UNITED STATES ADVISORY COUNCIL ON THE NATIONAL INFORMATION INFRASTRUCTURE October 19, 1994 Gilmour 269 pp. The meeting was convened, pursuant to notice, MESSRS. ED McCRACKEN and DELANO LEWIS, Co-Chairs, presiding. APPEARANCES: MR. EDWARD McCRACKEN Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Silicon Graphics, Inc. MR. DELANO LEWIS President and Chief Executive Officer National Public Radio DR. TONI CARBO BEARMAN Dean and Professor School of Library and Information Science University of Pittsburgh MS. BONNIE L. BRACEY Teacher Ashlawn Elementary School Arlington County Public Schools MR. JOHN F. COOKE President The Disney Channel MS. ESTHER DYSON President EDventure Holdings, Inc. MR. JACK FISHMAN Publisher, Citizen Tribune MS. LYNN FORESTER President and Chief Executive Officer FirstMark Holdings, Inc. MR. JACK GOLODNER President Department for Professional Employees, AFL-CIO MR. EDUARDO L. GOMEZ President and General Manager KABQ Radio MR. HAYNES G. GRIFFIN President and Chief Executive Officer Vanguard Cellular Systems, Inc. MS. SUSAN HERMAN General Manager Department of Telecommunications City of Los Angeles MR. STANLEY S. HUBBARD Chairman, President, and Chief Executive Officer Hubbard Broadcasting MR. ROBERT L. JOHNSON President Black Entertainment Television MS. DEBORAH KAPLAN Vice President World Institute on Disability MR. MITCHELL KAPOR Chairman Electronic Frontier Foundation, Inc. DR. NATHAN P. MYHRVOLD Senior Vice President, Advanced Technology Microsoft Corporation MR. N.M. (MAC) NORTON, JR. Attorney-at-Law Wright, Lindsey, and Jennings MR. VANCE K. OPPERMAN President West Publishing Company MS. JANE SMITH PATTERSON Advisor to the Governor of North Carolina for Policy, Budget, and Technology State of North Carolina MS. FRANCES W. PRESTON President and Chief Executive Officer Broadcast Music Incorporated MR. BERT C. ROBERTS, JR. Chairman and Chief Executive Officer MCI Communications Corporation MR. JOHN SCULLEY Former Chairman Apple Computers, Inc. MS. JOAN H. SMITH Chairman Oregon Public Utility Commission MR. AL TELLER Chairman and Chief Executive Officer MCA Music Entertainment Group P R O C E E D I N G S CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I'd like to convene this meeting of the U.S. Advisory Council on the National Information Infrastructure. It's a pleasure to have this meeting today here in the Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts. I'd like to thank all the council members for all the hard work yesterday in the Mega-Project meetings which were held over at Silicon Graphics. I think we have a really ambitious schedule today and we should really probably get right into the work. However, before we start I'd like to introduce to you the Mayor of the City of Mountain View, who has a few remarks, Bob Schatz, who is sitting over next to me. Bob, let me turn it over to you. MAYOR SCHATZ: Thank you very much. On behalf of the citizens of Mountain View, I would like to welcome you to our city. We are most pleased and honored that you have selected Mountain View to hold this important meeting, for in our community technology plays a vital role in providing a high level of service to the citizens we serve. We are able to communicate and share information electronically over a wide area network and our residents can share their views on any number of issues with us through Internet. One of your topics today is to focus on ways to improve citizens' access to government information which is so vital to governmental agencies, and we appreciate and applaud your efforts in this area. The advisory committee is comprised of many distinguished and dedicated citizens throughout our country, and we in Mountain View are pleased to have Mr. Ed McCracken, the CEO of Silicon Graphics, which is located in our city, as a member of your council. Silicon Graphics has had a great reputation as one of our corporate residents. In fact, for those of you who owns or operates a business and wants to move to Mountain View, we would also be delighted. At this time, if I may, I'd like to introduce to you the members who are present of our Mountain View City Council. In the audience is Council Member Jim Coughlin. Thank you, Jim. Council Member Art Takahara. Art. Council Member Norman Shatsky. Thank you, Norman. And our City Manager, Kevin Guzman. And, on behalf of the City Council, we wish you success at this important endeavor, and look forward to the benefits that the National Information Infrastructure will bring to our country. Again, welcome to Mountain View, and I hope you have a nice day. Thank you very much. (Applause) CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Thank you, Bob. And thank you, City of Mountain View, for making these facilities available to us today. It's great to be here. I indicated earlier we had a very ambitious schedule today. We've been working as a council for almost a year, fact-finding, getting to know each other, getting to know what the issues are, splitting into mega-projects, starting the work; now it's getting real. And that's why we were appointed, to do real things, to take on the hard issues. It feels good, to me, that we're finally getting down to the point where we're able to do the real work that we've been asked to do. The agenda today is long. There are some things at the end of the agenda relative to the -- in fact, let's just spend a few minutes going through the agenda. There are a couple of changes. Does everyone have the new agenda that's different from the agenda in your book? VOICE: It's pretty difficult to hear. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Is that right? VOICE: I don't know if people are having audibility? Yes. Very difficult with the acoustics. VOICE: You're getting an echo of some kind. VOICE: Could we sit in the audience? CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: So the sound team -- we're getting some kind of reverberation on the stage here. We need to deal with that in some way or another. Can we try a little test? How about a little less sound? How's that? (Pause while working with sound system.) CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: With our agenda this morning we'd like to spend some time talking about the framework again. We spent some time on that last time; we'll come back and talk about it again. We'd also like to spend a good deal of time today reviewing the real work, which is the mega- project work. That, I think, is a relatively expandable length of time and if we need more time than is on the schedule, we'll take more time, and we'll take as much time as we'll need. Then the intellectual property principles are ready for a really open discussion here in the council. I know there are a lot of people who care about them a lot and who have strong feelings, not only on the mega- project team, but on the council as well. Again, we should feel like we should spend as much time as we want to air the issues there and to make sure that we really understand the issues that the council -- and we can deal with it appropriately. Then in the afternoon we do have discussion of the critical issues again, as we talked about last time. We'd like to do that at each of the council meetings. But, again, I think that's an area of time that we can compress if we have to. If it takes longer on the review of the mega- projects work and on intellectual property, we'll just compress that a little bit and perhaps drop a couple of critical issues out for today. We do have Dave Barram here this afternoon; he will be giving us a few remarks. And, of course, we'll close the day with a chance for public comments. You can sign up in the lobby for public comments. If any of the public would like to make public comments -- anyone -- (inaudible). CO-CHAIR LEWIS: First of all, I'd like to add my words of welcome. I'm Delano Lewis, co-chair along with Ed, and I'm very pleased to be here. I'm sorry I missed you yesterday. I heard it was a good day, and the dinner was good. I was on a plane and I was met in the lobby by a welcoming committee bringing me up to date as soon as I walked in last night. So, I'm pleased to be here. I'd just like to, first of all, thank all of you for coming. It's great to be in Ed's home territory, and I look forward to today. We have a lot to cover and I think, as Ed said, we're going to get down to the real issues. I would just like to add my comments to taking our time and really hearing from each other. I think what has been so unique about this council is that we come from many varying perspectives and many walks, but yet we have kept the interest of the American public uppermost, and we have been listening to one another and learning from one another, and I think that's really been the uniqueness of the council. I'd just like for us to continue it, and I'm sure we will. So, my view is, we want to hear points of view. We want to have as much discussion as need be, and to come forth with some consensus, if we can, so that we can offer advice to the Administration. So I'd just like to add my word that we'll take as much time as we need, because the work of the council on these issues is extremely important. So, I'd like to support Ed on that. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: The next thing on the agenda is to -- by the way, how is the sound? VOICE: It's better if you lean further back. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Let's move on to the next issue -- (inaudible) -- let's move on to the next -- framework -- talk about a framework and -- last advisory council we touched on -- opportunity to discuss that -- common ground -- letter we received from the Secretary about the framework. We have with us today Larry Irving, who is -- (inaudible) office -- amplify the response -- (inaudible). So -- VOICE: If I could just take a minute to set the backdrop and then just note the different pieces that are contained in the Secretary's memo. Let me start off by just repeating something Ed said. The Secretary met with Ed and Del over the summer -- internal staff people with the Secretary of Commerce like to be as far away from the microphone as possible -- take his advice on that. The Secretary met with Del and Ed over the summer to talk about the framework. And he is, as he said, in New York -- enthusiastic about the work that this council is doing, about the direction it is taking, and about the course that the framework charts for its future efforts. In fact, he was sorry he could not be here today. He is in Columbus, Ohio, opening a United Nations conference on trade efficiency, with themes that very much parallel your own work. He's talking today about the impact of information technologies on international trade, noting that the United States Government can negotiate -- legal barriers to trade around the world. Information technology can take on and diminish the practical barriers of time, geography, or lack of information. So his work this week is in concert with your own. He apologizes for not being here. But he asked Larry and I to take a minute and talk about his memorandum, just to give you a sense of the kind of direction that the Administration is heading in and the kind of advice that would be extraordinarily useful to us as we go on for the next year or so. The memorandum highlights four key questions, all of which, we believe, are consistent with the framework, some of which are more specific than the framework; four areas in which we would very much like to get specific comment, both today, of course, and as the work of the council progresses. The first goes to the goal that the President set forth in his State of the Union address last January, the goal of connecting every classroom, library, hospital and clinic to the NII by the year 2000. This is an extraordinarily important Administration objective, and we would appreciate any and all advice on how we can best meet this goal, what process we should use, what kind of institutional arrangements between levels of government and the private sector would best serve the goal, what kinds of ancillary activities--for example, teacher training-- that might be necessary to really fulfil the true meaning of this goal. I sat in on Mega-Project II meetings yesterday. My sense from those meetings is that the discussions that are under way certainly go to the kinds of questions that the Secretary poses in this first inquiry. The second is more general. We're asking this: based on the progress the Administration has made on our comprehensive NII initiative, what kinds of changes would the council recommend are directions of priority? I believe last night we distributed a copy of the speech that Vice President Gore gave in New York on Monday in which he took note of the kinds of efforts that the Administration has engaged in, talked about the kind of progress that has been made in the last year, some of the progress that hasn't been made that we had hoped for, and charted a path for the future. In that speech, he repeated both the goal of linking hospitals and clinics, schools and classrooms, but also talked about amplifying the basic objections that he set forth in both the domestic and global context of the now famous Five Basic Principles on which are policies are based. We come at a time when it would be very useful to get from you all a critique of what the Administration's priorities should best be. We have begun that process by distributing materials for public comment, the green paper, about which I understand there's some -- view, these two applications papers that came from -- Pabaka's committee asking for comments on how different public applications might best be implemented, the NTIA notice of inquiry on universal service that Larry Irving issued in September. All of these are efforts to gain comment, both from the council and the public generally on our direction, and this inquiry is simply meant to underscore the genuine desire of the Secretary to hear from you about what our direction should be. Third, we ask about what's sometimes called the Jeffersonian architecture of the NII. As a graduate of the University of Virginia, I think I would -- alumni association if I failed to use the phrase. But, as you know, one of our key objectives is open access, and we very much want to get your input on how that can best be accomplished, and what steps government industry and other stakeholders can take. Then, finally, we'd like to work with you in a public education and outreach effort. John Young made the point in his excellent remarks last night that the way to talk about these efforts is not to talk about technology, but to talk about real impact on people's lives. This is an important message. It's an important message that I know the co-chairs are concerned with, and it's an important message that both the Vice President and the Secretary have expressed personal interest in. As you know, we have been very active through NTIA and particularly through Stephanie Shoemacher, who is NTIA's Director of Public Affairs, whom I think is here today--and I'm sure Larry will elaborate on this-- to talk about how we can really get the messages of benefits of information technology out. This includes some of the kinds of activities that are included in your own outreach activities and we would very much like to be able to work with you towards that end. So, these four are not designed in any way to limit the breadth of the council's actions--the Secretary entirely and wholeheartedly endorses your framework--but they are specific inquiries within that framework that would be very helpful to us to get advice on. I think Larry wanted to talk for a minute about the kinds of specific activities that we're engaged in that give additional insight into this structure. MR. IRVING: I'm really not going to take up much of your time this morning. I'm going to just take the general we have here and maybe lay it over into the specific, and focus on the Tee-Up Program. We announced 92 grant award winners last week, so you can get a sense of -- is this okay? Can you hear over there? Okay. It will give you a sense of how we think it can work from general to specific. With the Tee-Up Program, clearly, the intent of that program is to do things like Question 1, make sure there's a private/public partnership to connect classrooms, libraries, hospitals and clinics. We need your insight into how that's going to work better. At least two of the members of the advisory council are affiliated with organizations with one Tee- Up grant; the State of North Carolina, and the World Institute on Disability did win Tee-Up grants. I'm sure that people are involved with those. I'm not sure if there are others involved with other grants. We hope that as this program grows that other people on the council, other members of the council, will be involved in this public/private partnership. We honestly believe that that's the best way it's going to happen. We're putting up $24 million as a Federal Government, and we're going to get about $70 million worth of build-out. That doesn't mention the half a billion dollars of programs that we couldn't fund, many of which are going to go on anyway because of either public sector or private sector investment. Are we hitting the mark, are the things we're focusing on the right things to focus on? The same thing with regard to changes to the Administration's direction or priorities with this program, are we making the right commitments? We are funding programs ranging from community information, library science, education, public safety, public information, government health, higher education, community information, arts and culture, and social services. Are those the right things? I know I was disappointed that we didn't have as many public safety applicants as we would have liked, and we only had one or two grants awarded to public safety applicants. Are there other communities that need these technologies that we're missing? Is our balance right; as you go through this, are we doing the right things, are we focusing on the right areas? Similarly, as we try to figure out if this is open to all service providers, open to all technologies, are the types of things we're funding -- and obviously we have peer review panels and they are making determinations, but we would welcome insight as to whether or not the types of applications we funded make sense as we try to get to the Jeffersonian architecture open networks. Finally, and perhaps most importantly, this program at $24 million is only going to be as important as -- if only we can leverage these particular grants will they really matter. Only if we can inform the American people about the progress we're making, why it's important to them, what's happening in real communities, with real people, using real technologies, to more or less paraphrase, again, John Young. Most people get technophobic. They're scared of these technologies. It's only when you make them understand--or help them understand rather than make them understand--how it's going to affect their children's lives, their lives, provision of health care, improvement of delivery of government services, improvement of public safety, how they can have access to museums and libraries without having to leave their communities. That's when this matters to them. If you just talk about machines, technology, CD-ROMS, and software, they're really never going to get it. How can we work together to make this public education campaign really work? I know a lot of you have had a chance to meet Stephanie yesterday and in New York. But Stephanie is somewhere out there in the audience; I don't think I can see her from here. I hope you all get a chance to know her. She is going to be the point person for the Department's public education campaign. The first salvo was fired last week when we announced the Tee-Up grants. More than half of the Tee-Up grant awardees came to Washington. The Secretary and Deputy Secretary announced the awards. There was considerable press nationally and in the local communities about these awards. I think there was more buzz in the local communities because people are really going to be using these things at home. But how can we do a better job of making sure that people know what's going on? One of the things we're requiring is quarterly reports, so every three months we'll be getting updates from people about the progress of their roll-out, whether it's a planning grant or a demonstration grant. Your dollars are only being spent well, as American citizens, if we are able to educate people about the failures and the successes, if everyone who is thinking about these kinds of projects has a sense of why they matter. So, again, we need your help in devising and formulating a public education campaign. We know that's a priority for this council. It is certainly a priority for the Secretary, and he would like to know how we can work together to get this public education campaign out. I was talking to the Secretary's Chief of Staff, Rob Stein, yesterday. I was almost on my way to the plane and his last words were that the Secretary wants this to be as important, and for us to do as much as we can do without our 24-hour days and with our budget to educate the public. We know we can leverage that using the resources around in this council, and we hope that we can figure out a way how this public education, public outreach campaign can really soar. We can use the next several months to make the American public aware of, and I think proud of, what we're doing as an Administration and as a nation to bring these technologies to real people. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Thank you, John, and thank you, Larry. Do all of you have a copy of the Secretary's letter? If not, I think we have a few extra here that we could -- it was in the folder, but if someone needs one, we've got more right here. I really appreciate the input from the Secretary and from the team here. I think it's appropriate to have some discussion as a council here in total as to how we integrate these four requests into the current framework of the work of the council. Perhaps we could start by just taking any open discussion on that. Any comments from members of the council? Yes. MR. ROBERTS: Just to start it off--I was going to make this as part of my remarks later, but I think that in the Secretary's letter, clearly, Items Nos. 1 and 3 will points of focus for the Mega-Group II Universal Service areas. I mean, those questions, at least for the most part, are right on what we've been focusing on in our committee. VOICE: Well, Bert, we're very glad that you said that, because that's what we were thinking. MR. ROBERTS: Great minds think alike. No, I think that's absolutely right. I've had conversations with Jonathan Sollen and others about the work plan and the Secretary's response, and the Secretary framed this, I think, and is very supportive in what we were doing. One, particularly, when we talk about connecting classrooms, libraries, hospitals, and clinics to the NII by the year 2000, we've done bits and pieces of that already in Mega-Project I, to some degree, and II. So, I think that I and II may be involved in No. 1, because they are already talking about it. I think that we can add a lot more to that from our future discussions. VOICE: Of course, one of the issues here in Mega-Project I is the additional work relative to hospitals and clinics. I think it's appropriate to have some discussion as to whether Mega-Project I is getting ready to take that one on as well. VOICE: That will be one of our next challenges when we've completed education and electronic -- CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: So you're agreeing to step up to the plate, right? VOICE: Uh-huh. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Good. MS. BRACEY: I have a concern that doesn't deal with the hospitals. When you're talking about teacher training, we're talking about outreach for next year. And I think if you want it to happen in the educational community, those of us who are attending conferences now need to get started because it takes a long time for the idea to drift down, and that whatever we do should be started this year. There are many of us who are attending conferences, and perhaps we could put together a package that would allow us to take advantage of the audience of people that we're speaking to, and also give you some feedback. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: So we can ask Mega- Project I and II to pick up. I think the real challenge we have here is, how do we make sure that every classroom, library, hospital, and clinic can be connected by the year 2000? I think, on the issues of cost, there's going to need to be some work between the two mega-projects. Perhaps the chairmen of the mega-projects could get together and discuss how that cost information and how the cost discussions could be, perhaps, shared between the two groups, because it's an issue of access and it's an issue in terms of setting the goals in education. You can't set the goals in education, or hospitals and clinics, unless you have a good feeling for what the costs are. So, we need to make sure that we're working together on that rather than separately. VOICE: Mr. Chairman, one of the really excellent outcomes, I believe, of the NTIA grants are also going to be some realistic costing of issues involving hospitals and connection of education, schools, libraries, etc. But we have, in fact, had some early effort by the Department of Education to develop costing, from Linda Roberts' efforts. So, we will be working also with them in trying to involve other areas of the Executive Branch and the private sector to make sure we have costs that are valid and that we can stand behind. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Maybe we can skip to point three, then come back to two. Point 3: What do we need to do to meet our goal of promoting an NII which is open to all users, open to all service providers, open to all network providers, and open to change? To me, that seems, clearly, something that we could give to Mega-Project II to grapple with and include in the agenda there. Does that make sense? VOICE: It's also part of Mega-Project III. We're talking about creating an environment where you have content on the net and where you have security for transactions. We're not talking about getting onto the net, but making the net worth getting onto. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Uh-huh. VOICE: Or, sorry, the NII. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Other discussion? VOICE: Ed? CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Yeah. VOICE: To some degree, the Mega-Project I discussion on Electronic Commerce has touched on those issues. We'll be getting that -- later. But we have emphasized the need -- VOICE: I'll be happy to take any inputs here. Yes? DR. BEARMAN: I think that's an excellent idea, to have it on the December agenda. What would be helpful in advance would be to have some additional information about what the task force and its committees and working groups are doing. I feel, sometimes, that we're reinventing the wheel and we may be duplicating some effort. We've had very good communication with NTIA, with OMB, and the working groups. But, if we could have sort of a status report with any documents that are available. For example, feedback on the privacy document, but beyond that. Feedback on the privacy document, copies of summaries of comments that have come in; is there a new draft of the privacy document coming out? Just kind of a status report on the major initiatives. A second area that I think would be helpful to have clarified--and we need to think about it--is the relation between the National Information Infrastructure and the Global Information Infrastructure. I know that this is going to be an agenda item, in part, for the G-7. What preparation is taking place for that; how does our work relate to the work in the GII? And we've been asked, in each Mega-Project, to address the international implications. That's a huge challenge. So, what, specifically, can we do that will be most helpful? MS. SMITH: Ed? CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Yes. MS. SMITH: I'd like to add Number 3 to Toni's list. In the words of Susan Herman, from our last meeting, there does need to be moved up the agenda to some extent, at least big time, Larry, more attention to the LII, the Local Information Infrastructure. If the customers can't get to it, then all the products in the world aren't going to be very meaningful, and especially looking at the next session of Congress and competition in the local loop. