Realizing the Information Future - The Internet and Beyond

The potential for realizing a national information networking marketplace that can enrich people's economic, social, and political lives has recently been unlocked through the convergence of three developments:

• The federal government's promotion of the National Information Infrastructure through an administration initiative and supporting congressional actions;
• The runaway growth of the Internet, an electronic network complex developed initially for and by the research community; and
• The recognition by entertainment, telephone, and cable TV companies of the vast commercial potential in a national information infrastructure.

A national information infrastructure (NII) can provide a seamless web of interconnected, interoperable information networks, computers, databases, and consumer electronics that will eventually link homes, workplaces, and public institutions together. It can embrace virtually all modes of information generation, transport, and use. The potential benefits can be glimpsed in the experiences to date of the research and education communities, where access through the Internet to high-speed networks has begu n to radically change the way researchers work, educators teach, and students learn.

To a large extent, the NII will be a transformation and extension of today's computing and communications infrastructure (including, for example, the Internet, telephone, cable, cellular, data, and broadcast networks). Trends in each of these component areas are already bringing about a next-generation information infrastructure. Yet the outcome of these trends is far from certain; the nature of the NII that will develop is malleable. Choices will be made in industry and government, beginning with inv estments in the underlying physical infrastructure. Those choices will affect and be affected by many institutions and segments of society. They will determine the extent and distribution of the commercial and societal rewards to this country for invest ments in infrastructure-related technology, in which the United States is still currently the world leader.

1994 is a critical juncture in our evolution to a national information infrastructure. Funding arrangements and management responsibilities are being defined (beginning with shifts in NSF funding for the Internet), commercial service providers are playi ng an increasingly significant role, and nonacademic use of the Internet is growing rapidly. Meeting the challenge of "wiring up" the nation will depend on our ability not only to define the purposes that the NII is intended to serve, but also to ensure that the critical technical issues are considered and that the appropriate enabling physical infrastructure is put in place.

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