NetNews Usenet Archive 1992 #31/NN_1992_31.iso/spool/misc/handicap/8500

Internet Message Format | 1992-12-30 | 13.6 KB

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From: [e-mail] (Frank Odasz)
Newsgroups: misc.handicap
Subject: Thanks, and by the way...
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
Date: 30 Dec 92 15:28:17 GMT
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Index Number: 26915

[Forwarded from the Blind-L mailing list by Patt Bromberger]

Thanks to all that responded to the congressional office of technology's
request for input. A part of the study is specifically focused on
how services to special populations might best be handled. I'll make
special emphasis on the input I've received from the folks on this
listserv.
In teaching people about the online mode, I've learned that the potential
is invisible to most. Stick-to-it-iveness is often lacking, and stories
of real, ongoing, online activities are needed to encourage newcomers.
Can any of you help me by providing stories on your vision for how the
online mode can support real people in tangible ways?
-
Here's an essay you might find of interest:
               "Standing Tall" Telecomputing

The need exists to recognize teachers and citizens, locally,
regionally, and nationally that are innovating with
telecomputing. The need exists for a set of "Community
Telecomputing Standards" that can be adopted by all existing and
future online systems as to recommended minimum basic skills,
shared vision of the potential, and dedication to share
resources.

Credibility of the medium pre-empts interest and motivation.
"The medium" needs a noted sponsor/advocate to generate interest.
Clearly discerned benefits are a necessity. Community
teleliteracy/infoliteracy preceeds the creation of successful
virtual communities. AWARENESS of the importance of community
teleliteracy is the overriding need nationally, and is everyone's
responsibility.

A "Giraffe" program has recently been identified that recognizes
teachers and citizens who "stick their necks out" and "stand
tall" by innovating on behalf of their communities, though no
telecomputing component exists currently. K12 lessonplans have
been created that lay out an action-oriented philosophy of
community service. For more information call 1-800-344-TALL or
write The Giraffe Project, POB 759 Langley, WA 98260

The prospect of expanding this program through telecomputing
and to enhance the dissemination of this wonderful set of ideas,
appears quite workable. Setting aside, for the moment, the
decision of whether or not to partner with this specific project,
lets look at the broad picture.

THE UMBRELLA CONCEPT:
A program of participation encouraging an activism philosophy to
grow community systems from the bottom up could be articulated
and encouraged without reliance on a given corporation or
funding cycle.

John F. Kennedy once said "Ask not what your country can do for
you, ask what you can do for your country." Personal computer
telecommunications provide a new opportunity for personal
involvement in an age of trying personal schedules and a
fragmenting society. The ability to participate once again in a
community has been made possible by the convenience of this new
technology.

Most people are goodhearted and want to help others, if they can
identify specific needs. Most professionals want to provide some
level of community service, particularly if they can work it into
their busy schedules. Status and attention must be drawn to those
community experts whose expertise is needed to be part of the
community knowledge trust; national scientific, mathematic, and
entrepreneurial expertise particularly! Our "Electronic Elders"
need the opportunity to contribute to the community.

One incentive would be if professionals contributing their
expertise "online" were publically recognized for their
contribution.

AT&T has 100,000 employees looking for a way to contribute to
their communities, as do many, many corporations.

COMMUNITY TELECOMPUTING STANDARDS:
This emerging concept refers to a set of principles accepted by
all systems.
 - Basic modem skills
 - Purposeful use concepts and philosophy
 - Strategies for models of impact on the local community from
   telecomputing activism, sharing resources for the common good
 - Dedication to publicizing local heros ("giraffes") as a way of
   establishing role models.

Dare to be different, a hero, stand tall and support your
community, speak out that the potential of telecomputing is real,
don't follow, lead! Stand up and speak out that you see
unrecognized potential in your community, particularly given the
power of the new, affordable, telecomputing tools. The benefits
of their use are limited only by the imaginations of the
participants.

The Giraffe project's rapid success indicates there is "a real
listening out there" for efforts to recognize individuals and a
real need to "belong." The time is ripe for a "cause" centered
around the reinvention, the rehumanization, of our communities.
The need is to dramatically publicize models of impact to
communities, individuals contributing, volunteerism, public
service, innovations, and widespread professional participation.

The World Scout Organization (the largest uniformed body in the
world) has recently received $300,000 for work on community
development and the environment. Most such efforts could only
benefit from a telecomputing component. Tom Grundner, of
Cleveland Freenet suggests a Cyberscouts program; scouting for
the 21st century!

Adopting principles doesn't require funding. An adhoc consensus
of functional training benefits, shared promotion of the
credibility of the medium, and the sharing of stories, models
and basic resources, needs to happen. If a new community system
comes up, there should be a starter set of resources readily
available; listings of 800 health hotlines, government contact
persons, basic information resources, K12 lessonplans, self-
teaching lessons on the telecomputing basics, etc. National
organizations could "have a presence" on EVERY community system.

A ladder of progressive skill development aimed at encouraging
mass involvement is needed. If innovations lead to funding which
leads to more innovations, an empowerment engine is created.
Training of new 'electronic citizens' and sharing of successful
innovations, would allow the growth of community systems in EVERY
community from the bottom up. Such systems, linked together,
would provide a national tap on local innovations!

INDIVIDUALIZED GROWTH PATH:
The idea of a progressive reward system has merit. We all have a
responsibility to impact the world positively and embody certain
AMERICAN principles. Similar to the presidential award for
physical fitness, or the Boy Scout merit badge system, the
progression might go as follows:

1. LEVEL ONE - (Tenderfoot): complete 5-10 self-teaching,
achievement-based online lessons on the modem basics and perhaps
a primer on the activism philosophy of this technology in "the
age of the individual."