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Bert? MR. ROBERTS: Yes. I would just like to add a comment on Number 2. First of all, our committee--and I will report on this later--isn't in what I would call unanimous agreement on a number of issues. But, with respect to what the government can do, I think there's a couple of opportunities that are going to present themselves. One, might be an effort to move aggressively forward on an interim NII solution, and again, I will address that. But I think there's another opportunity, commenting on what Joan said, that, whereas, it was a fait de compli that legislation would be passed this year and whatever was in it that might affect the NII was not going to be in any way biased by this group and we needed to look out at the longer term, the facts are, legislation didn't pass, good, bad, or indifferent, depending on your perspective. But it seems that we, as an advisory group to the Administration, might have the opportunity to give preliminary or interim input on some issues. And, again, our task force is focused on universal service, but some issues that, if and when the legislative initiative begins to roll out again this year, perhaps we could make an attempt to advise the Administration, on some of the issues. I'm sure it will all be lost in the powerful lobbying that goes on by firms that are in this room, but, nevertheless, maybe we can influence something that, when we started this, it looked like it was not a done deal, but it was going down its own path irrespective of what we can do. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Yes. I'd like to add to that. I think Bert's on the right track. I've had some preliminary conversations with Jonathan about this, that when we started this process as a council, the legislative move was moving fast. It was our view as a council that we're not so sure that we could come together with a consensus to make a difference, and we've made a statement that we would, where appropriate, make comments, but, as a rule, we were going to get deeper in the issues, which we're doing. Now, '95 presents different opportunities. I would agree with Bert that if we could hear from you as to your own interests, directions, and priorities that have legislative input, I think that would be helpful for us and we could, as a council, decide our next steps. But I do think that we may have an opportunity to lend some advice there. MS. SMITH PATTERSON: Mr. Chairman, I'd like to respond to that, not for our Mega-Project, but as a representative from the states. As the legislation at least has not failed completely, since it can be reintroduced in the U.S. Congress, the states have an opportunity this next year to move ahead themselves in deregulation, and I think you're going to see the states moving ahead to take actions themselves to make sure that competition exists within the local loop and also, if possible, total deregulation. So, I think the council needs to be aware that that is a movement that is ongoing and will have to be looked at in the total framework of what the Administration wants, plus how this is moving forward as we sit, even today. VOICE: Well, I have a comment on that one, Jane. I have been around and speaking to groups and moving around in various sessions, and my view is, I think the states and local governments have felt left behind and really want to take a much more aggressive position, and I would endorse that. I would only ask that we not make it adversarial, which I know you're not intending, and that we do keep in touch, because I think the council can be of some benefit. I think we represent such a broad range on this council, and I think our reputation is good, that we may have some value here in bringing these points together and maybe making some impact. So, I would just want to say to state and local, maybe this could be a forum for some consensus here. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Larry, you have some comments here? MR. IRVING: I just wanted to briefly state that, with regard to the State, Federal, local cooperation, the Vice President, in his speech on Monday, announced the second summit. About a year ago, last December, we held a summit in Washington of state, federal, local regulators, to try to talk about what we were trying to do. We're going to do a similar thing sometime between now and early next year, maybe December, January, February. The dates haven't been set. I have already talked with some people about that, the leadership of NARUC, and I know the Vice President's office has talked to NGA and NCSL, and will talk to NATOA and others, to try to get a sense of what those discussions should be. But we're going to move aggressively, as a Federal Government, to work with the states. During the pendency of the legislation, we agreed completely that there is an opportunity to do some things at the states, and I think there's also been -- I see change in attitudes of many state and local regulators about the need for competition and their role in developing a competitive model. So, we are going to do everything we can to prod states where they are so inclined to move forward, and, where they're not inclined, to try to give them the wisdom of those states that are so inclined. But we are planning on a non-adversarial, closely cooperative relationship with the states to derive deregulatory policy at the local levels. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: There seems to be an awful lot of interest in responding to this request from the Secretary. It seems to me like the idea of putting it on the agenda for December -- but I think it might be good to help -- you know, and to respond to the information in this document, which I think is a very good synopsis of what's been going on, what the current priorities are, and also telecommunications policy, legislation, and a number of other issues. I think to help us, as co-chairs, to framework this, it would be really helpful for us, I think, if sometime in the next couple of weeks we could get from each of you that have ideas in this area to maybe send us a page or two of agenda items or how we might structure this agenda from your standpoint in terms of giving feedback to the Administration on priorities, and then we'll take that data from you and structure a discussion at the December meeting and handle it that way. We'll make that something we can do during the December meeting and get right back to the Administration. Does that make sense? So, if I could ask for you to send in to us something -- I think, because of the three-week notification time for these meetings and those kinds of things, I think it's something we probably have to get back in the next couple of weeks so that we can really -- November 4th would be a good time. Let's use November 4th as a deadline for that. Okay. Finally, Point 4: How can the Administration and the council work together to articulate and capture the imagination of Americans on the economic and social potentials of the NII? Comments? CO-CHAIR LEWIS: I'll start, if no one has any comments. I think that our position has been rather clear--and I've said this to Jonathan from the council's point of view--that we -- in fact, Mega- Project I has spent a lot of time advancing -- and Jane, on all the education dimensions, not only on education institutions, but educating people about NII. So, I think we are very much supportive of this. Our interest would be that we'd like to work with you and be supportive of your leadership because it's important to understand where you would like to take this in terms of the various areas of education. So, we definitely stand ready to work with you. And I talked to Stephanie this morning, and we'd like to sit down as soon as possible to start helping you plan this. It does dove-tail with the public outreach. I've been one that's been very supportive of doing an outreach from the council. I've said to our group that we will bring back to you, probably by December or before, a plan that we can present to Commerce on outreach that will need a detailee and some money. I just think it's important to have an office, some way to connect with us, some way to bring in input. It's just not happening, and I've said it over and over, and I'm very strong on that point, that we need some help there. So, I think education and outreach go hand in hand. Let's talk about the kinds of ways we want to educate, the kind of areas of education, but then, how do we connect people, how do we let them know what's happening? So, we definitely want to take your lead and work with you on this. Go ahead. VOICE: Del, one of the possibilities might be -- I don't know if this is something that they would consider, but the Advertising Council might consider this as sort of a major project that they could bring to the attention of the public. They usually take on things that are more pressing in terms of social problems, you know, social relations, and particular kinds of disease issues. But this might be something, because it has such an impact on the competitiveness and the social integration of society, they might take it on. If we presented a proposal to them, I'm sure they would consider it as a project. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Thank you. VOICE: Mr. Chairman, I would add--and this is going a little beyond--when you actually get into outreach that, as a number of the council members have said, I'm sure almost every one of us are speaking at different forums around the country, different meetings, about our work on the council and the NII. If we could have--whether it's developed by ourselves, the U.S. Department of Commerce, or the Advertising Council, whomever is helping--a set of overheads or slides that have the message that we get across that are similar, at least, that we can insert into our speeches. Messages repeated tend to get across in this country. And if we're giving mixed signals, even with just a few words, it confuses, I think, the citizenry, rather than informs them. So, it would be very helpful if we could have access to the kinds of overheads, or slides, or presentation materials that you think are appropriate for us to sell a message, and to make sure that the NII becomes a reality for all Americans. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Very good. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Yes? VOICE: I think that's basically a good idea, but I just want to put in a footnote, that the whole point of the NII, in a sense, is that it is a place of mixed signals. The world is large, and complex, and heterogeneous; we're not all going to be speaking with a single voice. It's certainly nice if we come to consensus about certain things, but I feel uncomfortable with the notion that anything that's not kind of formally approved by the council as our single signal is going to confuse people. So, I'm not disagreeing, but I'm amending. I hope the public is smart enough to deal with several signals. We all have slightly different visions, some of the things we agree with. That's it. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Let me add to that, that I don't think there's a disagreement there. I think Esther's point is well-taken. But there are certain basics, Esther, that the public has no clue of. I mean, you are much more knowledgeable about a range of issues and have your own perspectives, and the council has perspectives, on some very complex ideas and issues. The public has no clue about any of this, really. They don't understand basic views of NII and what it means. So, I think that there is an opportunity for really basic kinds of fundamental -- what is the NII, what is X, how do you define it, how does it work, you know, those are very basic things, and I think that that's just not being done. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: We'll take comment from John, then over to Bonnie. MR. SCULLEY: I think that we ought to probably wait a little bit until our Mega-Project teams are a little bit further gelled in terms of the ideas, and then I think C-SPAN could be a terrific vehicle to get the message out. C-SPAN is better, in my opinion, than conventional television because you can actually discuss an issue in other than sound bites and you can get points of view. This is relatively complex, and you want to be able to make a connection in terms of the end benefits to society, which I think can't be done easily in sound bites. So, I would encourage, Del and Ed, that you do two things. One, is to start to think about, proactively, how do we start to get the message out with C-SPAN and maybe other mechanisms, and the second thing is, to think about what the two of you could do as spokespeople for us to get the message out in various forums, like the National Governors' Association. And then I'd also like to ask a question. I remember when we first started this council, it was made quite clear that anything that was a statement by the council, we all agreed, would come from the two of you, not from any of us. And I just wanted some clarification in terms of, is that a misunderstanding, or is that still our policy? If so, how does that tie back to the comments of us speaking on behalf of our points of view, or the council's points of view in other speeches we may be giving? CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I think that's a really good point. I think we all have to be careful. We ought to be careful when we make comments, which role we're playing. We all wear more than one hat in life. When we talk about the decisions of the council or the advice of the council to the Administration, we need to make sure that we're talking about things that we really have agreed upon as a team, and, on the other hand, we all have strong ideas about things, and it's perfectly okay to give talks about our strong ideas. But I think we all need to be very careful that we don't mix those two things up and talk about our strong ideas as the work of the council. I think, as the council moves toward providing advice to the Administration in formal form, then certainly all of us can be spokespeople as to exactly what that is, because it's something we've all agreed on and it's something that Del and I don't need to be the only spokespeople for. But I think we need to be careful that we do that before the work of the council has progressed to the right point, as you indicated earlier. I don't know. Del? CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Yes. I feel the same. I do have the same feeling that Ed does on this, that we really don't want to limit your speaking. That's not our effort at all. I think that as long as you keep the roles together, you can always report on the work that you do, your participation, your particular ideas and views on the issues. I think that's very, very proper. But, on official decisions, be careful that it's a council decision. And I think that's pretty easy to do. We don't want to limit, nor do we feel that we're the only spokespersons, either. But we think that, from an official point of view, we can all give official positions, but just keep the roles as clear as you can. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Bonnie was going to be next, then back to Deborah. MS. BRACEY: I wanted to point out, also, that there also are a lot of people already out there. And, like Jane, I would like to have whatever the things are we'd like to present, just sort of an ideational scaffolding, because sometimes, when I'm sitting there in a conference and I hear other people telling me what we're doing, I'm kind of surprised. So, I think it helps if we're in a position to be able to offer some more concrete types of things that we sort of agreed on. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: All right. Deborah? MS. KAPLAN: As I listened to the discussion about this question that's been raised by the Secretary, I'm just concerned because there are so many different audiences. And I think if we look at the broad question of getting more of the American people, ordinary folks, to understand what these issues are -- I'm positive the way not to go is to talk about Mega-Projects. And the kinds of feedback that the Administration is asking us for, which is a discussion about fairly sophisticated topics amongst people who already have a pretty detailed understanding of what the issues are and what the details that have to be agreed upon are, as you were saying earlier, Ed, a lot of people just haven't a clue. I think, I was sitting at the table last night with John Young at dinner, and he was remarking that most people are not very interested in anything called The National Information Infrastructure, and are convinced that it's not going to do them a whole lot of good, or be very useful to them. And how you translate that into ordinary concerns of ordinary people that have to do with what's on the menu of the school lunch today, and fairly mundane, but relatively important topics that shouldn't be belittled -- I think we just have to bear in mind that there are many different audiences and levels of discussion. I find the challenge of the question to be a very big one, especially to those of us who, I think, sometimes can see the butterflies a whole lot easier than the elephants, and you can get stomped by the elephants while we're debating the different aspects of the butterflies. The one way to get at it that I was impressed about last night as we were talking, is letting people know that this is all about keeping up with their kids and trying not to fall too far behind where the kids are, because I think most people know that the kids understand this stuff, and the kids are going to be the drivers. I think that's a theme that we might want to build upon. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Vance? MR. OPPERMAN: Ed, I'm glad you raised this subject, because a lot of us have groups that we routinely report back to, and the same groups that helped us get appointed to this body. And it would be unrealistic to think that, in the last year, that none of us had said anything about what it was we were accomplishing, not accomplishing, or doing. In addition to that, a number of us get invited--in my case--to business groups and other groups, depending on the council member. And the way that I've tried to handle that is, in part, to give my own personal reactions and a progress report on what the Mega-Projects are doing, the schedule of events, and so forth. One of the things that I've been impressed about is that there is no enthusiasm, and rather great antagonism, if people think you're talking about a new, national, Federal Government program, at least in the business and professional groups I talk to. To say there's no enthusiasm understates the case, and there's an immediate turn-off. A lot of people, when they hear the NII, think that they're talking about some kind of new bureaucracy or some kind of new Federal Government, "we're here to help you" approach. And I would not be giving feedback to this group or the Secretary if I indicated that there was anyone that I've ever talked to that thinks that anything would bring antagonism to that false impression. When I've confronted that, the first thing I've led off with are the Five Principles. It's pretty reassuring to an awful lot of groups that ask us to make comments, to hear the emphasis in the initial speeches and in the initial undergirding of the NII initiatives, that there's a primacy and a recognition of the role that markets have to play. That certainly, in many ways, gets away from a misconception, at least in some audiences that I've had to address, on how we get that kind of feedback--and all of us are going to have different reactions and different kinds of feedback--back in a way that is useful to the Secretary. That, I think, is a challenge we have to face. In part, that will be our report, but perhaps there are other ways that we can advise, short of another year of drafting and a formal report, and all the rest, that would enable us to get some of that information back to the Secretary a little more timely. That, I think, is a challenge we might want to address. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Bert? MR. ROBERTS: I think, to be practical about this, or to put a practical element in this, you know, a lot of people can run around the country and give speeches, steam panels like this can appear before 20 people. We're not going to get the point across until we can, I think, be more in a mode of demonstration and get to specifics. There was nothing wrong with the Vice President's goals that he's articulated, but, until you can bring those home as to what it means -- it's like when the space program was launched. If you have a goal of exploring space, it's hard to get enthused about it; if you have a goal of putting a man on the moon, people can relate to that. I think, before we get too proactive--which I do think we have to get quickly--about delivering our message, we A) should understand what our message is; B) also try to get it reduced to some very specific and things that can be demonstrated that would catch the public's eye. I suspect Deborah's point is right on, education is something that every household, every family -- it's a tremendous problem. And this stuff that we're talking about is really neat when you look at it in the education environment. It's not the only thing we're going to do, but I think you can get public enthusiasm and support if we could be a bit more specific, even if it's not what the ultimate goal is, about some interim efforts that we can do. Again, I'll be happy to write this up. But, from a panel point of view, the more we can focus on that kind of thing -- and, again, nothing wrong with running around the country and having hearings, that was probably good input, but we shouldn't confuse that in any way of getting public enthusiasm driven up, because special interest, you know, has a forum to provide inputs, and so on. I think it's kind of like what we saw in New York. I mean, is there a way you can start to show people those kinds of things in a much broader way? And there are ways to do that. You've got television, you've got advertising, you've got community colleges. I mean, there's lots of ways to do that. So, practical is what I would push for. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Now, let me add to this, and maybe one way to kind of bring it together, I look at it in three steps. And that's what I talked to Jonathan about, working with the Department of Commerce to develop the message, the very basic message. So I look at it, number one, the first phase, as just general education; what is the NII, what is it about, what is its impact on the basic definition of language? So, just a basic education. That's what I think when I think of public education. And two, is the outreach piece, that I think we have a real need to do, which is to let people know how to interact with us, how to participate with us,a nd how to give us their feedback. And three, is the one that Vance mentioned, I think he was talking about, which is really, how do you talk about the work of the council? How do you explain our various positions, how do you explain the decisions we took, and very substantive kinds of things. That's the third piece, and we're nowhere near there yet, because we're just now getting down to the issues. But I think education is, how do we work with some professional groups, Jonathan, to really help us? The worst thing you could do in trying to educate people is to say NII. That's the worst thing you can do. It just doesn't give the average person any comfort as to what in the world this is. So, we need some help in terms of being very clear, what are the fundamental messages, and then outreach, in terms of how to connect with us, and three is, how do you really talk about the work of the council? So, I look at it in three phases. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I really liked your comments. I think it really relates almost to Point 2, the priorities of the Administration in this area. We certainly, at least in all my discussions with people, whenever we mention the topic of kids and how kids can be impacted by this, everybody's eyes light up; people that are asleep wake up, and everybody starts to move into animated discussion. It seems to me like there is -- keeping up the kids, that Deborah mentioned, is another way to look at it. But I think if there is a way to really capture the imagination of the entire populace based on a "man on the moon" kind of goal relative to education, I think that could flow throughout all of society. So, I think it's a matter of priorities. It's a matter of priorities. And I think you might want to think about that and see if that's -- as you draft your comments back to us by November 4th, whether that fits in. On Point 4, I think we've probably discussed it enough. We do have this outreach program that we're going to start in January as kind of Phase 4 of our framework for the NII, and, of course, as the Commerce Department moves to put together its public education and awareness program with very -- there's a lot of energy on that committee to work with you to twig that up and to help in any way possible to get the message out. We all believe that the Information Infrastructure is going to impact in a major way the way we live, the way we learn, and the way we work, and we need to get through that and really understand it. I think the more people out there that really understand that, the better off we'll all be. Any other comments on this? (No response) CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Thank you very much, Jonathan, Larry. Thanks to Secretary Brown for the letter. I think we're really moving toward really working together in this area, and it's a pleasure to see the relationship developing. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Why don't we look at the third item on our agenda? Let me see if I'm right. I've got all of these pieces of paper here. Yes. It's not on your agenda specifically. But, as we look at the framework here of our work, we'd like to spend a few minutes on some basic fundamentals of process here, and discussion of process. As we get into the issue, specifically, I'd like to hear from the council as to how you think we ought to proceed. I have some thoughts, and Ed and I have discussed this. We would just like -- let me just throw out the first thought, and then proceed from there. We had said early on that, in order to be as efficient as we could, we were appointed by Secretary Brown and that we were obligated to come to participate--and you are doing that extremely well-- that we made some decisions early on, at least, I think, informally, and I'd like to put it on the table, that the members of the council speak when we get down to the issues, and not representatives. So you don't have a representative -- your comments. So, I would throw that out for process as we get down to hearing from the reports, as we get down to coming to consensus on issues, that it was our view that it's members of the council who would make statements, and speak, and give their positions. Thoughts? I felt that was basic, but I thought it was important to put on the table. MR. ROBERTS: Well, I would just add a little bit to that. I would go a step further than that. You know, I have been one of the vocal people that said that this council was expanding, probably for political reasons. Once it got started, we decided to add another 10 members, another 10 members, and so on. That's all right, but we're about at our max. But I would suggest that we be even a little bit more proactive on what you say. Council members, at the parent level, that don't show up but their name is being carried, I would think a call from the Secretary, a call from Larry Irving, a call from yourself, would be worthwhile. And, if they don't want to participate, throw them off. It's very simple. VOICE: Here, here. VOICE: A point of view. VOICE: I can tell you, from my position, I don't have a lot of free time, so I don't want to hear that everyone is working too hard to appear here. VOICE: You've been giving a lot of your time. VOICE: The people who disagree aren't here to speak for themselves, but I completely agree with Bert. (Laughter) VOICE: What was the last part? VOICE: I completely agree with Bert. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I think there were two points that Del was making. One, was the one we've been addressing, the other one is, even for the people that are here, there's been some interest on some of the Mega-Project work to have a staff person present something to the council. I think, you know, our working guideline was that we would try to keep it amongst the council as much as possible. So -- other part of the -- CO-CHAIR LEWIS: And if there's a technical question, obviously we could refer to our staff or the technical expert that's working at Commerce, or wherever, to give us some direction and some answers for a technical question. But, for the most part, we would do our own speaking. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Yes, Toni? DR. BEARMAN: May I just raise a question related to that? I'm very, very pleased that several members of the council have wonderful staff, plural, backing them up. There are a couple of us who are very, very fortunate to have a staff person helping us out on a full-time basis. This has been a problem for some of us in terms of the resources needed, such things as travel funding for staff, the cost of participating for some of us, for example, from the education community. The resources are not really available. One thing we would like to know is, whether there is any possibility of some support for the cost of our participation. We feel it's a very important equity issue. It's great if you can have 10 staff and lawyers backing you up; we wish we had that. But some of the costs, even if just travel. Some members are paying a lot of expenses out of their own pockets personally, even using retirement funds, and that seems a bit excessive. So, if something could be investigated in this way, that would provide some support for the staff, help photocopying, things like that would make a big difference. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: I appreciate those comments. I do know, as far as our travel as council members and our expenses as council members is being reimbursed. That's a fact, right? DR. BEARMAN: Right. Yes. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Okay. I want to make sure that you knew that. DR. BEARMAN: Yes. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Now, your only other point is, you know, for other staff support and other expenses. You'd like to have some help because you don't have the resources that maybe some other groups have. DR. BEARMAN: Right. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: And that's a legitimate point. Let's take a look at that in terms of looking at overall expenses. DR. BEARMAN: Thank you. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: We'll probably need some more detailed discussion outside of this group to zero in on it, but the point is well taken. So, that is basically agreement. The other point that I wanted to talk about on the process question was your feeling about majority views, minority views, and consensus. We had talked about this informally early on, and I think there was a basic understanding that we were going to proceed to try to come to consensus on issues. And I will lay this out on the table. Obviously, we want to have a majority of you, which will give us a consensus, but, again, this group has been inclusive and not exclusive, that we ought to allow for "minority views" and other views to be a part of the record and a part of the report. Now, that leads to, if we've got majority and minority, whether or not we should vote on issues and whether or not we should allow proxies. Ed and I have a position, and then let's open up for discussion. We both think that there should be majority and minority, but not make it so formal. Obviously, we want to reach consensus. Our other view is, where appropriate, I think we said, we may have to take votes. I don't think we should be afraid of that. Now, we both felt that you ought to be here to vote, and we're not so sure that we would want proxies. But we are open for discussion. That's where we are. What's your reactions? Yes. MR. OPPERMAN: Well, Del, I agree with all of that. I've never liked proxies because I've never been able to persuade a person that can't hear, see, read, or participate in the argument. And, by the same token, a proxy isn't very able to share their views with the other group that's voting. So, if you're going to open it up to proxies, you might as well have 10,000 people on the council. We'd never meet and we could all do it electronically, perhaps, or by post card. I just don't think proxies work, and I don't think you should allow them. VOICE: Yes. I would be opposed to the voting, simply because most of the issues that we confront are so complex and so convoluted, and I don't know how you would frame an up or down vote on one issue. I mean, like part of the process or issue, I may not like the other part, but if I've got to force a vote, I've got to cast a ballot to stick it on one point. I would rather, where you would have a situation where a report would be drafted and you could sign on either on this particular report or sign on that particular report, so you could get your majority/minority opinions that way, by which report or which conclusion best states your position. I hate to think of us getting involved in Robert's Rules of Order, can I amend that motion, is that motion out of order, discussion, call for the vote, and those kinds of things. It just gets too convoluted. I think the consensus approach will allow us to say, well, I'm on that resolution or that agenda and I will sign onto that one, and not sign the other one. Maybe in some cases you'd sign on both. But the idea would be not to get us into a show of hands or a voice vote. It gets too parliamentary, and I don't think that's where we want to go. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: What are the other views? VOICE: I have a hard time following that, because there are so many issues involved here that there will be a multitude of minority reports. There simply won't be a majority report and a minority report that comprehensively reflects all the views on one side or the other. I don't see how you can avoid some sense of nose counting in order to determine a consensus behind a particular issue, whether it be done in the full council, or in the Mega-Project level. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Other views? Esther, then Bonnie. MS. DYSON: Yes. I don't think we need to make such a fuss about it. The fundamental way you do it is you say, here's some wording, do most of you agree with this wording; what do we do to fix it so that most of you agree with it? Then, when there's a real division, there's some kind of minority comment that's appended, without Robert's Rules of Orders, but with some quantification of how many agree and how many don't. It's a very interactive process and it works. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: It's been working so far, interestingly enough, too. MS. DYSON: Yes. MS. BRACEY: And we've done clarification. But I hope that when we do major initiatives in the Mega-Project, that all the people who are members of the council are allowed to express their opinion before it goes forward and is made into something that is already going to happen, an event, on the basis of time. I think we need to talk before we put those initiatives forward to make sure that's what the council members want. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Well, I think that goes without saying. I know our Mega-Project Chairs agree with you. And, if that's been happening, I'm sure that'll be corrected, that all of our deliberations have been in the open. We want to hear from all points of view. And, obviously, before a decision is taken, we want to hear from all concerned. So, I know that is very key. Ed? CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Yes, I agree with that. I also believe that we should work very hard as a council to try to grapple with the tough issues and develop a consensus opinion as much as possible and try to, almost as a first pass, to understand the things we agree on and the things we disagree on, and really endorse the things we agree on and try to make that stack as big as possible. And then we should take those things and really work on those issues that we disagree on as much as possible. And then I think there is a role for a minority report on those things we disagree on, or two reports, or whatever. I think it's really easy sometimes to just say, well, we disagree on that; let's do two reports, let's get on with it. I think it's really important to grapple with the issues. I think our work as an advisory council is to be a diverse group that represents so much of America around the table here. I mean, this is the microcosm that we can discuss some of these issues and try to develop an approach which is a consensus as much as possible. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: This may be the first test at the consensus building. And it usually works. I mean, you can hear around the table the varying points of view. And, if you haven't spoken, let me hear from you. But I'm hearing already that we have started this process of not being too disciplined and too tied up in parliamentary rules, that this group has worked together, hammered out things, and come to consensus. We've done it. We haven't had contentions, contentions, but I think that's the result of our talking to one another. My view -- and Ed, I think, shares it; we're very close to where Bob Johnson was -- but we did want to leave ourselves open, that if we really felt, and you felt, a vote needed to be taken, we would deal with that. But I think Ed and I both felt that we could handle it without getting too structured, that we could find out where the consensus was, and, obviously, if there was a minority report that needed to be issued, we would do that and we would proceed. I think that's the way we wanted to go, and I hear that from most of you. I think we can go from there. Any other thoughts? (No response) CO-CHAIR LEWIS: So, if I could summarize on the process here, we have decided that it's members of the council that would speak and you would not have representatives representing you, and certainly you would be the person voicing your opinions. As far as the process was concerned, as we got down to issues, our view was to come to a consensus and we would try to work hard on that, either from the Mega-Project view, or from the full council. We will hammer it out to come to a consensus. And, if we cannot, obviously we will certainly respect the minority views and have that presented as well. If appropriate, we will leave it open to voting, but basically our view is, we'll move to consensus. I didn't hear thoughts about proxies. We heard clearly from Vance. Others? No proxies? Everybody's nodding. So, I think we will proceed to no proxies, that you would be here to represent yourself. So, Mr. Co-Chair, I think that probably puts the process in focus. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Great. Great. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: You want to take a break? CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Yes. A good time for a break. How about 10:15 return? CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Great. Thank you. (Brief Recess.) REVIEW OF PROGRESS ON MEGA-PROJECTS MEGA-PROJECT CO-CHAIRS CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: We are running a little bit behind. Let's keep moving. We want to look at the review in progress on our Mega-Projects from the Mega- Project co-chairs. First of all, I would like to say that there has been a great deal of work done. Many of you have been working extremely hard, and I'd like to say thanks to all of you, particularly to the co- chairs, who are providing leadership to these task forces. You're doing an excellent job. The first, is a review of the ongoing issues on access, Ensuring Access to the NII. Bert Roberts is the co-chair, along with Carol Fukanaga, and she couldn't be here. Bert is going to lead that discussion. They've been doing an extremely good job, and I look forward to hearing their report. Bert? MR. ROBERTS: I'm on? All right. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: You're on. ENSURING ACCESS TO THE NII MR. ROBERTS: I would like to, first of all, say with respect to our council, and I think, irrespective that there are a couple of members on the Mega-II Task Force that are not here--Carol being absent because of an illness that she had in the family--as a general proposition, we have had what I would call relatively active participation. We have had a number of meetings in between these sessions. Typically, as I indicated last time, using anything from telephone conference calls to -- we're getting video conferencing relatively down to a point where it's useful in terms of our meetings. We've had participation at the actual member level, and all of those good staff work across the spectrum of things. I think we're getting into areas where we are now not only confronting, but, in some cases, coming to consensus on some of the difficult issues, that obviously this particular area of universal service/universal access will be focused on by the entire panel. What I would like to do today -- and we, as I indicated, Del, will be submitting some information in writing, which I will cover in a second, for the December session. It will be, I think, a little bit better shape than what I'm going to cover today. But, what I thought I could do today is take the council through a series of principles that we, for the most part, have directionally agreed on. I will tell you that there needs to be more development of some of these, and I will tell you there needs to be word-smithing of these before I would suggest that we have something that will be an absolute recommendation this council puts in writing to the government, but I believe these concepts that I'm going to go through -- we certainly are directionally in consensus on, and those areas in which we are not, I will identify, where we are continuing to have some problems with the issues at hand. I will also talk a bit about some of the in process work that is ongoing which haven't, at this time, been reduced to principles, per se, which I think, again, is a lot of good work going on. So, what I thought I'd do is take the council through a series of eight principles which I think are actually the top of the pyramid that underlies a lot of detailed discussion. And what I would again purport to do is, we will get these cleaned up, documented, and submitted, if you will, to the full council in better language than I will be taking you through at the moment. 1. The first principle that we have come up with is the fact that when you are looking at universal service/universal access -- and bear with me for using those words interchangeably; I'm going to talk about definition toward the end of my discussion, and that is one of the issues we are having great difficulty with, and are grappling with. But, when you are looking at the implementation, the concept of universal service/universal access, we believe that the NII should actually have two objectives: 1) A short-term objective that will focus on getting the concept implemented quickly around today's technology and within a scope of what I would call realistic funding for subsidy kinds of targets; 2) The long-term solution, which would have significantly more capability than we would be talking about short-term. It would also have goals and objectives as to where we want to be eventually, but it shouldn't take away from the fact that we need to do something quickly. More specifically on this principle, the short-term goal and recommendation that is evolving from our mega-group is that, in a short-term context, we should not worry, to state it negatively, about wiring every home with anything, but, conversely, what we should focus on for the short-term goal is equipping the institutions as soon as possible. By institutions, we refer to that as schools, libraries, media centers, community centers, centralized places where people can come, get access to the information highway as defined at this state in time. There may be some extension of that concept to hospitals and community health centers, but I want to be careful there. You've got quite a spectrum of that. We haven't agreed to that as a panel yet. A lot of hospitals don't need money and you may be talking about a different concept there in terms of types of health to rural areas, and so on. I will tell you, there is some issue about not using words like this on the panel and staying technologically neutral, I will say there has been a lot of discussion with respect to, what can you do today in terms of wiring up institutions such as schools and libraries. Telephony capability, namely, plain old telephone, and the extension to ISDM capability, which is coming at us very fast. We have statistics on this. It seems to be a good way of extending a great deal of capability that we would require for the short-term goal. There is significant discussion going on as to what we mean by short-term. There is a straw man on the table now that is being hotly discussed, let me put it that way. But the straw man on the table is, let's propose something that can be done by the end of 1996 and get the government initiated behind it, move forward, fund through certain stimulants, through certain minimal requirements, and make something happen. I would suggest to you that we all think, from a technological point of view, from a service point of view, everything exists out there to do what we're talking about. And the problem of that date has more to do with, is it possible for our government to react that quickly in terms of what they would need to do with respect to certain levels of funding, and perhaps cutting through certain other bureaucratic issues, or maybe even current law to make that happen again. A long-term solution is clearly one of bringing to every home--and I would parenthetically say we've also talked about, to every individual for certain capabilities based on what the technology is going to be at that time--levels of service that could be generically talked about, two-way broad-band, other kinds of very significant capability. By long-term, we're talking about, within 10 years. That's the outside limit of the horizon that we would be talking about, such that the implementation of these kinds of goals ought to be by the year 2005. We are also very convinced as a panel that a number of the major issues that this government tends to look at today and face today in terms of cost and subsidies will well be removed by the decline in the basic cost of computers and facilities, and by the commercial stimulants, which I will talk about in a minute. In other words, if you're looking at the issue of, how do you get this long-term goal done, and what will the subsidies be at that point in time, they will be substantially less than any of the numbers that have ever been thrown out over the past period of time. That is our first issue. Maybe the thing to do would be for me to quickly run through each of these and then open it up for discussion rather than one at a time, because there may be some overlap, to some degree. 2) The second principle that we are in agreement on is that commercial and competitive forces should be the driving force behind the NII with the government being involved from an incentive stimulation policy--and perhaps standards--direction's point of view. 3) The third principle is that universal access and service decisions should be heavily influenced--there are those on the panel that would use a stronger word, but let me use that word--by local community and specific individual requirements, with resources allocated accordingly. It's recognized that, as part of this, the federal, state, and local governments will all have a significant degree of interaction in how the NII will be developed with respect to certain baseline standards to ensure certain minimal levels of universal access and service. But the key is, there will be differences out there in how baseline services are defined by individuals. And the other key is, local communities are going to have a great deal of the responsibility in delivering to their citizens -- whether you're talking about through funding, or whether you're talking about understanding of the requirements and needs, with respect to the delivery of the NII. 4) The fourth principle is that the networks that comprise the NII, must all work together. There must be no bulkinization of the network. To the extent that this situation does not arise by itself, it is fair to subject it to government policy. In summary, you have to have interoperability of the networks that encompass the NII. I would again, quickly, point out that we're not talking about one network or one technology with that statement, it's whatever networks encompass that, we must have interoperability. 5) The fifth principle is active access. All classes of users of the system, not just some, need to be able to create, as well as receive, information. Passive receipt of information in the long-term solution is inadequate. It must be an active access, with participation of the users in receiving and creating. 6) The sixth principle is, there has to be redundancy of input and output. The users should always have more than one way to input information and control applications. That is, for example, through keyboards, through a mouse, through touch screens, through voice recognition, and should always have more than one way to receive the information, as text, as graphics, as speech, as audio. Redundancy of input/output is obviously a principle that will be directed toward the disabled and the many communities of interest that may not be able to use the systems as we have come to know them today. I think Deborah's group that had the various demonstrations around yesterday give us an idea of what we're talking about here, but the principle is, it should be a part of the fundamental NII that will be being implemented. 7) The seventh principle is that government information, from a universal access point of view, should be no less available on the NII than it is today under current law. Now, there is an issue here, and I want to be very careful with this statement. We are commenting on that from a universal availability, a universal access point of view. This comment does not take into account other critical areas associated with such things as privacy, so I want to be very careful. We had a lot of dialogue at the group commenting that when you move between technologies into new technologies, all of a sudden, the issue of something like, what was private before when you had inefficiencies of systems that were tied to paper, may become very available when you are looking at things like the NII and electronic media. So, the principle here is, what is available today from the government under the various laws that have been passed, Freedom of Information Act, and so on, ought to be no less available on the NII, but we recognize from our panel, and I'm sure this laps over into the other mega-group, that this statement, in itself, may cause problems with respect to privacy and other issues. 8) The final principle that we have so far is that if the government allocates or disposes of critical resources--for example, frequency spectrum which is under the government control--universal service and open access should be taken into account and it should be an integral part of the decision- making process in the future. That should be fundamental. Just like the FCC today must take public interest into account on decisions that it makes, what we are saying is that the government, when it is going through allocation or disposal of critical resources, should take universal service and open access into account as part of that decision-making process, not necessarily coming down on one side or the other, but it should be an issue that is looked at and taken into account. An example of where that was not done, was not considered, was the PCS auctions that we are undergoing. The government may well have made a right decision in terms of how they have concluded those should take place, but they didn't take into account these issues. And, as we come down to advice through this council to the government, we think it should be fundamental, particularly since you're looking at long- term goals and long-term solutions to some of these. The work in process right now that we're not really ready to comment on or surface today. The first, is a simple matter, which is a very complex matter of definitions. We have clearly expanded the scope of our charter from what I think we talked about at the first meeting to be something much more than the physical access, if you will--when we say physical, we think of networks and technical capability--to something broader which will include two concepts: access, which is probably related to the physical--I want to be careful with these words--process that we originally thought, but there's also going to be service. To what services to people have access to, in what will they be limited? Of course, when you get down to charging, what services do you charge for, and why? We also have had a lot of discussion of the pros and cons of being tied to the traditional telephony-based definition of universal service. Obviously, on the negative side, it is limiting. It has grown historically out -- that we are able to crisply define the new concepts, if they be that, in terms of what we are talking about with respect to universal service/universal access going forward. The second piece of work in process are the environmental scans that I talked about at the last meeting. Today we have what I think is an excellent summary and an excellent snapshot of what exists today. There is still some work being done, but I think when it is distributed to the entire council you will find it as a good compendium of information with respect to the status of things that we are focusing on today, whether you're talking about demographics of the population, the network reach, technological capabilities, regulatory status around the country. I would look at this environmental scan work that we had done as being an appendix, if you will, to our report, because I think it is important that we understand the starting point. I would expect to distribute this, on behalf of the panel, as part of our December meeting. We were going to distribute it today, but I think there was a strong feeling on the part of the panel that we want to be very careful that this information isn't, in effect, thrown out for council and public consumption without some caveats as to what it is and what it means, because the danger of this is that the information will be extrapolated in ways that will not make sense in the future. The slopes of certain lines are changing must faster than people realize. the costs are coming down much faster, the networks' capabilities are moving much faster. And we believe we need to put around the distribution of this material a little bit more substance in terms of what it is, what will be used, how we will use it, and then also combine it in a document that would include the principles, and other things. Again, we will distribute that in December, but I think you will find it fascinating. The third ongoing set of considerations which is going to be very fundamental, obviously, to our own topic of universal service, universal access, are funding considerations. We've had much debate, much discussion with respect to that. I think we've learned a lot. We've learned, for example, that things that can't be done today on a ubiquitous basis could be done tomorrow, or tomorrow's a long-term solution, perhaps relatively inexpensively in terms of some of the issues of subsidies, simply because of how the commercial and competitive environment is driving things. I think we've also learned that there are solutions that can be implemented on the short-term that will not be prohibitive with respect to costing subsidies and funding, and probably are within the reach of a short-term goal of this panel. Again, we've had lots of discussions as mapped onto the environmental scans. We will have recommendations, or at least directional recommendations to this council, possibly by December, and we can start raising some of these considerations. But I think we're moving well along. On this point, on the part of the Mega-II group, I want to disclaim the letter that was distributed on the part of the Advertising Association that should have come -- it was, in fact, sent to me. I didn't realize it was sent to the total committee. It should not be taken out of context. It is not our opinion that that letter is correct. We do think that advertising will play a part in some levels of funding of some types of services going forward in the future, but, if you read that out of context of what will be our total committee's deliberations, it is one small part of a very complex issue. So, although it was distributed and although it's out there in public hands, and I'm sure there's much debate and comment under it, I think you should consider it, for the moment, irrelevant, and we will deal with that as part of our overall considerations on funding. The final thing, which is what I mentioned this morning, Del and Ed, is that we do look at it as our responsibility to address Questions 1 and 3, not in a vacuum of this panel, but certainly those are part and parcel to the things that we've been looking at. And we also talked yesterday about the fact that the NTIA's Notice of Inquiry, which obviously posed questions and so on, many of those will be things that our panel is looking at as well. With that I would like to, first, throw it open to any of the Mega-Group's two members, if I have misstated something or not raised to the proper level of issue that some of these things may well have been. And, if there are no comments there, what I'd like to open up is any comments, or debate, or discussion on what we've discussed so far. I hope that's satisfied what you were expecting today. