impact has been. This work provides a material basis to frame the vision that will guide the further development of the Net.

2) How to make the new communications potential that the Net makes possible available more broadly and widely to people.

3) How to establish why study of these developments is so important toward the continuation of the important social and technological advance represented by Usenet and the Internet.

There seems lots of speculation as to what the new communication networking advances make possible.

The actual study of the foundations of the Net, however, make it possible to build a vision, not on speculation but by seeing what a prototype makes possible.

In the early years of the development of the Net, there was a conference at MIT celebrating the development of the computer. At that conference the pioneers of the computer revolution discussed the needs they saw for the computer in the future. They looked at what would be the need in the university, in the library of the future, etc.

Also they discussed how there was a need for a broad based democratic participation in the development of the computer, rather than having its developments decided by a few in secret.

The computer pioneers at the MIT conference set a framework for a democratic process for technological development of the computer and it would be helpful to set a similar framework for a democratic process for the future development of the Net today.

That is some of the reason we have written 'Netizens: On the History and Impact of Usenet and the Internet' and are encouraged by its publication in English and Japanese.

There needs to be a broad public discussion of what should be the future development of the Net.

Rather than speculating what the development of the Net may lead to, it would be good to discuss what we want to be the social benefits it can make possible, and then to work to make that vision a reality.

I would like to respectfully challenge Jim's statement below, because I believe that communication media have had, and will continue to have, a profound impact on society:

>Or can this be managed as a transitional change which
>becomes absorbed into various aspects of our lives, like
>the telephone or television did?

The telephone and television changed everything. Some of these changes were socially beneficial, and some were not.

Briefly, the modern bureaucracy, both the corporation as it exists in this century, and state bureaucracies, could not have developed and could not exist without the telephone. The telegraph and railroad worked together to create the first non-local national businesses, and set in motion a series of changes in the way people are organized (according to synchronized schedules!) that created the foundation for today's business and governmental institutions. The telephone, together with the automobile, the airplane, and the skyscraper, made possible the urban landscape and the transnational corporation.

The television has become the most important political force in the world today. In a coup-d'etat, the first battles are no longer over armories, because that is not where power is centralized. During the fall of communism, the most important battles in Bucharest and Moscow were for television stations, because that is where the power to persuade, inform, and misinform, is centralized. In democratic nations, leaders are elected and policies are sold to the electorate like products. If you don't have the money to buy television advertising, you cannot effectively run for office. In the United States, we elected Ronald Reagan and Bill Clinton primarily because they are geniuses at presenting themselves on television. For a more detailed analysis, I recommend Neil Postman's book, 'Amusing Ourselves To Death.'

I believe that many-to-many media have the potential to initiate changes at least as profound as the telephone and television did. I will make more detailed statements in this regard in subsequent postings.

About facing a global revolution: yes, the change is big, perhaps still bigger than most people can believe at this moment. Anyway, IT is just a tool. Leadership, vision and the institutional changes are surely necessary. But above all I would like to mention human resources. It's people who use IT, who make desicions, face challenges, cooperate and (hopefully) benefit from this development. Hierarchies become lower, we are working at virtual offices. Information flow is enormous. It's not only the coded information but tacit knowledge. Knowledge management is a key question. Globalising information should mean localising it!

Here I would like to add two lists:

A Conditions for the information Society

- proper technical infrastructure
- content, substance
- access to information networks
- ability and skills to obtain and use information and knowledge
- rules of the game: technical standars, regulations, agreements etc
- cooperation 

B Impacts of the Information Society

- new, better, more efective and cheaper services - without time or place
limitations, even tailored
- enhanced competitiveness and changes in business structures
- changes in work life, free time and democracy
- life-long or sustainable learning emphasized

With regard to the points raised by Mr Ritter; [002]

Indeed society is facing challenges of a magnitude never before experienced. Also the speed at which a medium such as the Internet can initiate these changes amplifies the impact to the extent that we have yet to grasp. Therefore to try and use historical perspective as a guide to absorbing such developments is pointless. This does not mean that some people or organisations will not try to do this!

The global nature of the Internet as a communications medium is very healthy in that it excludes very few people from participating. For some companies this is very frightening as it negates many of the advantages large multi- national companies strive to obtain. e.g. Size, local presence and a large asset base which are sometimes used as a barrier to entry for competition. In many respects now all that is needed is access to an Internet access point and brainpower! I am in no doubt that the less developed parts of the world have brainpower in abundance and are rapidly acquiring access to the 'Net'.

