Information Resources for Telecommunications Planning:

A Guide for Rural Massachusetts

Christopher J. Campbell

This document contains many links. If you find that one is no longer in existence please contact us at:

ruralma@larp.umass.edu

Introduction

Information and communication technologies have been developing at a rapid pace over the past few years and decades. For example, desktop computers now have the speed and power that once occupied whole rooms, and the fax machine has transformed the telephone into a faster partial substitute for the mail. In addition to advances in the various forms of telecommunications and computing, both are becoming more and more intermeshed. Phone lines now carry computer data from automatic teller machines to personal computers. Desktop computer video conferencing now allows simultaneous communication by voice, video, and data. There are many other examples, and each year brings new ones. Some predict that rural communities will benefit tremendously as computers and telecommunications enable rural residents to tap into expanding amounts of information and increasing employment opportunities. Others predict that new technologies will cause rural places to fall further and further behind in infrastructure and service, or that technology will allow urban places to take control of rural employment, retail opportunities, credit, education and government. It is almost certain that advances in telecommunications and computers will have an effect on rural communities in Massachusetts. What the effect will be is less certain, but planning for the change will make a positive result more likely.

Research, planning, and action to guide the development of telecommunications and computing in rural Massachusetts are relatively young activities. Therefore, the amount of information that many policy makers, planners, and citizens know on the topic is relatively small. The aim of this publication is to help to expand that information base. It is written for policy makers, planners, and citizens who are interested in the use of telecommunications and computing as a tool for economic or community development, especially in rural Massachusetts. It is a beginning only, intended as a brief introduction to selected ideas and to some valuable sources of information or assistance.

The useful life of much information on telecommunications and computing is relatively short due to the rapid rate of technological development and other changes associated with them. Finding up-to-date information is vital to those who would plan for the future of telecommunications and computing in rural Massachusetts. This reports describes several kinds of information resources: periodicals, books, organizations, and electronic resources. This body of information contains resources useful for rural telecommunication planning in general as well as ones that have relevance for Massachusetts in particular. The goal is to provide a sample of the information available, and provide those who wish to learn more with a few places to start. The first section, "Where to Start Looking for Information," describes information resources containing a broad range of information on rural telecommunications and telecommunications planning. These are places to turn for an introduction to the issues of rural telecommunications or for ongoing developments. The second section, "Where to Look for Information on Specific Topics," introduces some of the sub-topics of rural telecommunications planning and identifies some information resources dealing with these sub-topics.

Where to Start Looking for Information

Though there are many books that touch on issues affecting rural telecommunications and computing, there are only a handful of recent books that deal with the particular topic of rural telecommunications in a broad-based way. An excellent overview of a great many of the telecommunications issues facing rural America is the U. S. Congress Office of Technology Assessment's 1991 publication Rural America at the Crossroads: Networking for the Future. It addresses economic trends, economic development, infrastructure, regulation, and the role of government. This publication deals with some of the following specific issues. It argues that there is a growing need for rural areas to have access to information and communication in order to participate in the new economy. The emergence of a new regulatory framework may make it more difficult for rural areas to gain access to equal levels of telecommunications service. The book advocates linking rural telecommunications policy and rural economic development policy. And it argues for the need to be flexible and link together different users when designing a rural telecommunications policy.

One of the publications most often cited in the recent literature on rural telecommunications is the 1992 publication Electronic Byways: State Policies for Rural Development Through Telecommunications by Edwin B. Parker et al. This book is a mixture of discussion about over-arching issues at the state and local level, and specific case studies of rural communities using telecommunications. It covers the changes in the rural economy and the telecommunications regulatory framework, and how these changes affect the way that rural places must think about their telecommunications needs. The authors discuss state policies that deal with the issues of service availability, service quality, and cost. They identify the players in telecommunications at the state level, and review different kinds of state and local rural development initiatives using telecommunications. The book then provides statistical evidence for the assertion that telecommunications can help rural development. Finally, the authors make a long list of recommendations for states, development agencies, and telecommunications providers.

Because of the rapid rate of change, one of the easiest ways to find information quickly on rural telecommunications and computing is in popular current-issues publications. The news magazine literature does not go into depth on the issues involved, but can provide a sense of the kinds of emerging telecommunications and commuting applications. Examples are two articles in Business Week in the past two years, one which describes the economic development strategy of Telluride, Colorado based on telecommunications (Atchison 1993), and another which surveys recent state efforts to build fiber-optics for such things as distance learning, telemedicine, and the provision of government services (Lewyn 1994). Computerworld provides another example, an article reporting on the development of satellite work centers in Hawaii, California, Washington state, and Japan (Betts 1991).

