John Usher wrote:
>If, like us however, your policy is not to charge, on the basis that the
>service is for access to information sources, *and* you only have a
>limited quantity of equipment, then you could consider that users using
>free email are obstructing information seekers, and effectively getting
>cheap, worldwide phone calls.
Nice question. The difficulty seems to be caused by seeing this technology
as about just providing access to information sources (or is it libraries
just being about providing access to information sources?) when for many
people far greater significance lies in the power of online communications.
So maybe the trick is to get libraries recognised as providing local
access to communication channels. Unfortunately there's no precedent,
(woops I nearly wrote There's no President...) - relatively few libraries
have public payphones in them or faxes for public use ... not many
libraries made significant contributions to the community publishing trends
of previous decades ... how many school classrooms have telephone points
... when do schoolkids use the telephone as part of structured learning, in
schools or in libraries? Social policy has to be racked up a few notches
to appreciate the significance of ICTs *as a means of communicating*,
rather than for people to go on being the passive recipients of knowledge
produced for them.
So John, what chance Islington maintaining their excellent policy but
articulating a new basis for it which is less about information sources in
the traditional sense and more about promoting communication as part of
people's everyday life in the Information Society? (Ah yes, costs. So
it's back to the need for a campaign, a real campaign, for free local
calls, without making the US mistake of treating public access to ICTs as
something morally inappropriate for taxpayers' money)
regards
kevin
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Kevin Harris
Community Development Foundation
http://www.cdf.org.uk
60 Highbury Grove, London N5 2AG ... tel 0171 226 5375 ... fax 0171 704 0313
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%%
|