We should welcome and encourage the additional intelligence resources this will unleash amongst the global community. Any attempts to marginalise the development of these activities should be avoided as we will all benefit but perhaps not in ways we might expect.

Mr Ritter's final point about leadership having a different focus and measurement of success reevaluated are both essential. Working as I do for a company heavily involved in international trade I can only see trade growing as these developments to remove barriers continue.

My hypothetical framework to understand the nature of today's info-commu- nications revolution is to look at it as two-fold social changes taking place simultaneously: rise of the third industrial revolution and transition to the third phase of modernization. These social changes seem to be inseparably related to both technological changes and changes in human consciousness even though I cannot say exatly how they are related.

Modernization, in my view, is a continuous process of human empowerment, first in military sphere (militarization), then in economic sphere (industrialization), and now, probably finally, in intellectual sphere (informatization). That is to say, we are entering not a post-modern era but a maturing phase of the modern civilization in which progress and development still continue at a breath-taking speed. But we are learning that our power, either military, economic, or intellectual, is not infinite and we are far from being infallible. In some cases and for some time, we might move backward rather than forward. Yet, as a general trend, we may safely say that our modern society has been and will be achieving some real progress so that our future is brighter than our past.

I look forward to stimulating discussions in this mailing list, being encouraged to find the names of my old and new friends here.

Dear colleagues:

It is clear from the number of responses which we have had from very thoughtful contributors, that the topic of the nature of the impact of information technology is of great interest.

While most seem to agree that we are experiencing a revolution, not just evolutionary changes, there are many who propose that this revolution must be MANAGED. Leadership is a word that is being used a lot in your contributions.

How is this leadership to be applied? Are leaders people of vision? Do they know where they are going, and we follow? Is that the model of leadership we are talking about in the cyber world? Does the technology itself pre-suppose or pre-dispose certain leadership styles? What impact have you seen from IT on your community? How are the leaders responding to that?

We are awaiting your views and ideas.

I'd like to make my statement on what Ernest Wilson and Jim had said about the IT Revolution.

I think that is completly true what Ernest said that the 'critical elements to successful use of IT is not the IT, but the LEADERSHIP, VISION AND THE INSTITUTIONAL CHANGES necessary to apply the most appropriate technologies to societal needs.'

I'd like to make a big difference between corporations and SME's. I've seen here in Argentina and in Brazil, how big corporations where slow to understand the great benefits and the big changes that IT and the Internet are making possible, while SME's where very fast to adopt new technologies. I would say, that in general terms, small companies in which IT mean a proportional bigger cost reduction solution than in big organizations, leadershio, vision and institutional changes are bound to happen quicker.

If this is so, and considering that SME's are one of the pilars of a countries economy, I would say that we've seen nothing but just the begginig of the biggest revolution our Global Society have ever seen.

For sure, IT Revolution will change most every aspect of our lives. Today, we have the Internet, the E-Mail, the Web sites, Intranet and Extranet. These are the tecnological changes necessary to give place to a bigger change, the social revolution. What's comming is THE revolution. Interactive TV, cheaper and faster world wide communications, next generation political procedures, etc.

I would finally say, yes, we are facing The Global Revolution of next century. We'll see how new types of societies will grow, and what's more important, we can take the Leadership in many aspects of this revolution.

Allow me to heartily endorse the notion for a new structure of governance that can provide the necessary stability in formulating a predictable, stable environment that will accelerate electronic commerce.

Underlying that concept is the more important principle that those investing in the infrastructure and technologies must also commit to developing the required predictable environment if they hope to realize the returns on investment that are expected.

Councils are interchangeable with concepts of communities of interest, but invite the realization that membership includes agreements to be bound by governing rules. This will foster market development and, as companies and consumers move between communities, promote interoperable rules systems, which only enhances trade and competitiveness.

The Global Information Infrastructure Commission, the Internet Law and Policy Forum and Mr. Collins' organization are all excellent examples of evolving efforts at developing the required organizational structures. I would welcome examples of others.

I am writing this from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. I moved from Tokyo to KL last April, to further promote networking in Asia.

Over the past year, there have been many interesting and serious challenges and events happened in this side of the world.