The information on rural telecommunications and computing available in more specialized research journals ranges from case studies to statistical analysis, from theory on social impacts of telecommunications to strategies for faster implementation of new technologies. One such journal is Telecommunications Policy. Some research on applications of telecommunications has recently begun to appear in mainstream planning publications such as recent articles in Planning (Yovovich 1994) and the Journal of the American Planning Association (Handy and Mokhtarian 1995).

An expanding form of information for those interested in rural computing and telecommunications is the Internet. There are many different resources on the Internet, and many different ways to reach them. One of the most exciting new parts of the Internet is the World Wide Web (WWW)[1] . The National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) has a site on WWW. This server contains information on new developments, federal initiatives, legislation, and grants, among other things. It has hosted a "virtual conference" on the issue of universal service. It also contains links to many other potentially relevant sources of information (U. S. National Telecommunications and Information Administration 1995). Figure 1 shows a view of one of its pages.

Figure 1. A page from NTIA's WWW site.

Where to Look for Information on Specific Topics

While in many fields, the practitioners already have a working knowledge of necessary terms, this is not necessarily the case in the field of rural telecommunications planning. Telecommunications and computers have undergone such explosive growth in recent years that many concepts are poorly understood by most who work outside of the computer and telecommunications industries. Yet planning for the use of information and communication in the community requires the activity of more than just technology specialists. The number of telecommunications and computing concepts and the rate at which they change makes it difficult to explain them all here. However, there are existing resources that do this job quite well. This section introduces resources dealing with particular topics related to rural telecommunications planning, as well as briefly describing the topics themselves.

Kinds of Infrastructure and Services

The many different kinds telecommunications networks with their many components present a terminology challenge for the uninitiated. So too do the many different services that this infrastructure supports. The Colorado Advanced Technology Institute (CATI) Rural Telecommunications Resource Guide currently provides one of the better, and more thorough, explanations of basic telecommunications concepts that those engaged in rural telecommunications planning might want to know (Colorado Advanced Technology Institute 1995). A related document in printed form is Telecommunications and Rural Development: A Community Planning Guide, produced by the Colorado Center for Community Development at the University of Colorado, Denver and the Interdisciplinary Telecommunications Program at the University of Colorado, Boulder. This publication provides a good explanation of different kinds of telecommunications networks for telecommunications novices. It also lays out a step-by-step planning process for rural telecommunications planning (Colorado Center for Community Development and Interdisciplinary Telecommunications Program 1992).

The Massachusetts Telecomputing Coalition is an unofficial working group with representatives from organizations involved in education or communications in Massachusetts. It offers a publication called Models for Connecting K-12 Schools to the Internet: A Guide for Decisionmakers. While this publication is targeted to people in primary and secondary education, it actually provides a good introduction to some of the alternatives in creating networks that are connected to the Internet. It also includes a glossary that, while less detailed than CATI's, explains some additional basic computer networking terms (Massachusetts Telecomputing Coalition 1994). It is obtainable in printed form from TERC in Cambridge or electronically by anonymous ftp or gopher from hub.terc.edu.

Phone service is no longer a homogenous product, but is a variety of hardware and services. There are different modes of communication, including voice, data, and video. The wide variety of services and possibilities of service is unknown to the average telephone customer. NYNEX, as the local telephone service provider for almost all of rural Massachusetts, has information on what forms of telecomputing and telecommunication are currently possible in rural Massachusetts, and what could become possible. For very practical information on telecommunications services offered in New England, there are two publications from NYNEX. The first, A Glossary of NYNEX Products and Services, provides brief descriptions of many kinds of telecommunications services. While this publication is oriented toward NYNEX employees, it gives a sense of what specific telecommunications services are being offered at this time. NYNEX also offers a customer-oriented publication on data communication, How to Talk Like a Data Communications Expert, that is a good place to start for those with low levels of familiarity with the topic. Other telecommunications providers, such as cable companies and local Internet providers may be important locally and regionally. Indeed, to a greater and greater extent it is possible for telephone, data, and video to run over the same system, providing opportunities for service providers to cross over into other aspects of telecommunications.

Telework

The use of telecommunications in work and business has spawned a great number of terms. "Telecommuting" is a relatively common term in the United States and it generally refers to the use of telecommunications to substitute for all or part of a journey to a worksite. In short, it involves bringing the work to the worker instead of vice versa. A broader term, and one with more international usage is "teleworking." While teleworking is often a synonym for telecommuting, it can also imply the use of telecommunications in situations where there is not really a "commute" to speak of, such as self-employed, home-based workers, private consultants, and contract workers (U. S. Department of Transportation 1994, 9).