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Yes. Thank you very much, Bert. It certainly does fit what we were looking for today. Bert has outlined eight principles that the Mega-Project has come forth with, and we're going to open that up for discussion. We talked about definitions. He's not quite ready to give us a complete listing of that -- lots more discussion. On the environmental scan, I just had one question. Did you say that you will make that available to other groups at some point? MR. ROBERTS: We will make that available as part of the December meeting, and various staff people have badgered me into an understanding of what that means, in advance of the December meeting, for getting information in. So, you will have it as part of the distribution kit for the December meeting. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Great. And then I had one other question about funding. That's the cost question, the subsidy question. Is that what you mean by funding? MR. ROBERTS: Funding really, I think, has two fundamental parts that we're addressing. First, is the cost of whatever we're talking about doing. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Right. MR. ROBERTS: And you have to matrix or look at that on a time continuum, based on forecasts of what is going to happen through the natural forces and what will then need to get into the second point. The second point is then, therefore, what needs to be "subsidized," and, if it is subsidized, how does that take place? CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Right. That was my understanding. So the floor is open now. Thank you very much. I thought that was well done. I think you hit, really, the major issues as you look at principles of access. Any discussion, maybe one by one, or generally? Yes, John. MR. SCULLEY: I'd like to comment on your Principle No. 1, Bert. First of all, I think it's a very good principle, that we ought to have some realistic short-term objectives and focus on public institutions as a logical place to begin. I think that when many people think of the National Information Infrastructure they tend to think of its impact in terms of telephones, televisions, personal computers. But I think when you get to public facilities, that we can also look at the successful experience with ATM machines. There are only about 87,000 ATM machines in the United States, yet I think it's had a huge impact in terms of showing people how their life can be different, more convenient. I think that if you look back at telephone service, it started with party lines before people had private phones, and there could well be an opportunity, now going to your Principle No. 7 about government information, even government transactions, of looking at what goes beyond the ATM machine in terms of transactions over networks. That's something where people don't have to go out and buy a piece of equipment, they can go out and experience it by walking up to it, either information or transactions. And I think, as we look at the role that the government can play in this -- I'm not a fan of the government subsidizing activities, but I do think in the procurement process, whether it be the post office or whether it be government agencies, that there is an opportunity for the use of kiosks and other types of technologies that go over networks that are interactive, just as an ATM machine is interactive. That might well help explain to the public how the Information Infrastructure is going to touch their lives in ways that are going to happen much sooner than waiting for them to go out and buy some new piece of equipment. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Very good. So, you certainly endorse the short-term objectives of moving with the public institutions? MR. SCULLEY: Yes. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Very important. Yes? VOICE: I'd like to add that part of the rationale for the short-term solution dove-tails with what the Secretary talked about in terms of capturing the imagination of the American people, moving beyond a principle to a goal; that, if we can agree it's achievable and we bring private sector support to for the government, that, by its very nature, is going to interest people and excite people, I believe, more than simple principles. MR. ROBERTS: It would probably be, in all fairness, Del, that the committee, through a couple more deliberations over the next couple of weeks -- you may find us delivering to this council a very, very aggressive proposal with respect to the short-term. And I don't want to leave this meeting today, since we have no meetings between now and December -- with anything other than, there are -- I'm speaking for all of us, now. We believe that if we can stimulate and force something quickly, not to the detriment of the long- term solution, but getting on with things that we can do today within reasonable cost standards, we as a council ought to put tremendous pressure on this government to do something. And they are willing. I mean, Jonathan was here yesterday, and it's a question of, how can we deal with the complexities of trying to move this kind of an initiative through the government? The only debate within our panel had to do with how aggressive can we be, opposed to the goal. But it's possible that by December, besides the principles and besides the scans, we may have the outline of a very aggressive proposal that we would recommend this council, in fact, work with the government on related to short-term solutions. So, I don't want to -- CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Very good. Any other discussion? (No response) CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Well, it's my understanding that -- Ed? Sorry. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I liked your comment that access was beyond technology and we really had to relate to services. It seems to me like there's also a third part of access which relates to people. You addressed that partly in your access principle relative to multiple redundant ways to get to people that are disabled. I also think there's a people access point that relates to schools. If we can train our kids in school through the short-term, aggressive program to use the networks, then people are going to train their parents, they're going to train teachers. There's an enabling thing that has to happen in universal service, it seems to me, where people have to understand it, they have to desire it, and they have to be able to use the services and the technology. It seems to me like that needs to be addressed as well. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Yes. Mitch? MR. KAPOR: I really have a question of the other council members. Generally, when there is relatively little comment in the face of lots of new information, it either means that everybody is enthusiastically in favor, or people are just sort of stupefied, and I can't tell which here. We've been working pretty hard on this. That was sort of an attempt to be funny, to say we need to get some sense of, you know, does this sound okay, sound good, sound bad, don't know, before we move on to the next topic. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Yes? VOICE: I guess it's like most principles. The principles make a whole lot of sense and it's hard to react other than saying, gee, that sounds okay. So my question then would be, do you have any examples of the kinds of things you might propose as specific short-term projects? I mean, is it more electronic tax payments, is it more electronic food stamps; can you be a little more tangible? I know you haven't decided on this yet, but what were you talking about that you're not ready to tell us formally? (Laughter) MR. ROBERTS: Well, the only danger of surfacing this is, we'll get into the same two-hour debate we did yesterday. I can give an example and it would be -- one thought process might be along the following lines, is that every school, every library, perhaps community centers that could be identified, senior citizens and others, but a specific identified list of institutions that are centralized in concept, probably focused on education, and have public access capabilities, would be wired with ISDN type of capability, where that wasn't extended, phone-type capability would be extended, such that those enterprises could have access to the Internet as we know it today, and as it's going to grow over the next two years. I'm not suggesting that's the total solution. You asked for an example. Where would the funding come from that? You are in a window of funding opportunity that it will not be prohibitive, and I'm going to use the word for the last time, it's rounding air for the government. Okay. I'm not supposed to use "rounding air" when I refer to government. I've been chastised for that. There are ways that we probably can work with the government to stimulate the state enterprises and the local enterprises to do something within a time frame and let the monies flow. Yes, there will be mistakes made, and yes, the technology will be obsolete after a period of time, all those other thousands of reasons that it can't work, but just think about, perhaps in two years, of having every kid in America have access to Internet through an ISDN-level capability, if not that, telephone, where you just lose some speed, through centralized locations. You know, I think we can afford a few mistakes on that. That's one example. VOICE: My response is, I'm enthusiastic. MS. BRACEY: I'd like to say also that I think to have our students to touch the future through the children being able to reach out, we'll finally get phones. No, I'm kidding. But I mean, to finally be able to allow children to be a part of this, because we've got to prepare our students for the 21st century. This will help with the transformation, because if we don't help, education will never change. So, I appreciate the hard work that has gone into this effort. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: I think Stanley has been trying to talk. MR. HUBBARD: Yes. Nothing controversial. I'd like to really comment Bert Roberts and his group for what I think is a very, very good statement, and I think your plan is a very, very smart one. We have to walk before you run. I've been giving speeches to different groups around the country about different subjects and I always get asked about the NII. I always make the comment that I think we have to wire every school, every library, so at the very least every child in this country will have access, maybe not in their home, but in some nearby facility. So, congratulations, Bert. I think you did a great job. MR. ROBERTS: Thank you. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Susan? MS. HERMAN: Well, in the challenge that Mitch threw out to have us comment, I have some questions, Bert. I'm not sure that they are answers that you have now, especially given that you don't want to necessarily reveal all things at this time. But I guess the first one goes to the issue of all schools, all libraries. That's great. Is that public, is that private, is that something that communities define, or is this something that you see being defined from the beginning? I mean, community centers, for example, day care centers, barber shops, sometimes are as active a place, a point of exchange and access as the local school, which might be closed at 3:00 o'clock. So I'd just throw that out as something that maybe your committee has already looked at. But that is one question, comment, however you want to take it. The second is, public policy has made a significant difference in the issue of universal service, and the example that I'm aware of is one where Philadelphia and Camden, New Jersey, having very similar demographics, have very different telephone penetration. The reason that they do, I'm told, is because in Camden, where it ranges between the mid-'70s to the low 90th percentile, they have just basic phone service and people subscribe as they do. In Philadelphia, there is a fundamental platform of lifeline service, if you will, below which no one may sink. They may stomp on their phone, they may never pay a bill, but, bottom line, there is a certain level of service in which no one will ever be disconnected. Therefore, their penetration rates, I'm told, are up in the 99th percentile. I recognize that this is an issue where public policy makes a difference. I also recognize it ties into financial issues because, how does that happen? It can only happen, possibly, with subsidizing, or some other ways of distributing cost. But I throw that out as a question as to whether or not you are looking at, not just universal service, but what I might call more like a lifeline service. Is there a level below which we want to make sure no one sinks? Is there a lifeline which we want to make sure everyone is tied to, almost whether they want it or not? And I'm not necessarily speaking to your long-term, which I understand is in potentially every household, but, even at the beginning, the short- term to the schools, the libraries, and so forth. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Good questions. Bert, did you want to respond? MR. ROBERTS: Do you want responses? I mean -- CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Well, you might just give some sense of reaction. MR. ROBERTS: Before I hog it, does anybody else want to take a shot? Come on, Mitch. VOICE: You don't have to respond. I mean, I was just sort of throwing it out. MR. ROBERTS: I want to respond on one specific issue, but go ahead. MR. KAPOR: We have actually begun discussing a version of that very issue, and we simply have not yet reached a conclusion. I mean, the form in which we've discussed the issue, is the observation that, in the nation as a whole, universal service today for POT reaches 94-95 percent of the populace. You could say, well, either this is very good, or it's not enough, especially because there's lumpiness in that. And, as you observed, some communities and neighborhoods have, in terms of basic phone service, 70-80 percent. And what is of concern is that, in some metropolitan areas, the percentage is going down. So we have on the table the question of whether, in the course of our recommendations and principles, we want to tackle in its own -- fashion the issue of universal service today in the POTS context. I mean, it is its own very important and complex issue. Our reservations are not about -- and I suppose I'm proposing to speak for the group, and I have absolutely no authorization to do this, so I just better say this is my personal opinion. There's a question of whether and to what extent it sort of fits into our charter if we're focused on NII. I mean, how much can we take on? What I assume is, especially given your feedback on this, we're just going to have to continue wrestling with this. Just remember, this is an interim report. Right? We have until December 6th to present something that we're prepared to stand behind. Is that fair, Bert? MR. ROBERTS: Yes. Just two comments. One, we've actually been on the POTS and the universal aspects of that, and so on. We've actually been asked by the Commerce Department to give a recommendation on whether, as part of a short-term goal, we ought to extend from 95 percent to 100 percent the issue -- you know, the gap of people that don't have phones. I think there's going to be varied opinion on that. I think it does relate to what we're talking about, though, with respect to the short-term goal and how you get access broadly to a number of areas. And, on that point, there are two issues. One issue, is certain people don't have telephones today because they can't afford it, and there are certain other people that don't have telephones because of rural, geographic kinds of reaches and displacement. Both of those may have to be solved differently, and both may be looked at differently in terms of short- term solutions. Another point you mentioned right at the front was public versus private. That's an issue we're going to have to grapple with. Obviously, when you talk about all schools and all libraries you have those two mixes that are in there together, and that's going to bring up issues that have to be addressed, both long- term and short-term. I will tell you, from my opinion point of view, when you're looking at the short-term solution, don't put impediments in it. I mean, all right, so you've got a private school that may make out a little bit, as long as you don't do that to the disadvantage of the schools, and the priorities of the schools in the inner city or the rural areas that don't have access. The key is to stimulate and get it done for the short-term, and then sort out some of these issues about, did anybody make out on it, did some equipment vendor rip things off. I mean, those all have to be sorted out, but those can be done. We haven't discussed that point. I think you may find a different question mark when you're looking at with respect to the long-term, though. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Jack had his hand up, and then Toni. MR. FISHMAN: As a member of Bert's Mega- Project, I think probably two or three points need to be made. It's my understanding that when we say that we're not ready to reveal, that could be interpreted, possibly, wrong, in a sense. We're not trying not to tell the council, or the world, for that matter, what the principles are that we're working on. We, on the other hand, have certain data that we're trying to collect that is not in final form, and the premature release of that data that we're accumulating could be interpreted in the wrong direction, which I think if we want to make sure that we've got it in the proper form, that as it's interpreted, that would be fully revealed at that time. So, I think as a basic question here, that we're not trying to hold anything back from the council at all. We're not trying to reveal totally what our game plan or our principles are, which I think we are. It's a matter of, there's certain data that we are collecting that's not ready for release. I think the second thing, as a member of that particular panel, that we think to solve -- I think, for the group, that if we can do something, as I think probably Bonnie said, although it may not be perfect, if we can do something to touch the future type of thing with our children, and we can do it quickly, we think that that would have a tremendous impact possibly on the long-term effect of the National Information Infrastructure, because if we can touch the future with our children and we can do it quickly, then we think that they will be going home to talk to their parents, grandparents, and others in that particular area. As far as community centers are concerned, this place really was thrown in, schools, libraries, community centers. We don't really have defined community centers, except in certain parts of our society. There may not be a library, or the schools may not be as active as we would like for them to be. I have taken from LaDonna, I think, who brought up the word "community centers" at one time, that we want to make sure that we have full accessibility as far as we can in this initial stage to every community that we possibly can to touch the lives of the future. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Thank you, Jack. Toni, you had a comment? DR. BEARMAN: Well, I think you've done a superb job, and I'm very, very pleased with the principles. I think we didn't say more because we're all very supportive of what you are doing. I also very much like the idea of focusing on some short-term action items. Let's get going on this. I see a lot of overlap with what we're doing in Mega-Project I, particularly in the libraries, schools, and community centers, so I assume you'll be touching base with our project as well. One point. I realize you do not want to release all of your environmental scans and the data yet till you feel happy with it. I would hope you would call upon the members of the council with expertise in particular areas. I would be very happy to look at the data you may have about libraries, for example. There are new studies coming out every day that you just may not have seen yet. And, if there's a way that members of the council can help you by taking a quick, confidential look, not disseminating it widely, to help you with the environmental scans, with recommendations for the action plans. I think your questioning of all libraries -- of course, you don't mean all 115,000 libraries the very first year. So, if there is some help we could give on which libraries and where. One final small point, but important. Please, as you are looking at the schools, always remember the school library media center person, because that's the person who works with all the teachers and all the students. So, please don't forget those libraries as well. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Thank you, Toni. I think, to Mitch's point, there is consensus developing. I think that the people listen intently, and I don't think there's major disagreement on these various principles. It sounds as if there is a strong support for the short-term objective/long-term objective approach, and the other items seem to be fairly clear as well. I couldn't help but hark back to my telephone days with Susan Herman's question on Camden and Philadelphia. I had been with Bell Atlantic for a number of years, as you all know. That came up quite a bit. One answer is, the regulatory structures are different. You have one commission under New Jersey and one under Pennsylvania, and the commissions--and I know Joan would agree with me--are not all together in their approaches on how they regulate the telephone service. So, I think the fact that we are going to be talking to NARUC, which came up with Larry, and the regulators, I think is a very, very important point as Bert and others begin to sort of track through, at least the telephony piece. But there are a lot more pieces to it. The regulatory scheme has certainly had an impact on the kinds of subsidies or cost structures that impact phone business. So, the regulatory piece is definitely a part of it. Yes, Bert? MR. ROBERTS: This brings forth an opportunity, I think. Let me ask it as a question. Is there any problem of, perhaps, us distributing some of this information to some selected members of other Mega-groups that could add expertise before it gets to the general distribution, public distribution, and so on? CO-CHAIR LEWIS: I don't see a problem. Do you, Ed? CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I don't think there's any problem with that. MR. ROBERTS: Then that answers my question. Thank you. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Good. That would be very helpful. Mitch? MR. KAPOR: I just want to make one point of clarification. In the same fashion that we're still exploring the scope of what is meant by community-based institutions, schools, libraries, and so on, which we need to come to some closure on fairly shortly, my characterization would be that when we talk about connecting all of these institutions, whatever they are, into short-term to an existing NII, one of the open issues is what we are ultimately going to say, through what technological means. One of the ways of addressing what the issue is there is -- we have not yet come to agreement about whether we can even name specific technologies or not. One set of people is perfectly comfortable saying it should be ISDN, or it should be ISDN and POTS, and another set of people are saying, no, that is not sufficiently technology neutral. So, you know, in the spirit of sort of full disclosure of where we are in our process now, I just wanted to clarify that. If anybody should want to weigh in on that, you know, please feel free. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: ...if you will bring those back to us in December in final form, I assume, with also some clarifications on definitions and environmental scans, and we will also be discussing the funding part of that as well. So, December will be sort of a final look. I would think, would we get something before December? Okay. So we'll have a chance to have a look at it before we come to our December meeting. So, a job well done. ELECTRONIC COMMERCE PRINCIPLES CO-CHAIR LEWIS: If no other comments, then we will move to the Electronic Commerce principles, by Vance Opperman and Jane Smith Patterson will discuss Education principles. MR. OPPERMAN: Del, how do you want to do this? Do you want to do electronic principles first and then hear a report on education? All right. So I'll go first, and then Jane will take it on education. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Do we need copies? MR. OPPERMAN: You should have had distributed to you the Principles for Electronic Commerce, Mega- Project I. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: We have more if anybody needs it. MR. OPPERMAN: Okay. They're also in your book, although that which is being distributed will be different than that which was in your book, which reflects the differences in drafting yesterday. By way of background, I've been blessed, and Jane's been blessed, by a very hard-working, very conscientious group of experts on Mega-Project I and people who have given a great deal of time. In fact, it's been kind of an honor to watch that process kind of work. What we have in front of you is what we've adopted by consensus as the first seven principles dealing with electronic commerce. When I say by consensus, obviously the document reflects compromise, it reflects a rather rich, constantly redrafting process, which has gone on now for about three months. Many of you in this room, not just on Mega-Project I, responded to our request for comments at the New York meeting. And you will notice, some of those comments have been incorporated in the document before you. But, since it's kind of our honor to bring forward to you the first of the drafts that have come through the Mega-Project process, we submit to you Messrs. Chairmen and to the full body, our final recommendations for the seven principles dealing with electronic commerce. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Thank you. Was Jane going to add, or are we going to open it up for discussion? MR. OPPERMAN: I think what we'd prefer to do, is we would do electronic commerce now, and then Jane will give the report on education. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Okay. Great. So, would there be discussion here? Did you want to take us through it? We want to make sure that we have some input here. MR. OPPERMAN: Well, the easiest way to do that is to read along. The concept behind this -- and, as I said, we adopted this language by consensus, but, again, after a long number of drafting sessions. 1) Number one lays out the overall principle that we expect the NII to have on the American economy or American commerce. 2) Number two is specifically related to the concern we have that we recognize change and development of our economy. We also recognize, though, and wanted to give it a specific principle by itself, that worker retraining is going to be necessary, both for productive use of new technologies, and also to allow transition for individual workers. 3) A re-work of one of the Five Principles, emphasizing the primacy of the vigorous competitive environment led by the private sector. 4) Number four recognizes the importance of intellectual property and the other matters that we communicate there, particularly in the commercial context: transactional security, rights of users, data integrity, and so forth. 5) We talk about the primary role of government in electronic commerce, and we specify what we think that is. I think, without jumping into education, it's probably fair to say that many of us feel that the role of government is different in electronic commerce, which has been a very successful part of the NII to date, then, for example, the role of government in such areas as education. And I think you will see, when we discuss education, that many of us feel the primary role of government in electronic commerce is essentially to assure a level playing field, but to get out of the way, whereas, in education, you have a much more proactive role for the governmental levels in education, for a lot of obvious societal and financial reasons. 6) In six, we talk about local and state governments, in addition to the Federal Government. That's where we start talking about consumer awareness programs. 7) Then, last of all, we underscore, again, our commitment to the private sector, but also to underscore the importance of higher education and research community involvement. I might say that each one of these principles has had its own little set of discussion points, and word-smithing, and grammatical give and take. The one in seven that will catch a number of people's eye, I'm guessing, is the pre-competitive language. Our basic approach there is that, to the extent that there ought to be government funding in electronic commerce, given the fact that there's been such a rich private investment and we do not think that that's where primary government funding should be, but there's obviously a role, we believe, for government funding and pre-competitive research. Now, the question is going to come up, how do you define pre- competitive? We wrestled with that, and there have been a variety of ways to deal with that phrase, all the way from market failure, to basic research, to a variety of other formulations. We've adopted pre-competitive, in part, because of some of the legislative efforts for various joint consortia which have used that phrase, but also we adopted pre-competitive because we thought that was the best phrase that summarized the idea that, if there's government funding to be spent in this area, it should be spent in areas that are not already being developed by the private economy. And that, again, ties in with our basic view of the primary role of government in electronic commerce. As I said, as you will see in education and other areas, I think we have a somewhat different view of the primary role and responsibility of government in those areas. I can tell you where the hot buttons are in each one of these, but I don't want to do that because -- VOICE: They can figure them out. MR. OPPERMAN: Yes, it's a test. There are plenty of other people around this table that have been through this process now for, oh, I don't know, 15, 18 hours at various meetings. But that gives you the high points or the low points at least. And, as I said, we are pleased to be able to bring to the full council a document which was achieved by consensus. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Very good. That was a good synopsis. Discussion? Your reactions? Yes, Joan. MS. SMITH: I have a question on Principle 6. I need either further explanation or elaboration on the last phrase which says, "and through consumer awareness campaigns to promote the adoption of the NII." Is that consumer awareness campaigns to promote what local, state, and Federal Government are doing to stimulate the use by procurement, offering government services and so on, or is that a general kind of promotion campaign for the NII, whatever? Vance just said it was a general campaign. So that leads me to the next comment, if that were to be the answer, which it was. And that is, there is a great deal of emphasis in the Vice President's principles, and also in these principles, about the private sector leading. And I was curious as to how and why, and by what method local, state, and Federal Government should also be a promoter, an advertiser beyond its own goods and services that it is providing by way of the National Information Infrastructure, and why should the public have to pay for promoting products that are on the private market and available through the private economy? MR. OPPERMAN: In the commerce area, it is not our intention--and Joan and I agree with a lot of that thrust--to see the government, local, state or federal, suddenly get into robust competition promoting or advertising competing products. But, when we had the phrase about promoting the adoption of the NII, we think there is an important role, listening to Jon Young last night, for example. The various programs that are ongoing at the local, state, and federal level -- we certainly don't have a universal understanding of all those programs. But there are many programs that are subsumed under the concept of the NII that people are simply unaware of: the use of 800 numbers, the use of cross- boundary emergency response facilities. If, for example, we adopt programs in the schools, both out of Bert's report and much of what will come out of our educational report, many of those programs in the schools, for example, will probably need to have campaign of awareness. We also kept it vague as to who would be targeted by these campaigns. We said consumer awareness campaigns, and we mean that very broadly. If, for example, you have a program where schools are involved or where there is an effort by a local government to team up with, say, the state university, that consumer awareness may be targeted at other legislators, it may be targeted at certain parts of the society, it may be targeted at parents, and it's intentionally left quite broad. But it is meant to address our concern that even when good projects are done, and even when there are good applications, there has to be some degree of promotion. And I think some of that degree of promotion will take place by the state, local, and Federal Government. We didn't say the degree. I tend to share your comments, Joan, that this is not going to be the primary use of government funding. But there will be some of that that will have to go on. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: That's good. Yes, Deborah? MS. KAPLAN: I'd like to bring to your attention an area that I think -- it may be assumed that issues around use of technology for people with disabilities is adequately being covered in Mega- Project II. I'd like to offer an argument that I think it belongs here, too. Under the Americans with Disabilities Act, Title III, there are specific provisions dealing with access to places of public accommodations. That comes from the commerce clause and is intended to open up access to commercial transactions for disabled people. The problem that exists under Title III of the ADA right now is that the language of the bill specifically talks about places of public accommodation. And I don't know if this is a problem with other civil rights legislation, or a relevant issue, but for disabled people it's a significant problem. It's not at all clear, under the Department of Justice regulations or even under the statute, whether electronic transactions are covered by the ADA, because you don't need a place of business in order to do business electronically. So, there is a potential significant problem with technologies being developed that disabled people can't use, and I think, well, we showed you the positive side in the demonstrations yesterday about technology for people with disabilities. There's a very negative side as well with technology that's out there now that a lot of people can't use, which means many people are simply not being able to buy things electronically, even if they want to. Another aspects, as I look at these principles, is a similar problem in work places where there's technology, and I spoke about this at the last meeting, so I won't belabor it, but where there is software and other applications that are out and very widely used in the workplace that people with certain disabilities can't use with no adaptive technology that exists that solves problems. So, all the worker training in the world can't solve that problem if the technology is not usable. Third, I'd just like to suggest that on the R&D section the whole area of human factors, looking broadly at all people, including people with different kinds of disabilities, is probably a very appropriate area for government to be involved in in terms of R&D in order to maximize that effort and get that information into the hands of companies so that private companies that want to get involved in the area don't have to put their own research into human factors and ergonomics to figure out what are good design guidelines for all people, and then that ends up being proprietary information that doesn't get shared with the next company that wants to take up the same issue. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Very good points. Yes? MR. OPPERMAN: We are not entirely insensitive to that. It seemed to us a couple of things. First, we were looking at Mega-Project II to address the questions of access and service. I think that's part of it. We tried to develop principles for electronic commerce, and, I guess within that context, our response to those issues would be three-fold. First, that generally speaking, the best approach to those problems will be reached by the private competitive market, and they will answer those concerns most reliably. Second, that if there is research or technology or issues posed really by any circumstance that is not being addressed in that fashion, that would be pre-competitive, and we understand the role of government in fostering pre-competitive research. Third, it seemed to us that, again, the specifics of how -- I mean, it's certainly a principle that we all accept, I think, that the information future can't have "haves and have nots." It seemed to us that that is not addressed, really, within the context of developing commerce, per se. So, if there is not a delineation of specific applications or specific concerns such as the ones that you raised, it's not because we don't think they're covered, but, in a commercial context or in electronic commerce, we think it's generally best done by the private market, unless it's pre-competitive. And then I assume we're going to have some principles that deal with ensuring universal access and universal service which we did not address. MS. SMITH: I guess I'd just like to leave the question, what do you do then, or what have you talked about, when there is evidence of the marketplace not working and not solving specific problems? MR. OPPERMAN: Well, I think that's always -- that, to me, is a question that generally is not in electronic commerce, but it seems to me that is a question of social policy. You have a number of claims that can be made of places where the market is not reaching somebody else's definition of what it ought to do, and then you ally those against what's available in terms of resources, and that's what an elected representative form of government does. I don't know, and I don't feel at all competent to address those issues. But I think that's a matter of social policy and ought to be addressed in that fashion. For example, the issue that you raised most pointedly, it seems to me that is something that we address in the context of universal service. If we adopt--if, and I assume we do--the principle that there are not going to be "haves and have nots," that principle flowing from that, I think, makes it incumbent upon us to address the question of, how do we make sure that there are not have nots. But it didn't seem to us that that was an electronic commerce issue. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Let me make a suggestion. This may be one case where we talked about our process and coming to consensus and reaching conclusions. I think what's important here is that the thing that Deborah mentions is probably we should be consistent as these task force principles unfold, and there should be a theme that we ought to agree on. I don't think there's any disagreement here. So, maybe somewhere along the line in some of these principles there should be some statement which would show our sensitivity to Americans with disability in the electronic arena. So, I think that's what her point is, that it's silent. And you're saying it's covered somewhere else, but it's silent. And I think that what we need to do is to have some language which will not be silent but will make some reference to it and that would flow clearly into access, and so on. So, I think that's her point. Not that we are going to hash out in the principles all of the details of how it works or doesn't work, or social policy, but have some recognition. So, I think it's a word-smith piece here. MS. SMITH: Thank you. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Maybe we can get our heads together. MR. OPPERMAN: We can certainly try that. I think Ms. Herman might be a good person to do that. Is that fair? CO-CHAIR LEWIS: You've been appointed to work with Deborah and others and make sure that we reflect that. I don't think the committee would disagree with it, it's just a matter of how we fold it in. Yes, Toni? DR. BEARMAN: I was just going to say that I believed in our discussion of the general principles which we feel will come first, we have tackled this to some extent. Second, the wording of consumer protection and user protection is extremely important in here, and that is meant to encompass needs of diverse communities and diverse populations. MR. OPPERMAN: Toni has been one of the people that's kept us honest on that subject at every sentence. We didn't rehash all the language debates we've had on this. Maybe in Sue's first effort at being more specific on that issue she can go back and visit our discussion and where we've talked about consumer protection/user protection. That might be a place where that needs some emphasis. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Very good. Yes, Bert? MR. ROBERTS: On these principles, particularly since they are focused on electronic commerce, I wonder if there needn't be another principle, or maybe you addressed it. But there is a lot of electronic commerce going on today. You can buy things electronically through E- mail or Information Services, you can do checking electronically, you can buy, purchase, and sell stocks electronically. There are bank-to-bank transactions, all of which have interstate -- and the point is, that must means that there's an existing set of laws on the books that cover those transactions. And it would seem to me that one principle, just as we had talked about in Mega-Group I with respect to the Freedom of Information Act and so on, there might be a principle that you need to focus on here that has something to do with extension of the current laws, rules that are in existence, if you haven't looked at that. The second point, I would ask -- MR. OPPERMAN: Well, Bert, let me ask you a question. I'm not sure I quite grasp the import of your comments. I agree that there is approximately $9 billion being done on information alone, and about $156 billion being done in our economy already in electronic commerce, and they're covered by a welter of rules and regulations. But what would you have us say about that? MR. ROBERTS: Well, the thing I can't see from these principles -- you say very directly here, for example, that -- pick one. Protection of intellectual property rights, transactions, securities, rights of users, and so on. You said it as a principle. Is that a principle that is consistent with the laws of the land today based on the governing of electronic commerce, or is it inconsistent? I mean, it seems to me, if we're going to recommend principles to the government with respect to these kinds of issues on electronic commerce, we ought to recommend them with the knowledge that it is consistent with, or additive to, or inconsistent with what's going on today. These all look very good. Does that mean that MCI can set up an interstate gambling operation? I mean, that's -- MR. OPPERMAN: Sure. MR. ROBERTS: You know, I think we need to understand. MR. OPPERMAN: I think the basic problem that we all kind of struggle with with varying degrees of success is the level of abstraction and the level of detail. And you can get such a high level of abstraction that you've said nothing useful, but on which there is universal agreement. Then you can go the other way and get tremendous detail, but there's no agreement, and you try to go along that spectrum. For example, in number four, we think it's important that we emphasize, as a limited number of principles, what is absolutely essential for any concept of electronic commerce. We think the things we have talked about in general in four are essential to that process and for the development of a fully useful NII and the continued development of electronic commerce. We have not spelled out, and I know that there will be discussion, and maybe even some disagreement on just exactly what type of protection of intellectual property we're talking about. We didn't spell that out in detail. So, from that level of detail, we are lacking. It is not, however, such a level of abstraction that it is, I think, unhelpful. For example, there are people, some of whom have testified and given us material, that argue that intellectual property, to take the first one on number four, is, in fact, a detriment or a barrier to electronic commerce. And the concept of intellectual property is that's commonly used today in the concept of the existing legal framework as a barrier, and is antithetical to the development of additional commerce. We have taken an opposite position. But I agree with you that we are open to the criticism that we have not been very detailed. Now, whether or not MCI can open up gambling, I'm not sure, but I have an Indian tribe that might be helpful if you'd like to try expanding. I must tell you, Bert, we did have somebody tell us that the future of electronic commerce was in- home gambling. I don't know if that's the future or not. But, in any event, we did not deal in that level of detail and we are open to that criticism. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Yes. We need to figure out how to handle that. I have a comment on that. But, Mitch? MR. KAPOR: I think that there is something above the detail level that might usefully be considered in that list of principles in four, which is, to what extent you want to take a position or represent that all of those rights are mutually consistent with one another. In other words, I would say that it's reasonable to ask or to suspect that they may not be, because there may be tensions between, for instance, intellectual property protection and the rights of users. Now, I had expected to make this point a little later on, but here it is in Principle 4, so it's coming up. And I think it would be a legitimate subject of inquiry to take a position on whether those are believed to be consistent or not. In other words, I think being mute on that question, which is to say, possibly just either failing to raise it or just assuming that they are consistent, is failing to grapple with a very basic issue, not a detail issue. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Point's well taken. Toni, and then Esther. We're going to have to move. DR. BEARMAN: I think we should remember that, with the principles, there will also be guidepost action items and major issues. We've gotten to agreement within the Mega-Project on the principles and we're working on all the other parts. Obviously, within those major issues would be exactly those kinds of questions. I think, Mitch, that we also have parts of our constitution that are in conflict with one another, too, which is good. It's important. MR. KAPOR: And there's a lot of worthwhile constitutional discussion on working it out, and we would do worse than to follow that example. DR. BEARMAN: Yes. Exactly. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Good. Esther? MS. DYSON: To answer, briefly, of course there's conflict. The whole point of this exercise in a sense is, first, to state the principles clearly and then to deal with the trade-offs and the compromises that they provoke. As to the second thing, I think a lot of us are biding our time and there will be further discussion on some of the conflicts between these two principles. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Yes, Bob. MR. JOHNSON: I think, to some extent, at least what I got out of Bert's point, was that there were applicable laws that involved current commerce that perhaps may be a conflict with this new emerging technology, and there should be some statement made that we should be -- in order to facilitate and foster the NII, there should be some review or some analysis undertaken of current regulations that may impede the development of this infrastructure. I think that's the whole point of our purpose, is to give guidance to the government on those impediments that might exist, as well as those appropriate things we think the government should undertake to see that this technology goes forward with, to use a phrase, deliberate speed. So that's what I'm talking about. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: That's a good point. Ed just mentioned to me, and I agree, that's almost a principle in and of itself, Bob. I think you've hit on a very, very cogent point, that there is some room here to get somewhere between too much detail and a principle that doesn't say a whole lot. I think there is some room here to add a little bit. Even if it means, maybe, another principle which would recognize what Bob mentioned, some work that we could do to bring this together in terms of law and regulation versus what the technology is going to bring, or recognizing that there may be some conflicts here, and just alluding to it, because I think what we're after here is some consistency. So, maybe, Vance, we can -- this is draft. We can probably come back again with your taking into consideration what you've heard this morning and take another look at it. MR. OPPERMAN: On the point of tension, I'm not sure that I agree that we can rank the relative importance or delineate the areas of conflict in, for example, the five items we identify in Principle 4. I'm not sure we can do that at this level. But I would be interested in comment on how to do that, and I would also be interested in comment, and I think the rest of our project would be interested in comment on this latter point, which is attempting to address the existence of legislative, regulatory, legal barriers or impediments to the expanding use of an expanding technology. And I'd be interested in comments, either now or in writing, or E-mail, or whatever form you want, and we'll circulate that to all members of our Mega- Project I. VOICE: ...comment, but a very brief mention. This evening there is a dinner talk by Marty Tannenbaum who runs CommerceNet, which is part of the overall Smart Valley Initiative, and anybody who's interested in going, it's at 6:30. You can some see me and I'll tell you where to go. I'm on the board of the -- Entrepreneurs Forum, which is sponsoring it, and consider it one more demo that coincidentally is at the same time. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Thank you. Well, we're running short of time here. We've got a fairly good discussion on electronic commerce principles with some input on a couple of items. One, is to look at Principle 4 in terms of possible conflicts and where we might become a little more specific as to how they relate, and then maybe an additional principle vis-a-vis the technology and regulation and how that impact is going forward. But I think you have heard basic agreement with the principles. We are all going to have to grapple with the principles being fairly broad, and then how do we get to some more specifics and come to conclusions on those specifics. I think all of us will be grappling with that as time goes on, but we are going to have the critical issue discussion, and we are going to have action agendas as part of our work plan. So I think this is certainly a very adequate first step, so we will hear from you again. Now, a few minutes, Jane, on education? EDUCATION MS. SMITH PATTERSON: I think I can be brief so that we can move on to the next discussion of the third Mega-Project. Our group has been working very diligently and hard on defining our principles on education. I would point out that we are looking at electronic commerce in education and other applications such as health, etc., all within the guidelines of our overall guiding principles and vision which we are working on. So, I think all of us will have to keep in mind that we have the overall guiding principles, and how all of our projects fit into that context. But, on education, we, in fact, late into the afternoon, did finally come up with an initial draft-- not a final draft--we could bring to you of education principles, and we want to submit those to further the discussion, and E-mail from all the members of our group. Then, in November, we are going to be meeting again, including a three-day weekend with members of the education community across the country together outside of Washington, D.C., to test our principles and points of view, and even particular action items, and be able to come back to you in December with recommendations there. So, there is where we are on education. I wanted to ask any of our members of our Mega-Project group who would like to add anything additional to that, but, in the interest of time, and since we are not bringing you draft principles, I wanted to make those brief remarks. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Very good. Thank you very much. So, we'll look forward to hearing from Education in a more defined way in December, after they've had their November meeting. We will look forward to that. Thank you, Jane. Any more discussion from Mega-Project II on Electronic Commerce, Education, or any other issues, Vance or Jane, before we move on? (No response) CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Thank you very much. A job well done. I appreciate those efforts. In terms of process here, we do have to by 12:15 for lunch because we have a press conference scheduled shortly thereafter, and then we also want to keep on track. PRIVACY ISSUES CO-CHAIR LEWIS: So, why don't we start -- I understand that the Mega-Project III focus on Privacy with Esther is more of an update, and I'm not so sure that we have principles to discuss today, so that could probably take us to the lunch break, if not before. MS. DYSON: Oh, yes. It'll be, I think, much quicker. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Okay. Esther, you're on. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Esther, please take us to the lunch break. MS. DYSON: It depends on you guys. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: We may break early. MS. DYSON: So this means we're doing intellectual property after lunch, is that correct? CO-CHAIR LEWIS: That's probably sensible. MS. DYSON: Okay. We are looking at the issues of privacy and related security principles. Where we stand now is that yesterday we took a set of 11 draft principles and we basically handled the easy stuff. We produced, using this wonderful consensus process, 11 principles that we all more or less felt we could agree with, and we've tabled the issues that were contentious. What I'm going to do right now is run you very quickly through the easy stuff and tell you a little bit what the contentious things were and see if you would like to give us any feedback. What we are planning to do next is have our staff person collect some background information that will help us think a little more clearly about some of the contentious issues, have a teleconference on November 4th, produce something that will still be a draft for the entire council to look at, and have our next Mega-Project meeting face to face right before the December meeting. So, I'm going to summarize these principles. And, if someone in the group disagrees with my summarization, they can also do that, and then I will raise the four problems we still had. These are kind of rewrites of what I believe you already got. Personal privacy must be protected in the design, etc., of the NII. Autonomy, individual choice, and meaningful consent are fostered by ensuring privacy. In addition, protection of privacy is crucial to encouraging free speech and free association on the NII. The privacy of communications, information, and transactions must be protected. Existing constitutional and statutory limitations on access to information and communication, such as those requiring warrants and subpoenas, should not be diminished or weakened. This means yes, we want access to information, but that doesn't mean you can go hunting around in what is normally protected government information. Individual rights to access personal information about themselves must not be diminished or weakened. This is a lot of the stuff about having the right to see your own records and correct them. There was some discussion as to what burdens that might impose on the people providing those records; should that information be guaranteed electronically, and so forth, and so on. Individuals should be informed of other uses and disclosures of information provided by that individual or generated by transactions. In other words, provided not necessarily explicitly or knowingly, but simply by some action you take, information records are generated. This was one of the real killers for us. The issue, fundamentally, was, should there be a negative option that is kind of general? Namely, people can -- you should be informed generally that this might happen, but you're not specifically asked if you want this information to be used in other ways. The trade-offs of these principles were pretty much the right of the individual to be notified and give informed consent, not necessarily each time a transaction happens, but in the context of a general relationship, which was one side. And then there was another side that felt that requiring such informed consent would be unduly burdensome on the parties with which consumers were doing business. There were fairly clear points of view on both sides of this issue, and I'll come back to it. Data integrity is paramount on the NII. This is accuracy, relevance, and timeliness of personal information. A national ID system should not be developed as a condition for participation in the NII. The part we left out was, what is the proper role and scope of anonymity, should it ever be permitted? And, on the opposing side, what happens to accountability and liability for things that are done on the Net by anonymous actors? Collectors and users of personal information on the NII should provide effective notice of their privacy and related security practices. This is separate but very connected to what those privacy practices might be. Public education about the NII and its potential effect on individual privacy is critical to the success of the NII, and that's sort of different from the individual players. It's more public, X particular transactions notion of public education. A government entity should oversee the development, implementation, and enforcement of privacy policy on the NII. Some of the discussion items here were, should this be independent or should it be part of some other agency or entity? We, I think, basically agreed it should not be a regulatory body. It should have oversight, it should raise issues. It should not regulate or enforce, but should check out the regulation and enforcement. There was some discussion about whether it should be permanent or simply be a five-year kind of organization. And we figured that privacy problems are not going to go away and it should be something permanent, but not necessarily a whole new infrastructure of bureaucracy. Finally, aggrieved individuals should have a private right of action, i.e., they should be able to sue to ensure these privacy and related security principles on the NII are enforced. In other words, you don't need to go to some government commission to sue for you, you can have a private right to sue to protect your rights. So, the things we didn't get to, and where we would appreciate comments, are: 1) This whole notion of informed consent. 2) The notion of, is there role for anonymity? And here you have things like whistle- blowers and free speech, fighting against accountability for slander, sedition, liable. Also, if you want to look at issues about electronic commerce and tax evasion, fraud, terrorists, pedophiles, all the nasty things that can show up on the net, should we be able to track them down, and so forth, and so on. 3) We also didn't really address the difference between, not the rights, but the obligations of government versus private sector users and collectors of data, or different kinds of data, such as health information. A lot of foregoing discussion was more along the lines of commercial information and other areas: legal records, if you've been convicted of child abuse; who has a right to know; how broadly can it be spread; should there be some kind of statute of limitations on how long that information lasts, that kind of thing. And we specifically avoided dealing with the Clipper Chip issue because we really felt that was an implementation issue. And maybe here I'm speaking only for myself, but if you take what the government says, there's not a question of principle here. If you want to argue some of these issues, again, they are fairly specific issues and we didn't think we wanted to address the Clipper Chip directly, although you could certainly take some of those principles and test the Clipper Chip against them. Now, I'd like to make a personal comment and then solicit other people's comments. I think in the area of informed consent we have a real opportunity on the National Information Infrastructure to do something we have not done in the physical world, because in the physical world the costs of soliciting consent are fairly high; people have to rewrite things, it's expensive, you have to keep data bases of people who do and do not want their information used, and so forth, and so on. These cost constraints are going to be much lower as we move to the National Information Infrastructure. There are things we did in the past that we may not necessarily want to repeat. So, I believe that, in developing these principles, we should look at this as a new world where we can do things, not just by repotting the same old practices, but actually trying to do it better and do it right now that we have a whole different dynamics of costs, and record-keeping, and so forth, and so on. Second, there were protections of privacy that were simply physical. It just costs too much to go to every DMV in the country, it costs too much to do this, and that, and the other. Those costs are also diminishing. So, the physical protections of privacy are disappearing, so we do need new legal/social/whatever principles of privacy protection in a world where the physical protections no longer apply. Comments solicited. Vance? MR. OPPERMAN: I have two questions. First, how do your comments relate to the draft we were give in April, and then the draft that was released on the privacy guidelines that Ms. Katzen gave to us? MS. DYSON: The things I read, as opposed to my personal comments, are basically rewrites and tightenings up, and so forth, of the draft principles. These are not the comments on the Privacy Principles paper that Sally Katzen produced, although, again, you could kind of -- I think there was a general feeling that those privacy principles were somewhat looser in respecting privacy rights of individuals than the ones that we produced, but these are not a direct comment. MR. OPPERMAN: My second -- see, that's the way you get to ask two things, you start off by saying you have two. My second question is, with regard to your comments on informed consent, much of the debate that went on in the various Toko pieces of legislation dealt with Customer Proprietary Network Information, CPNI, for those people that like ARGOT. And a lot of the legislative history that was developed around the CPNI provisions, both the Markey bill and over on the Senate side, really went into great detail about the current use and the lack of consent or the lack of the need to give consent, depending on what side of that fence you're on. How do you see informed consent dealing with that whole customary proprietary information area? How do you see that interrelating? MS. DYSON: Okay. I will answer, but, again, the rest of the group is invited to jump in, too. Basically, I don't know exactly what their particular final results were, but my personal feeling, again, is that your telephone records should not be revealed to anybody unless there's a subpoena or something like that, and that if you want them to be revealed to somebody, or the phone company wants to sell them to somebody, they should so inform you and get your consent. MR. OPPERMAN: And that would presumably include the fact that--I'm making these up--that 18 percent of all the people in Camden call Italian restaurants, or make reservations in Italian restaurants on Saturday night. MS. DYSON: No, no. That's not personal information, that's statistical information. MR. OPPERMAN: Well, that would be extraordinarily helpful information to have if you wanted to sell listings or information to, for example, Italian restaurants. MS. DYSON: Yes. MR. OPPERMAN: I mean, I guess the question I'm raising is, isn't your use of any form of electronic data transmission -- isn't the use of that transmission, what you use it for, how long you use it, aren't those also matters that go to privacy? MS. DYSON: Yes, absolutely. MR. OPPERMAN: And your view is that you would require consent before that information could be used? MS. DYSON: If my individual name is recorded as having called an Italian restaurant, yes. If it's an aggregation of data -- MR. OPPERMAN: I see. MS. DYSON: -- where individual names are not used, as far as I'm concerned, that's probably okay. There are obviously issues where -- you know, if I live in a very exclusive neighborhood and I'm the only person in that zip code, there's a problem if you do aggregations by zip code. But, beyond getting ridiculous, the issue is personal information, not statistical summaries. I mean, nine times out of 10 you'll find the person is perfectly happy to get junk mail. MR. OPPERMAN: Sure. MS. DYSON: An example we went through is, if I buy a pink sweater at Macy's, I don't mind if Macy's sends me something about a matching skirt. What I don't want is for Macy's to sell that information to somebody else, especially if I happen to be a man, or something, and maybe my girlfriend didn't get the pink sweater, and some other -- you know. MR. OPPERMAN: Sure. MS. DYSON: These are the kinds of things we're talking about where people's privacy doesn't seem to be an issue, but it is. MR. OPPERMAN: Well, I can't make the opposite -- I wish Bill Ferguson were here for this discussion, because that whole CBNI and the whole use of that kind of information is a very, very important, and a very hotly discussed and debated -- MS. DYSON: Yes. MR. OPPERMAN: -- and legislatively discussed issue. MS. DYSON: And we're not saying that this information shouldn't be used, we're saying that customers should be informed that it may be so used, and if they don't want it so used, they should be asked if it is okay if it is so used. It's not that they need to be phoned every time NYNEX is going to sell a mailing list, but that when they begin the relationship with NYNEX they're clearly asked, what kinds of information may we sell and may we not sell. So, the notion of informed consent is in the context of a commercial relationship, not in the context of each transaction. MR. OPPERMAN: Is it also your view that states should not be selling Motor Vehicle information? MS. DYSON: Yes. MR. OPPERMAN: So you agree -- MS. DYSON: Unless people agree. They can't -- MR. OPPERMAN: So you would tie all of that to require the getting of positive consent -- MS. DYSON: Yes. MR. OPPERMAN: -- for each application. MS. DYSON: For each application or set of applications. MR. OPPERMAN: Yes. MS. DYSON: Again, you can make the wording broad, but it should be explicitly broad. I'd also like to point out, simply, in the future when you look at this issue of advertising, I think there's going to be a fundamental shift in the physics of how things work, and consumers may be paid to receive information rather than paying to get it. I mean, what you're really having happen here is advertisers are sponsoring things. They want to do more direct marketing. It should be more at the consumer's option what kind of direct marketing they want to receive, so maybe they charge $5 for every ad they watch, if they're very rich. I think that's a very nice market mechanism where individual choice is paramount. The advertisers should like it, too, because they don't want to send their stuff to people who don't want it. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Deborah? MS. KAPLAN: I think this is a terribly important area and issue. As a consumer myself, I feel very strongly about this, but I think my sentiments are typical of many consumers. Earlier we were talking about people not knowing what the NII is and not wanting to hear about it in those terms, but I think we also know that this is an issue that gives -- most people "know" that this is an area where information probably will be used against them. I think most people are very cynical about this issue, and distrustful of what all this means, and have a gut level of fear of issues of privacy and how information about them already is getting spread all over the place and will, in the future, at a faster rate. And I think if we're concerned about the public's take on what we are doing and how the government is proceeding, we have to take a pro- consumer stand on these issues and set aside some of the particular commercial interests that some of us may represent. In part, quite frankly, because I think this council itself has been viewed by many people as a pro- industry council, and also because, as we move forward, if people are going to want to have much to do with all of this and say they think it's a good idea for the government's policy on the NII to move forward, I think people are going to have to see some up front recognition of their fears in this area, and some up front protection that they can understand and relate to. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Those are points well taken. Bob, and then Bonnie. MR. JOHNSON: I think they were some points well taken, although I'm not sure the one about this being perceived a pro-industry council is well-advised. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: I was going to come back to that, too. VOICE: Oh, I've heard it. MR. JOHNSON: That's a concern I've got, particularly in light of the fact that much of what we want to accomplish, we stated in our principles clearly that the private industry should lead the way. And, in addition, many of the subsidies that are going to be necessary to achieve some of the pro-consumer objectives are going to be borne by the industry. So, we have to have a very appropriate balance that encourages industry to get involved in a pro- consumer way, but, at the same time, recognizing that at the end of the day the industry must meet a certain bottom line objective or they're going to be very circumspect about going forward. So, I just think that we should keep the two in an appropriate balance. MS. BRACEY: I think the public is just a little bit more concerned about something which I call electronic stalking, and I am sure that that will be one of the outreach kinds of things we would do in trying to explain what it is the NII is doing, because what we're hearing mostly is the negative thing and we haven't talked about the person who could, through telemedicine, be better served, or some of the other types of applications. I think what most people log onto are pornography, the stalking thing, and something about bills and that kind of thing, and there are other things that we haven't even discussed that need to be brought up. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Right. Yeah. My comment here was, this is why I've been so high on the outreach component, Deborah. It's very clear to me that we don't want to get these labels started, whether we're pro-this, or pro-that, or anti-this, or anti-that. And we know that those impressions will happen and those perceptions will happen, but we need to really get on top of that quickly. That was my concern, because we'll up at the end of '95 lacking credibility if we haven't opened ourselves up to receive those comments, those opinions, those fears, if you will, those inputs, from a broad range of people. We've got to do that. On the other hand, we certainly must bring forth the other points of view of why industry and the commercial sides are important as this unfolds. So, we've got a tremendous responsibility. My honest opinion is, I think this council has a tremendous responsibility to bridge the gap. I've always viewed it as a body, as diverse as it is--now up to 37 members--to make a difference here in bringing all the points of view together and coming up with some sensible, constructive advice. I think we've got a tremendous opportunity to do it. We would not be pro- this, or pro-that, but pro-NII, pro-American public. I think that's the key. I have a couple of questions about where we are on the privacy. You are going to come back with us on this in writing a little more clearly as to what you have agreed to -- MS. DYSON: Yes. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: -- and what you're going to recommend. And is that a December time frame? MS. DYSON: Yes. What we have here are the things I more or less read, the 11 easy principles. We are collecting more information on the costs and other trade-offs on the informed consent issue. Likewise, we are going to be providing a little more background on this issue of anonymity, where it belongs, what current laws are. To me, this is the most interesting constitutional issue, freedom of speech versus freedom from anonymous stalkers, if you like that kind of thing. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: I did have a question about the right to sue. My lawyer's hat on. You've got a right to sue. I wasn't clear about what you were going to add or subtract to it. There's always a right to sue. I mean, individuals have got that in this country today. I was not clear about right to sue. MS. DYSON: Well, it's basically, a lot of this is things that are not on the NII should happen on the NII, but there are some kinds of laws that are written in terms of patterns and practices, and it's hard for an aggrieved individual to sue as opposed to -- okay. I mean, in the Equal Employment Opportunity thing, it's hard for an individual to sue. And what they do is they go to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: So we're really talking about a balance of resources here, not rights of individuals. I think there's always this imbalance of money in the legal system and resources to penetrate that legal system. But you can still sue. I mean, even going through Equal Employment cases, obviously, you have got to follow administrative remedies, but you ultimately can sue. MS. DYSON: Yes, anybody can sue, but there are a lot of suits that get thrown out of court. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Another question? VOICE: This is not a question. Are we going to get -- MS. DYSON: I can finish up on the -- VOICE: Are we going to get this whole set of principles two weeks prior to the December meeting -- CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Yes. VOICE: -- where we can -- yes. MS. DYSON: Yes. What we're going to -- CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I guess that means that it's important, right? MS. DYSON: Yes. What we are going to do is we're going to do a little more work behind the scenes so that we can produce something that's concrete and that either states our position or states our arguments more clearly based on, first, some staff work, and then teleconference November 4th. After that, we will be distributing something to the full council for discussion on December 6th. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Very good. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I think it was really good that we were able, through accident, to talk about electronic commerce and then immediately move into privacy and that we got the real tension between those two very important things. We think that electronic commerce will have a major, positive impact on business in this country in the way we do things. But, in some ways, there's a tension in some areas versus privacy. If there's anything we can do for the two of you, as you're working on your drafts for the next session, to have them work together, that would be great. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: I also heard something else in your deliberations, and it's coming through in a lot of the discussion. This is my own, just, observation. And that is, we're seeing what the landscape is today. If we haven't, we certainly should look at it, and I think you're doing that. It's come up a couple of times in terms of, what is the existing law, what's the existing practice -- but the opportunity we have here is, how can we make a more positive impact based on this reality? MS. DYSON: Thank you. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: That's what we can give. MS. DYSON: Yes, I agree with you. And I just want to state that, again, it's very good to look at current practice, it's good to know what current practice is. But, on the National Information Infrastructure, the laws of physics change. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Right. That's important. MS. DYSON: And it changes the balance of power between individuals in large organizations and it changes a lot of the issues of intellectual property, which we'll deal with after lunch. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: May I just add one other point here? It would be helpful to those of us who may not know all of the ins and outs of that impact of technology to have a couple of examples of how the physics may change, and how that may work, given a whole set of other technological things happening. That adds real, I think, sense to it. And then we can say, this is what we would recommend, given this set of circumstances. That's very good. VOICE: Mr. Chairman? CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Yes. VOICE: I'd just like to ask one additional comment to Esther, and that is, as you are discussing the privacy principles, are you, in fact -- this is the NII, but we also have talked about the GII and we know that in other areas of the world and countries, particularly the European union, they have, in fact, been developing privacy principles, and what those requirements would be on those of us in the U.S. if we were, in fact, to transmit certain data to them. So, are you looking at that in light of these principles? MS. DYSON: We should be. We didn't raise it much in our discussion, but it is an important part of it and our staff members are aware of these issues. I think the European example is a nice example, maybe, of going too far in the other direction. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: That's a very tough question. We don't know how the afternoon agenda is going to go; we've got Intellectual Property to cover in a deliberative way, and the Critical Issues, we're not sure how much we're going to get of that. But the GI is there. If we don't cover it today, we will get to it. It's a whole other set of discussions, and our role there. But your point is well taken. Any more comments on privacy? We should break, now, for lunch. Let me give you a little bit of administrative -- I just want to tell you that the city and state government applications are out front, so make sure you get a chance to review those. Lunch for council members will be in the rehearsal studio behind the stage. There will be people there to direct us. We will have a short press conference soon, and then we should be back here at 1:30 to continue with the agenda. Thank you. We'll adjourn till 1:30. (Luncheon Recess.) AFTERNOON SESSION CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Well, we're a little bit behind our schedule for today, but let's progress. I think our discussions so far have been really stimulating. Again, as I said first thing this morning, I really like it that we're getting into really real things, things that make a difference, and I think our discussions this afternoon will continue that activity. The first thing on our schedule this afternoon is our discussion of the work of the Intellectual Property team. It's one of the most critical issues I think we have to address as a council, and I'd like to turn it over to John Cooke to give us an update. John? INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY MR. COOKE: We are, as a Mega-Project, presenting today for your discussion and consideration the principles of intellectual property that we have agreed upon inside our Mega-Project, and we're also submitting to you our response to the green paper. There are a couple of things I need to say about procedure and process. As Del and Ed, this morning, talked about methodologies for proceeding through these kinds of things, I would say that somebody who was an observer of our Mega-Project came up and commented that they thought the procedure and process that we had used was very similar, and we did, only on a couple of occasions, call for a vote. We tried to find consensus. And, where we did not find consensus--and that would be found particularly in the response to the green paper--we gave voice in our response to those positions that were not maybe majority, but were clearly opinions held by some that were on the Mega-Project that needed to be aired. I also want to say that the principles that we established really also were the ones we used in responding to the green paper. I know you know that we asked all the members of the council to respond to us on the green paper and give us your comments. Certainly, some number did. Del did, Mitch did, Toni did, and others. We seriously considered all those comments that were delivered to us. Some made it into our report, others were ones that I'm sure that we'll discuss today. So, I'd like to, first, kind of set the groundwork for discussion, the principles. I'd like to say a little bit, kind of as a preamble to the principles, then we will walk through the principles together, letting every member of the council comment as we go through each principle. So, let me just say a couple of things as a preamble to how we got where we are. 1) First, we felt that the NII will alter the traditional environment of use of works of authorship, making it easy to produce quick and perfect copies, and to modify works. And, without protection against unauthorized uses, we felt that many materials and works would not make it to the NII. 2) Second, we felt that there should not be-- and this is very important for you to hear--a lesser ability to use works for educational and non-profit or other reasonable and beneficial purposes on the NII, meaning we clearly did not want that ability to be lessened just because transmission methods and dissemination methods changed. In order to accommodate those concerns, we felt that there needs to be a combination of legal and technological safeguards. We also felt that the principles that are now in force in existing law will need to be extended into the NII. It's very important for you to note that we think current intellectual property principles really will get repotted and we'll see how they grow in the soil of the NII. The Mega-Project believes that the first priority should be the preservation of meaningful incentives to create and provide works consistent with the incentives that are now present, and we sought desperately to find a balance between creators and users. I think when we go through this you'll be able to see that. I'd like to say one more thing before we get into it. I'd like to talk about, we were trying to accomplish four things: 1) Ensure that existing rights are not weakened. 