INET97 in KL in June was just an overture. Currency turmoil started in Thailand now spread most of Asia, giving further economic impact to the rest of the world. The haze originated from Indonesia spread to here, Malaysia and Singapore very badly in summer, seemed gone now, but may happen again soon.

MSC, Malaysia's Multimedia Super Corridor, and SingaporeONE is on the progress. Singapore has loosened its Internet content control policy.

The sharp decline of Asian currencies against US dollar, happened from November - January 98 is giving heavy burden to many IT(Information Technology) and Internet use and promotion in Asia. Most equipment used for IT are either US made or traded on US$ - automatic price hike, indeed.

Besides, all international telecom/Internet charges are also settled using US$, thus many ISP's in Asia now must pay more $$$s to US and other carriers and ISP peers.

PC purchase/sales are starting to decline. Government budgets for IT may be scaled down.

But still, I can feel that people in IT and Internet business are relatively more optimistic than, say, financial or real estate business.

Anyway, I am moderating [ASIA] track in Japanese for this GIS conference, and will chair that session in March. I see many old friends names here, and want to make many more new friends.

Reading and writing in English takes 2 to 3 times, at least, more time and energy for me, but I will try to follow as much as possible.

Is there anyone who can give your insight on new US government policy on Internet Governance? Mr. Magainzer's Green Paper, I mean. Especially about the implications to non-US countries and people.

I have read many comments regarding Jim Johnson's recent questions to the group. It seems to me there are many fine minds thinking very hard on this topic.

On behalf of the Consortium for Global Commerce (CGC), may I offer some simple thoughts regarding Jim's proposals:

Leadership: In the history of international commerce, the rule of law was the one and only incentive for merchants of other lands to risk the unknown for commercial gain. If their safety could be guaranteed, they would return time and again to establish trading ties. As the Internet is transforming from an academic exchange with one rule of 'peer law' to an open global forum, one model for leadership will be a conjoining of various recognised centers of leadership to govern the overall community.

History and current practice provide us with models. Many take the form of Councils which functionally may look like a cross between democratic forms of representation, and socialist styled working parties. Oftentimes, such Councils can appear so similar, one might be hard pressed to differentiate the roots from which they spring.

In my opinion, such a Council or Council of Councils, could become the institutional structure for governing the Internet which would be acceptable to the widest range of our current geo-political systems.

Dear colleagues

Kumon-san referred to a continuous process of modernization and Wolfgang Hennes wrote about a new kind of leadership, leadership by networking. Leadership isn't perhaps any more concentrated to leaders and their visions and strategies. Leadership and the creation as well as the implementation of visions and strategies - that's a continuous process connecting and focusing human resourses and available information. Leadership process means commitment to common goals at all levels, focusing the efforts. In practise this networking means lower hierarchies and perhaps some kind of a catalysing role of leaders. Jim asked are leaders people by vision. Perhaps leaders are those who are able to process visions with others, at the same time catalysing commitment to these visions and strategies.

The amount of information, that's tremendous. The overflow of information can block everything, all reasonable work. Quite many people would prefer receiving less information. Condensed, better focused, tailored. And one difficulty is of course this information which cannot be coded, how to transfer experience, wisdom etc.

Then, what does this new leadership mean to electronic commerce? The Sacher report publisehd by the OECD last year begins with a paragraph: 'Electronic commerce refers generally to all forms of transactions relating to commercial activities, involving both organisations and individuals, that are based upon the processing and transmisison of digitised data, including text, sound and visual images. It also refers to the effects that electronic exchange of commercial information may have on the institutions and processes that support and govern commercial activities.' This definition is of course just one among dozens but I think it's quite useful. It's broad and flexible enough and refers to effects on institutions and processes.

Technologically the situation is very good. E.g. in Finland our infrastructure is excellent, telecom markets are fully liberalised, deregulation has proceeded very fast, no de facto monopolies, tariffs are among the cheapest ones in the OECD countries (we have shown it's worth to liberalise the markets), the amount of Internet hosts per capita is clearly the highest in the world, the amount of mobile phones per capita is also the highest in the world, more than 40 %. Electronic banking is very advanced here, we have old traditions in that. Our enterprises have been able to e.g develop strong encryption technology (which is broadly in use all over the world, even in the US). People are technophiles, we are interested in using new technologies. All kind of e-comm activities, as well. - Finland is quite often called the Telecom Laboratory of Europe - or even the Telecom lab of the world.