Until recently, telework was most often associated with home-based work, but now the concept of telework at centers in the neighborhood or local community has become more common. "Telework center," "telecommuting center," "telecenter," and "satellite office" are commonly used to approximate the same idea. Teleworking also need not happen full-time. Teleworkers may work full-time at home, at a center, or as often happens, split their time between both or either one and a central office. Among telecommuters, the part-time telecommuter is currently most common (Handy and Mokhtarian 1995, 101).

Telework can also be a means of bringing new jobs into a rural community. Sometimes this can be in the form of a back office, when a company sets up a remote office in a rural area to handle clerical or data processing functions. Telebusiness centers, being pursued by the Nebraska Department of Economic Development, are facilities owned and operated by a local small city or co-op and would be built for importing electronic work to the community from around the country and the world (Hoy 1995).

One kind of teleworker that has received much attention in the popular press is the "lone eagle," a term coined by the Center for the New West, a Denver-based think tank. Lone eagles are professionals and business people who are knowledge workers and move to rural areas, running their business through faxes, modem, express mail, and airplane tickets. They work alone or with a very small staff (Burgess 1994, 4). Some rural communities in the western U. S. have used the attraction of lone eagles as an economic development strategy, and the center provides a list of the characteristics of communities to which tend to attract lone eagles. The Center for the New West is also able to identify examples of rural communities in the western United States who are using telecommunications as a rural development strategy in a variety of ways.

California, which has been one of the leading state governments in promoting telecommuting, has published a large review of telecommuting centers nationally and internationally, Telecommuting Centers and Related Concepts: A Review of Practice[2]. It also reviews mixed-use centers that somehow involve telecommuting (Bagley, Mannering, and Mokhtarian 1994). It is probably the most comprehensive review of telecommuting centers available at this time. The federal government is also in the process of implementing telecommuting for its employees, and maintains a BBS (bulletin board system), TeleConX, containing numerous files describing the program and a growing number of reports on telecommuting[3]. This BBS includes Transportation Implications of Telecommuting, which reviews the many different forms that telework and telecommuting can take.

Distance Education and Learning about Technology

Distance learning is a term that covers a variety of applications of telecommunications to education. Broadly speaking, it can describe anything from early examples like televised educational programming to people doing individual research using remote databases. It can describe applications in elementary through adult education. In many cases, though not always, it has a video component. Distance learning is an alternative to sending rural students of any age to distant communities for educational opportunity.

Distance learning comes to many Massachusetts communities through the Massachusetts Corporation for Educational Telecommunications (MCET). MCET is a quasi-public commonwealth agency that provides telecommunications services to 85% of the school districts in Massachusetts. Their services include a satellite broadcasting system called the Mass LearnPike that delivers a series of educational programs and the possibility of two-way audio communication with the instructors (Massachusetts Corporation for Educational Telecommunications 1994, 7). It also administers the Mass Ed Online LearnNet (MEOL), which provides information through the Internet (including the World Wide Web, shown in Figure 2), and provides accounts to administrators, and some teachers. MCET provides another set of networks that can reach into existing local sites, connecting them to larger networks.

Figure 2. The Mass. Ed. Online LearnNet is on WWW.

The Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners is the state agency responsible for the maintenance and improvement of library services in Massachusetts. It is the goal of the Board to interconnect every library in the state--public, school, college, and private--through the Internet, or through dial-up access to the Internet. The immediate goal is to provide a state-wide electronic library card catalogue and a universal system of interlibrary loan (Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners 1993, 12). However, additional goals are even more ambitious. The Board sees libraries across Massachusetts becoming local public-access points for electronic information, much like traditional libraries have been local public-access points for printed information. Moreover, the Board has as a goal that local librarians should be versed in how to use these local information and telecommunication capabilities, thus providing a local resource person (Maier 1995).

An important telecommunications development coming from the educational sector is the Massachusetts Information Infrastructure 'Points of Presence' Demonstration Project. Funded through a grant from the U.S. Dept. of Commerce's Telecommunications Information Infrastructure Assistance Program (TIIAP) and a collaboration between the Massachusetts Dept. of Education, MCET, MECN, and the Massachusetts Executive Education, this project is in the process of setting up 20 demonstration sites around the state having a local network server. The program is designed to encourage local collaboration between different organizations involved in education, including the public schools, the public library, a public institution of higher learning, and school committees. Although the funds of the grant are only to be used for the support of educational telecomputing, the equipment is meant to be the basis for a broader base of users should the community desire (Massachusetts Information Infrastructure 'Points of Presence' Demonstration Project 1995, 1-2).