2. LEVEL TWO - (Secondclass): verified steady use of
telecomputing, mentorship of others, creation and posting of
online resources, and innovations might be rewarded with
elevated status or even cash incentive programs.

3. LEVEL THREE - (Firstclass): conducting a real project,
moderating a conference, creating and teaching an online class or
unit, a significant contribution of a working telecomputing model
of activity to benefit the community.

4. LEVEL FOUR - (Star): working with resource agencies to bring
their resources online, working with local businesses to
encourage their sponsorship of the local community system,
working with organizations and people groups of all types to help
them identify how telecomputing might enhance their
communications functions. Training new users and demonstrating
new levels of true community benefit.

5. LEVEL FIVE -(Eagle): Creating and/or running a community
system

6. LEVEL SIX - Regional or national activities, creation of
telecurricular projects, participation in regional or national
conferences, listserves, etc. Infoscout role gleening other
online systems to repost quality resources locally. Liason role
linking ongoing resource sharing programs between established
systems.

7. LEVEL SEVEN - Broker partnerships between private, and public
funding sources, generation of innovative, fundable ideas and
partnerships that philanthropic interests would be attracted to.
Creation of minigrants programs so top-down dollars are leveraged
toward maximum benefit and participation.

RECOGNITION PROGRAM:
Each community network might agree to:
1. recognize local giraffes by posting their achievements online
   locally.
2. post stories of other giraffes as models from regional,
   national and global systems
3. disseminate a national database of contacts, K12 giraffe
   curriculum, perhaps an entrepreneurship component.
4. post information on actual projects offering open
   participation

Everyone would be invited to model giraffe behavior. All these
concepts need to be very openended, to ensure maximum
involvement. Everyone needs the opportunity to identify
themselves as an "online contributor"  with the opportunity to
display shoulder patches, window stickers. This new identity
of participation and activism has to be open to everyone.
(Remember all the yellow ribbons that popped up during the gulf
war!)

Some level of informal nomination and selection for recognition
needs to be modeled, without alienating those not formally
recognized.

Communities themselves could be selected as "Giraffes" by a
state or national group or corporation, fostering community-wide
pride. This form of recognition could be an incentive for
communities to encourage maximum community participation...in a
goodnatured sense of community competition.

National, or international "giraffes" might be recognized for
national or global online initiatives, like the World Scout
Organization's project.

Virtual communities and/or nations could be formally recognized,
a global nation of giraffes?! Example: the COSN community and
its advocacy of K12 telecomputing.

LEVERAGE LOCAL FUNDING OPPORTUNITIES:
If local businesses could be enticed to provide the nominal
funding to create and maintain their own local community systems,
ideally in partnership with a school, the school/community
outreach collaborative opportunties are endless. If additional
local funding were used to reward and encourage local online
innovators, then every community could simultaneously benefit
from locally supported growth of their own systems. Minigrants
could provide a growth path for community telecomputing and
create a self-contained reward system leveraging top-down
dollars toward maximum citizen benefit and participation.

Realizing this overall program could loom to become unwieldy,
different groups could offer different parts of the overall
mosaic. For example, Big Sky Telegraph can offer:

1. An internet ID for anyone interested for $50/year, flat fee.

2. Internet/telecomputing training via local and regional
systems, or via the internet. This training highlights the LOW-
COST proper use of long distance phonelines the use of high speed
modems can provide. Total costs are under $350/person, lessons
can be shared locally at no cost, supporting a train-the-trainers
model.

3. Installation of community networks for under $1000 if a PC
286 is available, complete with internet email exchange for under
$50/month in phone bills and perhaps $100/month for mail handling
fee. Macintosh and Apple IIe bbses compatible with MSDOS and
Unix bbses are potentially available, too.

4. "Point" systems; automailer disks which can provide maximum
utility with minimal training.

Initial drafts from five telecomputing K12 networks on shareable
resources were exchanged recently at the National Educational
Computing Conference in Dallas in conjunction with the Consortium
for School Networking, spurring the following questions:

Perhaps our challenge is to create a model for as good a
community teleservice, with training, as we can jointly invent,
which could be emulated rapidly in thousands of communities
worldwide. A powerpack of verifiably beneficial information needs
to be made available for any budding community network. A
turnkey, low-cost, "starter" system, with training and links to
internet, needs to be made available. The challenge to each
community is how mentored access might best be implemented to
assure its citizens maximally benefit from the services and
information available, at the lowest possible cost.

VIDEO PROMOTION:
As the George Lucus Foundation is interested in possibly
providing a video "treatment" to 'make real' the vision of
telecomputing, I couldn't help ponder what a full length feature
film script might be, to take the vision as we share it now, and
project the scenario forward in an optimal, upbeat manner, and
to end the film with the tone of "but YOU must participate to
make it happen" ....ending with a modem number on the screen.
The film would focus on those ideas that resonate inwardly
within us all, not on special effects...that which COULD BE.
Ever heard the term "Guerrilla Goodness." If there ever was
a time the masses could, or should, be mobilized for the benefit
of the earth and the future of humankind, perhaps it is now!

Who will be the first community members to be able to access
answers to most any question in a given community through
electronic alchemy? Who will support their sharing of these
secrets? Who CARES if I get online or not, as an electronic
citizen? The government? My long distance carrier? My community?

If anyone afloat on the online ocean is interested in the above,
I'd like to hear from you. Send me a note in a virtual bottle.

Thanks for reading!   Frank Odasz   [e-mail]