I think in general the most challenging part of the 'e-comm acceptance' process is perhaps the trust, how to create that. People have to be able to trust that everything is OK with e.g. safety, security and consumer protection. They think if it's really safe to pay, send their VISA card numbers and what if something is wrong with the product, will they get their money back. Visions and strategies, no matter if they are corporate, national or international, don't help so much if general accpetance and also commitment not strong enough. The acceptance is not created via any killer applications, we need general rules of the game (no overregulation, please), enough solid information and analysis what this all means, practical examples. Surely this is a difficult leadership process where human attitudes afefct a lot.

Now I have to stop this and start to prepare my speech on electronic commerce for tomorrow. Snow outside.

Dear colleagues, I have used my day by preparing my speech on electronic commerce for tomorrow morning. I thought perhaps you might be interested in a short overview on e-comm initiatives from Japan, the US and Europe (without any comments). - I won't guarantee everything is right.

A couple of addresses: 
- Europe: http://www.ispo.cec.be (the Information Society Project Office of
the European Commission) 
- US: an easy way for me is http://www.usis.fi, that is the American Embassy
in Finland, they have collected all important US government e-comm links at
their homepages.
- OECD: http://www.oecd.org/dsti/sti/it/ec/index.htm

- Finland (Ministry of Trade and Industry):
http://www.vn.fi/vn/ktm/english/tos/sisaeng.htm

*************************************************************
Towards Digital Economy Era, Japan

Principles
-Constructive efforts and swift response to change 
-Resolution of problems through technology and the marketplace 
-Security and trust 
-Universal access 
-International coordination 

Issues
-Building an International Framework 
-Formulating Rules for Commercial Transactions 
-Establishing a new System of Intellectual Property Rights 
-Ensuring Security 
-Protecting Personal Data and Privacy 
-Dealing with Illegal and Harmful Contents 
-Addressing Consumer Problems 
-Providing Support for SMEs 
-Human Resources and Education 
-Assuring Interoperability 
-Dealing with Other Institutional Issues


***********************************
A Framework for Global Electronic Commerce, USA
Principles
-The private sector should lead. 
-Governments should avoid undue restraint on electronic commerce. 
-Where government involvement is needed, its aim should be to support and
enforce a predictable, minimalist, consistent and simple legal environment
for commerce. 
-Governments should recognise the unique qualities of the Internet
-Electronic commerce over the Internet should be facilitated on a global basis.

Issues for International Agreement
-financial issues
-customs and taxation
-electronic payments
-legal issues
-uniform commercial code for electronic commerce
-intellectual property protection
-privacy
-security
-market access issues
-telecommunications infrastructure and information technology
-content
-technical standards

************************************************
A European Initiative in Electronic Commerce

Ensuring access to the global marketplace: infrastructure, technology and
services
-Maximising the benefits of the liberalisation of IT markets 
-Removing capacity bottlenecks 
-Maximising the effects of telecommunications liberalisation 
-Ensuring interoperability in a competitive environment 
-Making user-friendly electronic commerce services available: European R&D 
-International industrial cooperation in infrastructure, technologies and
services

Creating a favourable regulatory framework.
-Building trust and confidence 
-Ensuring full access to the single market 
-Principles of an electronic commerce regulatory framework 
-The essential features of a regulatory approach
-A regulatory approach that develops appropriate horizontal policies 
-Establishing Appropriate Protection for Intellectual Property Rights and
Conditional Access Services 
-Ensuring a Clear and Neutral Tax Environment
-Working towards a consistent global regulatory framework

Promoting a favourable business environment
-Consumers: creating awareness and confidence 
-Business: creating awareness and encouraging best practice 
-Public administrations: promoting a more pro-active public sector 
-Putting electronic commerce at the service of the citizen

Dear GIS online conference participants:

This is Waichi Sekiguchi from Nikkei.

Thank you very much for your informative comments. I think this is going to be a wonderful discussion.

Today we received a message from Mr. Ira C. Magaziner, Senior Advisor to the U.S. President. Unfortunately it was not delivered to everyone properly. I would like to post it here for him.

-----Original Message-----
From: Ira Magaziner
Subject: Re: from KL, Malaysia

The green paper is available at www.ntia.doc.gov. I will be speaking at the Economist conference in KL next Thursday and at the apricot conference in Manila on the 18th. I would be happy to discuss our ideas and hear yours around those sessions. Otherwise, please e mail your reactions.