There are also some names which have developed for centers where people learn how to use computer and telecommunications technology. The Nebraska Department of Economic Development has given the name technology learning centers to places where community members in general and local businesses can have access to computers, and learn how to use them (Hoy 1995). Technology learning center is also a term used by the Playing to Win Network, a network of non-profit organizations that help disadvantaged communities gain access to information technology through shared computer and telecomputing facilities and training (Briscoe and Mark 1995, 1-3). A narrower term is a community computing centers, the term used by several affiliates in the New York and Boston areas.

Community Networks

Some communities and regions are beginning to develop computer networks in their communities which link up people, public institutions, and/or businesses. An important example in Massachusetts is the town of Lexington, which is working closely with BBN (the company that operates the regional Internet backbone network) to link the town's municipal offices, public schools, and public library via the town's institutional cable TV network (Wetzel 1994). At this point a "community network" is a term that can refer to many different kinds of telecommunications and computer networks; two community networking terms with more specific meanings follow.

The Rural Area Network (RAN) is a concept contained in Rural America at the Crossroads: Networking for the Future, but the spirit of the idea is echoed elsewhere under other names. The RAN is an extension of the idea of LANs, WANs, and MANs[4]. It is a geographically-defined network of computers and telecommunications in a rural area that links up a wide variety of users. By linking diverse users, the RAN can achieve greater economies of scale in the provision of telecommunications infrastructure (U.S. Congress, Office of Technology Assessment 1991, 126-130).

The "free-net" is a common term used for local dial-up networks that provide local electronic information and which often have access to the Internet. The National Public Telecomputing Network (NPTN) is a non-profit corporation based in Ohio that promotes and supports the development of rural and metropolitan "free-nets," a registered service-mark of the corporation. A free-net provides a dial-up computer network that can be installed on a personal computer and accessed by other personal computers. Users can be individuals, schools, governments, businesses, and others. All networks which use the free-net name and which come into being with NPTN's assistance must become affiliates of NPTN, and these affiliates receive continuing assistance. NPTN provides detailed information on how to set up a free-net to serve a rural area, including advice on organization, budgets and hardware. It can also provide the necessary software. The National Public Telecomputing Network also has a site on WWW. Figure 3 shows a sample page. It contains descriptions of the organization, free-nets, and services. It also contains detailed information on Rural Information Networks (RINs), as NPTN calls rural free-nets (National Public Telecomputing Network 1995).

Figure 3. A page from NPTN's WWW site.

State-wide Computer Networks

MAGNet stands for the Massachusetts Access to Government Network. It is a state-government sponsored network currently in the planning stages by the Office of Management Information Systems. How extensively it will develop is still a matter of debate, but draft plans contain some approximate and possible outlines of its structure. Many different state initiatives, such as the "motor voter" law, and many different state agencies currently require their own computer networks. In addition, there are many business and municipalities which depend on contact with the state for important information. MAGNet has the potential to serve as the network interconnecting or partially replacing the computer networks used now and in the future by all of these different organizations. It could become the "internet" for Massachusetts, and indeed would provide access to the larger Internet (Massachusetts Office of Management Information Systems 1994, 29). MAGNet could possibly even go so far as to become the backbone network for residences in the state (Bradford 1995). Figure 4 shows a WWW site that is an early product of the MAGNet development process.

Figure 4. A product of the MAGNet development process.

Community Technology Centers and Telecottages, and Televillages

Mixed-use telecenters are also a developing option. Outside the U.S., the most common name for this kind of telecenter is the "telecottage." The concept apparently was first implemented in 1985, in Sweden, where their official names are Community Teleservice Centers. Centers typically have personal computers, printers, a modem, a fax machine, and a consultant set up in a central location in isolated rural communities (Grimes 1992, 274-275). Lars Qvortrup, in Telecommunications Policy, provides one of the better descriptions:

Instead of linking individual household to the network, IT [information technology] facilities have been concentrated within a teleservice centre, containing telecommunications, EDP [electronic data processing] and, sometimes, video equipment which is thus at the disposal of the entire community. The facilities available are intended to integrate a number of different business and community activities (Qvortrup 1989, 59)

In the U.S. an initiative by the Kentucky Science and Technology Council and two rural Kentucky communities comes close to the spirit of the telecottage. The "rural televillage" can be understood as a form of mixed-use community network with a "televillage center" at its heart. The Kentucky Science and Technology Council describes the televillage center this way:

The Center is a mixed-use facility (public and private) providing a comprehensive package of services to the larger Televillage. The Center can support a variety of customers with services provided on-site or remotely. Office space may be available and organizations maybe a part of or consolidated with the Center....