2) Ensure that existing abilities to use works are continued, not diminished. 3) And that would include applying the doctrine of fair use fully in the new environment, and allowing the continued development of flexible voluntary licensing techniques. 4) Also, we felt that it was important to develop the technology to make these goals possible as a practical matter and we believe it's important for this nation to coordinate with the International System of Copyright Law so that the GII can be developed fully. I want to say, and this may be a presumption on our Mega-Project's part, when we looked at the principles of Mega-Project I and we looked at Principles 2 and 6, as we had seen their principles, we felt--and I hope we were not wrong--that we were consistent with those principles as they stated in their principles. And, again, I'm referencing Principle 2 and Principle 6 of their work. Now, what I'd like to do, if I could have you turn to the tab that's under Mega-Project III, that tab. And, if you look under 2 of that tab, you'll find our 15 principles that we crafted together as a Mega- Project. I'm going to give everybody a minute to find those. Again, it's under Mega-Project III and it's under Tab 2 under that Mega-Project. Does everybody have access to those? (No response) MR. COOKE: Okay. Assuming that everybody does, I've talked to Ed and I think that there's a feeling that it will be useful if we walk through these together. I will do my part quickly, then you can comment on each one. I'm hoping that all of you, or most of you, have had a chance to look at these. So, we say in this that, "The members of the Mega-Project III propose the following set of fundamental intellectual property principles pertaining to copyright law and related rights." The first one we state is: 1) Adequate and effective protection of intellectual property is essential in order for the NII to develop successfully. 2) The importance to society of both copyright and patent protection was recognized by the framers of the United States constitution. The guiding principle of U.S. copyright law is that economic compensation to creators and copyright owners will, in the language of the constitution, "promote the progress of science and useful arts." Copyright law is an important means by which this public policy goal is achieved as the best way to spur creativity in a free market economy. Anyone can interrupt me at any time while I'm going through these. 3) Existing U.S. copyright law applies to uses of works on the NII and will cover most of the issues that can currently be anticipated. However, some amendments and clarification may be advisable in order to ensure adequate and effective protection in light of changing technologies. Such legislative changes should not be made precipitously without a full and fair airing of issues. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: John? MR. COOKE: Yes. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Excuse me. Did you want to have discussion on each one? MR. COOKE: As I go through them, I was hoping that there would be an interruption. As I said, if somebody wants to say, on point number two, I'd like to say the following. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I'd like to do that on point number two. MR. COOKE: All right. (Laughter) MR. COOKE: I knew that, and that's why I said it. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I think your lead-in is very good. Okay. Thank you. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: If that's going to be the methodology, then rather than waiting till you are done, I have a question about point one. MR. COOKE: All right. Then let's go back to point one. MR. KAPOR: I would be much more comfortable if the first thing that was said in this numbered list was something that you said earlier when you said, here are our goals. What you said was, the goals are to ensure that existing rights are not weakened and existing abilities to use information are not weakened. To me, that ought to be number one. This is a proposed shift in relative emphasis which you could argue, you know, might not need to be done. But, to me, that's the essence of the entire thing, is to try to find in this new technology a way of maintaining a traditional balance between the rights of property holders and the interest of the public in using information. And, while that is in the principles, and that's why I was going to wait until later, I think that this could really be strengthened if that is brought right to the top as the most central point. I know there are some other people here who probably agree with that. MR. COOKE: Okay. Let me comment. I will say something as an individual and other members of the Mega-Project can comment as they see fit. Since it was the goal of the Mega-Project to have that balance, I mean, it's all in the interpretation of the words. I personally have no problem with an opening statement like that as long -- I think, as I've heard the Mega-Project talk over a long period of time, I don't think that this group wants to see existing copyright law changed in any radical way. MR. KAPOR: Well, that brings me to the second point. MR. COOKE: Okay. MR. KAPOR: Which is, on the one hand, I share that desire and understand that it's reflected in this document. But, on the other hand, I believe it's really unwarranted to assume that that can be done without considering the possible consequences or side effects. See, this is a replay of what we had this morning on the electronic commerce principles. Of course, we want all of the good things to continue to be the case. We want rights holders' interests to be protected and we want the public's interest in using information to be protected. But, are we warranted, or what warrants the conclusion up front that copyright law, as a mechanism for achieving that end, is actually going to be adequate? Because people argue, and I think it's an argument that needs to be taken seriously without prejudicing what conclusion ought to be reached as to whether copyright law, as a whole, is up to these challenges. And, if it is, I mean, I think a valuable service that we could perform is to so demonstrate. But, since a lot of people have at least questioned that, I think it sort of does a disservice to the kind of dialogue that we need to have simply to state that copyright law is the means of proceeding because if it turns out not to be, if it turns out that there's just a kind of a poor fit between that legal regime and the technology of the NII, then ultimately the rights holders are going to conclude that they need a different form of protection. So, now is the time to be thinking about those things rather than -- see what I'm saying? In one sense, it's unwise to assume a policy of incrementalism. We ought to be a little more skeptical about that. MR. COOKE: Okay. Not at all being unconscious of what you just said, if you turn to page two of that document and look at Principle #6 and Principle #7 together, together -- I'm not arguing that that satisfies in any way your concern, but Principle #6 and Principle #7 together do, potentially, maybe, address your question of balance. MR. KAPOR: Yes. All I suggested there was putting in a preamble, changing #1 to reflect that, acknowledging it's already in there and just saying, you're asking for input and the input is, put that first. But that point, John, doesn't address my second point. MR. COOKE: It does not address your second point. I'm sorry. Did you have a comment? CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Is there other discussion? VOICE: I have a question. Are we attempting to rewrite Mega-Project III's principles here as a group this afternoon, which I don't think is something that occurred earlier this morning for either Mega- Project I or II? And I think that's going to be an extraordinarily difficult exercise if that's the way we are heading. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Well, I'd like to hear the council on that. My personal belief is that whatever we adopt as principles needs to be endorsed by the entire council. VOICE: I understand that. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: And I think there are -- VOICE: Is that the agenda for this afternoon -- CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Yes. VOICE: -- that we are going to try to rewrite these principles this afternoon? CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Well, I think we should -- VOICE: Or adopt them in one form or another. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I think there are a number of objectives. One, is to communicate what the principles are, to discuss them, to see whether they're acceptable to the council as they are, or to provide feedback to the committee for additional work that needs to happen. VOICE: Yes. Because in the process of our deliberations in the Mega-Project, as changes were made to any of the principles, they were rewritten and circulated and people had an opportunity to read them, as well as to hear them to be sure that we all understood exactly what was being proposed. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: I would only like to add that I certainly appreciate that, and have been very supportive of Mega-Projects' work and deliberations, and I've participated in some of those meetings over the past few months. But we all weren't there as those deliberations took place. We all weren't a part of the discussions and the beginnings of the rewrite. I think it's very important, as Ed said, that we bring it here and not necessarily in a rewrite mode, that's not the issue. The issue is, can we come to consensus on the principles that John is bringing to us on intellectual property? So, it's not a matter of rewriting what you've done or criticizing what you've done, but adding some thought and ideas to what's been put forth. And we did that with electronic commerce. We added some sensitivity on Americans with disability. Vance accepted some of those comments. So, we are continuing that. VOICE: I was simply asking as a procedural question because, from a procedural perspective, if we're going to do those kinds of changes, it would be helpful to have the changes put in written form so that everyone can see clearly what is being proposed. MR. COOKE: My suggestion to the two chairmen --maybe this is inappropriate--is, it seems to me that as we hear the comments of Mitch, and you, and Toni, and whoever else is going to talk, it seems to me that it might be useful for us to back into committee, if you will, taking those thoughts into consideration, and seeing if we can come back with something that's "acceptable to all the parties." Rather than trying to redraft language today, which I know we won't be able to do, is to hear comments and respond to them. I want to just -- Toni wanted to talk, and I know you did, too, Del. But there's one thing that -- CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Before that, I absolutely agree. I think that's a great procedure. I think that's what we should do. MR. COOKE: So, in other words, we'd like to hear what everybody has to say and see if we can come back and satisfy the council. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Right. MR. COOKE: One thing I want to say, and I don't want to mislead anybody here, because it's very important that Mitch know this, and everybody else does it. If you look at #6 and #7, I just want everybody to understand that the Mega-Project members clearly think that copyright law does apply. I don't want anybody to come away from this conversation here thinking that members of this Mega- Project did not think that. So, taking into account what Mitch has said, and having heard his two points, we'll go back and see what we can do about those. But I don't want anyone to be misled that this Mega-Project group felt that copyright law was not applicable. And I understand your point about incrementalism, and so forth, and so on. All right. Toni, would you be next, and then Del? CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Okay. DR. BEARMAN: I'm still on point one, so I wasn't sure what order you wanted to go in. MR. COOKE: I think he's on point two. DR. BEARMAN: I think that obviously the group has done an enormous amount of work. I also really found your preliminary comments to be extremely helpful. And I, too, feel that they're not incorporated into the principles, and I would hope that the group could incorporate more of that balance. I think as the principles now read, they do not quite have the kind of balance that I would like to see, balance in protecting the absolutely critical rights of the intellectual property holders and the absolutely critical rights of the users of the material. I think the order of the principles is also very, very important--we worked on that within the Commerce group--to start off with something a little more positive that does kind of set the framework. No matter what we say, whatever comes first will be considered to be most important. So, I would hope you would more to bring that balance and make sure that the user rights are given equal time and weight to the holders' rights. MR. COOKE: Okay. Duly noted. So you liked the preamble? DR. BEARMAN: Yes, very much. But build it into the principles, too. MR. COOKE: I understand. Okay. Del? CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Yes. Just in response to Al Teller, we did, from the National Public Radio perspective, did submit our comments in writing, and some of them were, I think, discussed and understood, and maybe some of them weren't. But I think it's incumbent to at least talk about them today. And, based on John's comment, I don't see so moved to go over each line of some additions and deletions that we talked about. I'll submit them again and hopefully they'll be considered. But, in #2, I just want to make the comment that, from the National Public Radio perspective and public broadcasting, but NPR, specifically, I am a copyright owner and a copyright user. And I felt that #2 was a matter of emphasis, John, and the committee. I felt it was really on the economic thrust side from an owner position, which I support, because I am a copyright owner. But I am very much like Toni. I'm concerned, also, about the rights of the user. And I had some language which really talked about, again, promoting progress of science and the useful arts, but also talking about preserving society's interest in a free flow of ideas, information commerce. It was the public interest thrust that I'd like to see in #2, as well as the balance of copyright owners. So, again, it's a matter of language. I'm not taking away from ownership because I believe in it, but the balance on the user piece I don't think was quite reflected, and I'd like to see it, and I would give you the language to support it. MR. COOKE: Great. So, we'll re-read your submissions. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Thank you. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Other comments? (No response) MR. COOKE: Okay. Had we finished three? Had I read three? VOICE: No. MR. COOKE: I had not? VOICE: You had read it. MR. COOKE: I had read it. Did we have any comments on three? Yes. MS. DYSON: I've been debating whether to say this or not, but I guess I agree with #3 in that such legislative changes should not be made precipitously without a full and fair airing of the issues because, in some sense, I think a lot of this is almost irrelevant and I think -- yes, gasp. I think in the long run things are going to change substantially and intellectual property, as something static, is going to be only a small part of what happens on the net. If it's protected, it will be widely distributed, it will be fairly cheap. And the important issues are going to be trademark and authenticity and the source of the information, and trying to get people's attention. And the marketplace value will tend towards things like performances. In my own example, I publish a newsletter. It doesn't really make money. The way I make my money is by holding a conference once a year. I think that balance of economic value is going to be more and more prevalent, and so someday we're going to need new laws, or the dynamics will change totally. So, in some sense I don't really care because I think this will work out by itself and we will have to change the laws, or at least we'll acknowledge that things are fundamentally different. So, I don't have a quarrel with it, but I wanted to just air that notion that the world is really going to change far more dramatically than any of this indicates any understanding of. MR. COOKE: Agreed. Yes, Jack? MR. FISHMAN: Well, I think Esther raises a good point, and it's one that pervades all of our discussions. We know we're in a changing society. To be trite about it is inevitable, but that didn't stop the founders of our republic from creating a constitution from the declaration of independence which has been still our guiding principles, and we've been able to work within them. And I think this has been the mood that pervaded our subgroup or Mega-Group, was that we don't have any crystal balls, we can't be very specific about a lot of things. But there are some basic principles that have served this society very well, and where there are some gaps, we think they should be plugged up and made more clear. I agree totally with Mitch's comments, and some of the others here. It's a balancing act. I mean, obviously what the constitution was talking about in promoting the creator didn't mean promoting the creator at all costs, and not at the expense of sacrificing the promotion of progress and science and the arts. Rather, what the founders saw was that we are going to promote science and the arts if we also recognize the creator. Now, to what extent do you recognize the creator, I don't know. We can't foretell. The point is, the creator has certain rights and they benefit the user when they're exercised. If they're not exercised, the user loses. If they don't have any rights, and, as a result of that, the creator gives up his work, then who loses? The consumer loses, the society loses. So it's a scale we're trying to balance here, and we're also trying to balance not only the rights, but various rights holders or stakeholders' interests, the consumer, the creator, the user. There may be different people and they may change, as you say. As Del has said, on the one hand, sometimes he's the owner of a copyright and other times he's user of a copyright. These are going to change. In the same sense, the technology is going to change. It doesn't mean we don't have any fundamental principles to guide us. I think, as we do enter into this new highway, we absolutely need some fundamental principles, just as -- if you want to draw the analogy--and it's probably ridiculous--but we need certain rules of the road or else people are going to enter that highway and there's going to be a lot of people hurt if there aren't any rules to begin with in that rush to get on that road. There's going to be a lot of collisions. So, we do have rules of the road and we should have rules of the road on the Information Highway as well. And we should set them out before the highway is built, not wait until there has been a tragedy. MR. KAPOR: -- any change in this, or is that just a -- MR. FISHMAN: I think I was agreeing with you, Mitch, in the sense that if you feel there is not enough emphasis given to the user, then that's fine, but we have to give both their due. MR. KAPOR: I'm perfectly happy with the attention that's been paid to that point and with the process that's been suggested. If I could just add one nuance, though, that hasn't that genuinely worries me, which is that by talking about plugging gaps, it downplays the possibility that in undertaking some act to change existing statutes for a legitimate purpose, which I would grant is legitimate, to me, the question must be considered, are there any harmful side effects, or what is this going to do to the balance of interests, because, for me, the test ultimately ought to be the balance of interest test. Simply to say that there is a gap for rights holders in the following areas, A, B, and C, and we need to do something about it is necessary, but it's not sufficient. And the overall concern I have with the tone of this is the concern of where the balance comes from. It comes up against when I hear about talking about the gaps, and just that it is looking at the situation from one side. Historically, I mean, I've been bitten by this. In the '80s when we had to deal with the issue of software protection for package software, and there's an enormous amount of piracy, there were some very well-meaning efforts that I was initially behind, as well as other people, to close the gap. And we were talking about using, more principally, technical means rather than legal means, but I think that's not germane to this argument. The problem was that we failed to consider the fact that what we considered as a legitimate technical measure to prevent people from pirating software also had the effect of causing honest users to be genuinely outraged because they judged that we were interfering with what ought to be their legitimate rights. And what happened, ultimately, was that we concluded--this was sort of as an industry--that that was correct, and the technical measures of copy protection came off. However, there were lots of hard feelings and lots of wasted energy and effort, and, arguably, the industry did not develop as rapidly as possible. To me, that's a case in point. We're considering things from one side, when closing a gap actually does not have the intended effect and doesn't benefit the people who are proposing it. So, what I'm suggesting is that we really need to make sure to avoid that style of thinking, because it leads to that style of trap. And the way to do it, is every time you propose to tighten something or to close something, the test is, to what extent are we confident that this isn't going to hurt somebody on the other side? That is sort of something that, to my mind, should go through the whole thing systematically as a perspective, which I don't see in this. MR. COOKE: Maybe I missed it. You used the word "gaps." Where were you finding that word or that concept? VOICE: He just said it. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Yes. Jack said gap. MR. COOKE: Well, I appreciate that Jack said it, but I will say that neither in the principles, nor in the response to the green paper, do we talk about gaps. I respectfully understand that Jack said it, but I don't think that when we drafted the principles, or we gave our response to the green paper, that we talked about filling gaps. MR. KAPOR: Well, language like "amendments and clarification may be advisable," suggests sort of a picture of what's going on along those lines. However, rather than take valuable time to debate that here, I would be happy to give you written comments about that. MR. COOKE: Great. Great. Okay. 4) Copyright laws should be foreword-looking and flexible enough to adapt to incremental changes in technology without the need for frequent statutory amendment. MS. BRACEY: Can I, in my very naive way, having only sisters and brothers for lawyers and not being one myself, as for an interpretation of transmission? Because I use PDS and lots of things like that, and I don't have a legal background to understand what that constitutes, and if I'm going to be getting the same services in the classroom later after this is adopted than I am now. I'm sorry to do this, but I just don't understand. MR. COOKE: That's all right. Well, I'll tell you, I did not introduce up front--and I have permission from the two co-chairs to do this--our consultant on this Mega-Project. Our consultant is Sharon Purmover, and she will stand up and define transmission. (Laughter) MS. BRACEY: Thank you. MS. PURMOVER: Can I be heard if I talk without a mike? VOICE: No. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Just take a seat there at the table. MS. PURMOVER: Well, let me say that the term "transmission" can mean a number of different things. In the Copyright Act, it has a technical definition. I don't believe that in our fundamental principles we were talking about the technical definition in the Copyright Act. So, if that's your concern -- My understanding of where we were going in the principles in using the term "transmission" was to talk about any communication of works over the NII and transmission with the terms we were using to get that across. VOICE: Do you ever use the word in the principles? MR. COOKE: No. MS. PURMOVER: It's not in the principles at all. MR. COOKE: It's only in the green paper. MS. PURMOVER: There is discussion in the green paper about transmission and what that means. MS. BRACEY: Very simply, in the learning process, first, I read the green paper and then I read the principles. Not having a legal background, I'm only asking questions like any citizen would do about things I don't understand, and I don't understand transmission. What I do understand, is if I don't understand, then don't question you about it. When I go back to my classroom and I don't get PBS, or whatever it is I'm used to, I'm going to be very upset. So, that's why I'm asking. MR. COOKE: Mr. Chairman, the committee considered a lot of things. The green paper is quite thick, and I think everybody who is a member of the Mega-Group read every page of it, and we've argued a half hour, at least, on each page, or discussed. It's not mentioned at all in the principles. So, for the purpose of discussing the principles, I don't think that should be a barrier because it doesn't create any confusion at all. It hasn't even been mentioned. Subsequently, I think when you see -- we, ourselves are recommending some further questioning -- MS. BRACEY: Okay. MR. COOKE: -- of the task force. You'll see that this will be discussed. VOICE: When we gave our response, or we were offering you our response to the green paper, we raised a lot of questions in that response about everything's -- MS. BRACEY: Okay. As I said, I'm just using my basic knowledge to show you what my concerns are. And I'm sorry that my law school experience is so little, but thank you. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Let's try to stay on the principles here and walk through them. I think we've got a good process here of walking through them one by one. I guess we're ready for #5. MR. COOKE: We're ready for #5. 