The Center's service package could include computer usage, video and document conferencing, fax, optical scanning, voice and electronic mail, information access, training and consultation (Kentucky Science and Technology Council 1994, 4-5).

Some of the potential users of the televillage and televillage center include companies, schools, libraries, workers, health-care providers, government, and citizens or civic organizations (Kentucky Science and Technology Council 1994, 5-6).

The name "community technology center" is used regionally by an effort in the planning stages in Burlington, Vermont that promises to offer a mixed-use center to low-income residents of a Burlington neighborhood. Community Technology Center has also been used as a general term by the Playing to Win Network in Newton, MA to describe the efforts of many of its affiliates.

Conclusions

In rural places, it is important that people from many different sectors of the community be able to work together on telecommunications issues. By their very nature, rural communities tend not to produce the economies of scale that make it less expensive to provide an advanced telecommunications infrastructure, powerful computers, and well-developed networks. In urban areas, single organizations such as large corporations, school systems, and local government can operate systems that are beyond the reach of any single entity in many a rural community. Therefore, an important part of developing telecommunications and computing in rural places is organizing people and organizations to collaborate, and to pool resources and demand.

For rural areas, the fact that the state is becoming involved in building computer networks out to communities is significant and encouraging. This means that computer networking may be coming within reach of much of rural Massachusetts. However, there is an important role for rural communities to play. State efforts will bring computer networks within reach of rural communities, but they will not bring networking services all the way to people and organizations in rural Massachusetts. In short, state efforts provide an opportunity for rural communities in Massachusetts, but they also require a significant community response.

There is a vital need for rural communities to have information and assistance in planning for their present and future telecommunications needs. Ironically, information is needed before rural communities can make the most of information highways. Planners, policy makers and concerned citizens now must learn how technologies, some which barely existed ten years ago, can affect their rural communities. While state initiatives hold out the promise of new opportunities, it is probably safe to say that many who might benefit are currently unaware how. Even those who work with communication and information technology in rural communities now need learn how to work with people and organizations in other sectors in order to maximize the investment in rural telecommunications infrastructure. Rural communities need resources that will make telecommunications information and planning models easily available and easily understood. This publication is an early part of what should be a continuing effort by those concerned with the future of rural Massachusetts.

Reference List

Atchison, Sandra D. 1993. The care and feeding of 'lone eagles.' Business week. November 15: 58.

Bagley, Michael N., Jill S. Mannering, and Patricia L. Mokhtarian. 1994. Telecommuting centers and related concepts: A review of practice. Davis, California: University of California, Davis Institute of Transportation Studies.

Betts, Mitch. 1991. 'Telework' hubs sprout in suburban America. Computerworld. July 22: 1.

Bradford, Jim, Director of the Massachusetts Strategic Planning Bureau. 1995. Interview by author, February 23. Notes of telephone interview. University of Massachusetts-Amherst.

Burgess, Philip M. 1994. Lone eagles. Center for the New West points west advisory. September 4.

Briscoe, Kim and June Mark. 1995. Evaluation of Playing to Win Network year three: Preliminary findings and recommendations. Newton, MA: Education Development Center.

Colorado Advanced Technology Institute. 1995. Rural telecommunications resource guide.http://www.csn.net/crtp/. March 22.

Colorado Center for Community Development and Interdisciplinary Telecommunications Program. 1992. Telecommunications and rural development: A community planning guide. Denver: Colorado Center for Community Development.

Handy, Susan L. and Patricia L. Mokhtarian. 1995. Planning for telecommuting: Measurement and policy issues. Journal of the American Planning Association, Winter 99-111.

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Hoy, Chris, Director of Special Projects, Nebraska Department of Economic Development. 1995. Interview by author, February 13. Notes of telephone interview. University of Massachusetts-Amherst.

Hudson, Heather E. and Edwin B. Parker. 1990. Information gaps in rural America: Telecommunications policies for rural development. Telecommunications Policy 14, no. 3 : 193-205.

Kentucky Science and Technology Council. 1994. The rural televillage: Creating a new strategy for rural development. Lexington, KY: Kentucky Science and Technology Council.

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