5) Intellectual property rights and effective legal means of enforcing those rights must keep pace with technological developments. Yes, Toni? DR. BEARMAN: I'm not sure where it goes, but I think it would go here. Mechanisms for payment back to copyright holders, does that fit in here? So, would this mean that -- I see it's also sort of referred to later, but it seems to me an important principle is that there be easy mechanisms for people to have payment. I also wasn't sure about the CONTU guidelines, and where that would fit in. Is that here under 5? I see you don't specifically recommend a group that would look at any new guidelines that would help translate the principles and the copyright law into action in the new technological environment. Does that go in 5? MR. COOKE: We did not recommend that. I mean, clearly, we will adhere to the advice of the council on that subject. It was not implied here. DR. BEARMAN: Okay. Well, I think those are two very important things. One, is the easy mechanism, wherever you want to put it in here. MR. COOKE: Right. DR. BEARMAN: And the other, is the follow-up, maybe a CONTU, too, or another Upstairs/Downstairs group, or something, as is recommended in the green paper. I would like to see that incorporated in our principles so that it's clear as we're talking about intellectual property rights, and, of course, user rights would be in here, too, and effective legal means. The guidelines have been very helpful in enforcing the current legal means, so what kind of guidelines do we need in the future? VOICE: Well, John, to respond to Toni's first point, I think in Paragraph 9 we do talk about, "the NII must provide owners of rights with the opportunity through technological means to control, identify, monitor, and be compensated for uses." Does that address your question? DR. BEARMAN: So maybe that's where it goes in terms of the easy mechanisms. MR. COOKE: Yes. Yes. Well, that's what we're talking about. DR. BEARMAN: Thanks. Sorry. I just wasn't sure where. MR. COOKE: Okay. Vance? MR. OPPERMAN: Maybe this is in your response to the green paper and I've forgotten it, or didn't see it. But I'm curious why it was you did not adopt the CONTU recommendation of the green paper. MR. COOKE: Which recommendation in the green paper? MS. PURMOVER: A recommendation that a group be formed? MR. OPPERMAN: Yes. Right. MR. COOKE: Oh. MS. PURMOVER: It was something that none of the members of the group expressed a desire to do. MR. COOKE: I don't think anybody in the group -- we talked about this. We just didn't think it was necessary. VOICE: What was the question, Vance? VOICE: We couldn't hear that. Yeah. MR. OPPERMAN: I was just curious why it was that the CONTU recommendation -- group such as the CONTU approach which had been suggested in the green paper had not been suggested by the subcommittee that was working on this subject. And the answer was, there was not a perceived need to do that. MS. PURMOVER: Let me just, for those who don't know -- someone said people may not know what CONTU is. It's the Commission on New Technological Uses of Copyrighted Works that was established when the 1976 act was written. What people are talking about is the possibility of establishing a second commission to perform a similar function. MR. COOKE: And, Vance, I think there were members of our committee that felt that the Patent and Trademark Office was doing that now. DR. BEARMAN: Well, then many of us in the library information and higher education community all strongly feel we do need such a group. MR. COOKE: Okay. MR. OPPERMAN: Well -- MR. COOKE: Go ahead, Vance. MR. OPPERMAN: If you're going to have additional material on that, there are a number in the copyright community that posed that, but I assume that if that becomes an issue that is proposed, we'll hear from those positions. MR. COOKE: Again, I want to repeat, we will go back in committee and look at that. There were those who felt that the Patent and Trademark Office does that now. I've heard what you've said. We'll talk about it and come back. VOICE: I have a question. I think we're up to 6. How did the committee -- well, it seems contradictory to me. But how did the committee rationalize Principle 4 and Principle 6? MR. COOKE: Well, I think the way that it was rationalized is I think there was a willingness and agreement to understand that change would have to happen to reflect the technology that's coming. But, on the other hand, they did not feel that copyright owners should be compromised or their position weakened when those changes are to take place. In other words, there is new technology that will have to be changed. However, the feeling was that copyright owners would not have to have their rights diminished or weakened because of technological change. MR. OPPERMAN: I understand that. I'm just trying to figure out, in the real world, it's sort of like saying change is coming, but if a change impacts something that's old, don't make the change, or don't lose any benefit from the change. I don't see how you get to that. MR. COOKE: Well, I think when we talked -- in committee we talked about authors, we talked about videos, sound creators. And the idea was, because you have technological change you will definitely have changes in the way that copyright law may be implemented. But, just because you have technological change, the committee did not necessarily feel that an author's rights would be diminished or lessened. And I guess I'm repeating what I've already said, but I think that no one wanted to see, because of technological change, that an author had fewer privileges and rights to his creation than he had before. VOICE: Yes. I agree with that. I think I understand the principle of what you are saying. But, once you create any technological change, it's going to make an author's work or his product available in all kinds of configurations, none of which we know today about. You've almost got to withhold creating of the printing press until you decide whether or not that's going to impact the author's rights. I mean, you sort of -- if you take it that way, because ultimately something will happen and you will end up with a court test of whether or not it has restricted the owner's rights. And I guess what I'm trying to do is -- maybe it's a copyright tribunal or something that sort of looks at these things. They seem to be in conflict. VOICE: That's the precise reason many people --and I'll add myself to Toni's list--think that something like the new CONTU is highly advisable. I raised the point before, and I don't think it was heard. I understand what you want to do, and I'll stipulate that I would want the same thing, which is to ensure that existing rights holders' interests are not negatively affected by new technology. But how do you know that that is possible? You see, I would argue that there's a difference between what's desirable and what's possible, and we're not on safe ground for the reasons just stated. And assuming that it is possible without -- VOICE: I -- VOICE: Wait. Let me finish my sentence. Without very negative consequences. Nobody knows. I'm not saying the whole thing is going to fall apart, but it does suggest the lack of wisdom in simply proceeding on the basis of desire rather than a critical analysis of how well equipped we are. And it says that what we can do pragmatically is to say, look, we are not, in this council -- we do not have expertise in copyright, what we have is a lot of people who are major stakeholders in copyrights. What there ought to be is a body that is constituted with a balanced expertise that represents equal points of view in this, and let them go at it. I mean, that is the argument in favor of that. VOICE: Well, we all accept the fact that change is here and more will come. Why do we have to accept the fact that, with change coming, there is a certain outcome that one has predicted that rights holders will have lesser rights? VOICE: I'm not suggesting that. VOICE: These are principles, not goals. MR. COOKE: Esther made a comment earlier today that I thought was very correct and that caused me to disagree with you, which is, the point of the principles is not that they're 100 percent consistent in all ways. The implementation of them in balancing the things that go between the principles is the hard part, which isn't going to be the things that we -- that's the details that go behind it. So, I don't see that there is a conflict in saying that there is a principle that you shouldn't change the things very much, and also a principle you should -- before looking. VOICE: Well -- MR. COOKE: When they come into conflict is when the interesting things may occur. And, by the way, I think, when you talk about principles, I don't think the establishment of a new body to do that, whether that's a good idea or a bad idea, really does not fall in the category of principles. It falls in -- it's an implementation issue. So, the argument is that principles really are what they are. Implementation is quite another matter. VOICE: John, along that line then, would you go the next step and say that, in order to do that, the committee might recommend the creation of a body to address the implementation issue? MR. COOKE: I think that -- VOICE: If you say, for example, when you say, "copyright laws should be forward-looking and flexible enough to adapt to incremental changes in technology without the need for frequent statutory amendment," if you're not going to go to statutory amendment, then you need to have to go to some tribunal or else you're going to -- either you're going to let the courts decide law, or you're going to end up going to Congress for the statutory amendment. That's why I think if you've got a tribunal that's charged with overseeing the regulated industry or the competitive industries, it can be far more flexible than having to always go back for statutory amendments, or either letting the court write the laws. VOICE: I just had one other comment on the principle discussion. It's kind of a general comment, when Nathan talked about Esther's point on principles. I have no problem with principles being basic and implementation helping us to decide if those principles come in conflict. My problem with principles is, the principles, if I see them, are one-sided from the get-go. That's when I have a problem. It does not become a guiding principle that I can live with. That's my problem. If the principle has more balance to it, then fine, I'm much more comfortable. And, obviously, if it comes in conflict, we need to figure out how to resolve it. But I have some question that some principles, as enunciated by the committee, have a little bit of imbalance here that concerns me. So, that's my only concern. Principles should be much more balanced as principles. That's all. MR. COOKE: Yes. And almost precisely to the degree they're balanced, it's going to be difficult to implement them and there could be some contradictions. VOICE: No problem. MR. COOKE: Right. So it's a very fair point to suggest there should be more emphasis or different principles. VOICE: Exactly. MR. COOKE: However, when we get that list, you're going to look at them and say, well, how are you going to balance this and that? VOICE: Yes. And that's Bob's point. MR. COOKE: That's the balance. Then, for implementing it, there's a variety of ways the government can choose to implement it. In part, through wording the statutes themselves in terms of guiding principles for other bodies, in part through formal creation of other bodies. But we weren't trying to prejudge how government would go ahead and implement the set of -- yeah. I mean, it's certainly a worthwhile suggestion that an implementation would be some body. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: John, I have heard two things here. One, is the balance. You've heard that and you're going to consider it. And the second, is that your team didn't discuss the issue of some kind of a tribunal, and that's being suggested. If you'd take a look at that, that would be great. MR. COOKE: Great. DR. MYHRVOLD: If I may, I'd like to comment on the idea or the notion that the desirability of a certain end result or principle necessarily might have to be sacrificed at the altar of practicality, is the wrong way to go. In the drafting of principles, our principles should not be hampered by some current notion of what is or is not particularly practical to accomplish in today's environment, because that might, perhaps, change tomorrow morning by some ingenious new mechanism developed tonight, perhaps within a few miles of this very location. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: I happen to agree with that. I think you're on target. Principles should be of a higher level, and not impacted by the practicality. DR. MYHRVOLD: It gets to the implementation. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: But I just think balance is the key. DR. MYHRVOLD: I understand. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: We're together. VOICE: Nathan, I accept your points. You've actually helped clarify what my concern is. That is to say, I agree, it should be at the level of principles, and the principles will have conflicts in them. That's when the interesting part happens. But the question is, is it appropriate to bind this whole document in terms of principles associated with copyright law? For instance, you could write something that said that the creators of works have rights and those rights ought to be legally protected, that those rights should be, in no sense, less than what they are now. And you could go through and you could remove copyright from this and you would have principles that were actually a little more abstract. Okay. So, this undercuts the -- I want to undercut the argument that I'm trying to drive things towards practicality. (Laughter) VOICE: My real concern, because I'm not being rhetorical about this, is I have a personal view that copyright is, as a mechanism, poorly suited in a number of ways to represent anybody's interests, either the public or the rights holders. Now, I'm obviously 100 times more familiar with this with respect to software, but I also have some familiarity with the NII. This doesn't make me happy, it makes me upset, because if it's true that there's a fundamental mismatch between copyright as a regime and the new medium, then the ultimate solution will have to be some new kind of legal regime along with new classes of works and net sets of stakeholders. And I understand that the minute, in a public forum, you raise the specter of -- generous of protection, which is what this suggests considering, it makes existing rights holders really get extremely nervous, and I can understand that, to the extent that I am and have been a rights holder. But I really put it to you that we're really not doing our job, again, if we simply assume that we can make the Copyright Act work. And the reason I keep coming back to that is, it unconsciously makes certain kinds of assumptions about the nature of works. It never contemplated the fact that you could make an infinite number of copies at virtually zero cost. And trying to protect works in the form of static bundles of bits under those circumstances may be a task that is larger than either the law or technology can accomplish, and that the very object of protection may have to change in order to come to some new accommodation. I understand what I'm saying is quite unorthodox, is quite radical. There are people who are saying it in print and saying well. And I fully expect to lose on this one and not harp on it, but I want to be on the public record about this, saying that in order to preserve everybody's interests, including the interests of rights holders, we ought to be considering the evolution of the legal regimes and not tying our fate and fortune to copyright. And, in the interest of time and efficiency, again, having said that, and having said that clearly, I'm not going to repeat it. But I will just say, if that doesn't get into the majority report, which I fully expect that it won't, it'll go into a minority report. VOICE: If I may, that notion that we do not begin from the framework of copyright law goes from the realm of impracticality to the zone of impossibility. We have to start to argue where we go. We need a starting point. We do not have a table au rossa here, we have a framework of copyright law. That is an undeniable fact, even if you accept the premise that it is completely and utterly useless in the digital era, which I personally do not subscribe to. There's an even larger question than that, or an additional question. We are a member of an international community which has a very complex, well-entrenched copyright structure itself. There are all kinds of international agreements to which are a party to which we have to abide by. Again, it makes that notion -- it's not important whether or not it's a radical notion from an intellectual perspective, it's an utterly impossible notion from any perspective of trying to achieve something. MS. PRESTON: I'll be very brief. Just principle -- CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Francis, then Esther. MS. PRESTON: That's quite all right. I agree with Al. You know, we've had 200 years of experience under the copyright law, and I'm sure that when radio came along they thought it was impossible, and when television came along it was a new technology, totally impossible to deal with, then came cable. And the law has worked. It is amazing how it has, but it has. And I think, in this arena, given the opportunity, you will see it work again. I feel very strongly about that. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Esther? MS. DYSON: Okay. Very briefly, sometimes things change a little, change a little, and change a little, and then they change a lot. But the fundamental thing here is, a principle is a principle. The principle of rewarding creativity and providing incentives for creativity is a great principle. Copyright is an implementation that is based on some physical circumstances that may no longer apply. VOICE: In looking through the principles, of course, many of them, many of the most important ones, wind up being independent of copyright. It certainly is a point well taken, that we can't predict now whether copyright law in the future is going to do everything that we need it to. But I think it would be irresponsible for us not to try to fix it and to try to work within that framework to the extent that we see the ability to do so. You can't ever preclude the idea that there's a better notion that will come along. We should be open to that possibility. And, to the extent that we need to reflect in here that the principles of rewarding the people who are both users and holders of intellectual property, those principles should transcend all of the legal framework. But we have got to work -- as we see things within copyright that we believe could be clarified to work, it would be silly not to go do it. MR. COOKE: I just want to comment on two points that were made. I think I want to emphasize the one that I think Al made, we are in a global environment where copyright is -- we are a party to a number of treaties and relationships that recognize it. Second, if you look at paragraph 5, or I should say Principle 5, it seems that it says an awful lot here. "Intellectual property rights and effective legal means of enforcing those rights must keep pace with technological developments." I mean, that's a broad principle that I think a majority of people would embrace because it's hard to refute it. Can we go on to number 7? CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I think Vance has another comment. MR. COOKE: Oh, I'm sorry. MR. OPPERMAN: Well, John, in terms of going back and drafting, I hope that you don't take all these comments to embrace what appears to be kind of a dialectical process. As I understand it, there are some who will argue that we have an imbalance, and I gather what that imbalance is the so-called rights of the copyright owner and the so-called rights of the copyright user. A lot of us do not see that as a dialectical process. A lot of us do not see that as an imbalance. Most of us, I think--certainly speaking for myself--think that the whole concept here is to put the emphasis on what leads to innovation, what leads to a society where innovation and creativity are encouraged? That's the process. That's what we're trying to accomplish. Within that, we made a decision many years ago, and I think the right one, to accomplish that, not by making things free, not by making it single use, not by having a property right of a generalized nature which was the English system at that time, but, instead, to have decided that the creator should be given financial incentive. And even within that context, if you read the constitution, it doesn't tell you how long that right is to exist. I mean, you could read the constitution and say, well, yeah, that's right, we're going to have a lot of innovation and creativity and we're going to give people monopoly control, but it might be for one minute, or it might be -- in the four basic copyright statutes we've had in this country we've gone from 15 years, to 17 years, to 19 years, 21 years, 75 years in some ways -- the intricacies and the details and the way in which we grapple with changes, I think, are well-accommodated within the principle. But I wouldn't want your committee -- at least there's a vote over here for the view that this is not an imbalanced document, that the balance is to be found in supporting and encouraging innovation, and supporting and encouraging creativity. This is not, from my reading, at least, imbalanced in accomplishing that goal. VOICE: Well, I don't want to prolong the discussion, but I would have to respond to Vance that there's another vote on this side that says, as presented, it is imbalanced, and that the words do not give the right kind of emphasis. I am a copyright owner and a copyright user, and I think the balance on the user isn't here. I think there should be some language to make that change, and you're going to consider it. I have to put that on record in response to my colleague -- CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Back to you, Jack. MR. FISHMAN: You know, if we get into this we have to start also defining what we mean by the copyright owner. Is it the creator or the owner? And what do we mean by the user? Is it the user who is appropriating that work to further their own interests, or is it the end user, the consumer? And, if you're talking about NPR, you're not the consumer. You're not the end consumer, you're a user in the sense that you're appropriating the work and passing it on. And it is really to benefit the public. The public -- VOICE: I certainly knew that. And you know, Jack, I pay my way along the way as well. MR. FISHMAN: Right. Right. VOICE: And my only concern is, I don't want to see limitations on the progress of science and arts by having the balance on the other side because I can't afford it if you interpret that strictly. MS. BRACEY: And that was my reason for asking what transmission was, because I wanted to understand the point that you were talking about. Thank you. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: All right. Back to you, John. MR. COOKE: All right. Principle #7. 7) The privilege of fair use, as incorporated in the Copyright Act and developed by the courts, should be fully applicable in the NII environment. Context of the new technology should neither expand nor contract the doctrine of fair use of copyrighted works. VOICE: John? MR. COOKE: Yes, sir. VOICE: It's occurred to me, now that we've had our consciousness raised appropriately about balance, that we may be a little out of balance in this one. We've said that the fair use doctrine shouldn't be expanded or contracted, where we said in the previous ones that the owners rights shouldn't be diminished. It looks like the previous one goes one way, and this one goes two ways. Just in the interest of balance, perhaps, what we really meant to say here was that the doctrine of fair use should not be materially changed, weakened, diminished, or comparable language to #6 because of the development of new technology. MR. KAPOR: May I point out another linguistic asymmetry that kind of goes to you, but while we're on this, we've got, in #5 and 6, rights, and in 7 we've got privilege. Let's use the same language. VOICE: We don't really need to quibble about that, I think. I tried to quibble with them about that and it didn't work. (Laughter) VOICE: May I say something on that point? VOICE: In any case, Mitch, the point is, the very use is the doctrine, and technically it is a defense. VOICE: Right. VOICE: So call it a privilege or a right. VOICE: I understand. Part of the reason that many of us, including myself, are as antsy as we are is when we see language like this, while we don't assume there was any harm intended, it is really a concern. It sounds, once again, like a document drafted by rights holders, which is where the balance comes from. And what will really be the kind of satisfaction that I think some people are looking for, and also what's consistent with our charter, is an assurance that the process is one that is fair and participatory from, you know, all points of view in the drafting. I mean, it is just a striking fact that there are a significant number of rights holder groups with particular interests involved with this, as well it should be. But that is another area where there needs to be balance, and we'd like to understand how balance, in terms of the participation in forming it, can also be given. Now, maybe we say that's why we're going to take as much time as we need at the full council level. That would be fine. VOICE: I would just like to support Mac and add one more clarification, because I think you were on the right track. I put some language out that will just sort of explain the fair use doctrine, or at least articulate it, to ensure public access to information, notwithstanding a copyright owner's interest and controlling use of his or her work. So, again, it spells it out. So, whether we add that balance, I just think the fair use needs to be clarified a bit, and you can make that very clear by one or two words in clarifying fair use. MR. COOKE: Vance? MR. OPPERMAN: Well, I -- MR. COOKE: I'm probably not entitled to call on people. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Well, I think we can both do it, John. VOICE: You're entitled, John. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Absolutely. MR. OPPERMAN: Specifically as to fair use, and let me preface this remark by saying I am not a lawyer, but I am aware--much to my friend, Stanley's, chagrin--that it has been decided at the Supreme Court level that fair use is a privilege, not a right. That is something that is very important to keep in mind and it speaks, in a certain sense, to the balance issue. And, if you go back to the original framework for intellectual property protection, the constitution, the sense of balance was addressed by protecting the creators of the work, the assumption being that if the creators were protected, the public good, the general welfare would be served by the output of those creators. That is the way in which the balance was originally struck and has been affirmed numerous times at the Supreme Court level. Fair use is a privilege. MR. NORTON: Well, if we wanted to split hairs about it, let me just repeat, where the rubber meets the road on fair use is in court, and that means fair use is -- VOICE: Use the mike, Mac. I can't quite hear you. MR. NORTON: -- a defense. But I don't think it really matters what we call it here as long as we have the balance that Del and others are looking for among 5, 6 and 7. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Vance? MR. OPPERMAN: Well, I thought the language, at least in 7, is not applicable, I thought, to the balance argument because, in fact, the concept -- when I see the phrase "fair use," whether or not we argue that it's a defense to prove an act of infringement, which is the way Section 107 which incorporates this whole concept is generally used, whether or not that applies or not, the idea that was incorporated in the '76 act in the four subsections that codify fair use is, in fact, an extraordinarily balanced piece of legislation. And, because any time you write something down in so many words, the genius of our civil system is that you have the development or the fleshing out of what those words mean by various fact-intensive, in this case, court proceedings. We must have a thousand cases, at least nine or 10 Supreme Court decisions, that pretty clearly spell out what fair use means. And I think, certainly, you can argue about users not being recognized or users of some rights or owners of license rights in other parts of this document. But I think when you say the privilege of fair use, or when you talk about fair use as it has evolved and as it is interpreted, that is a balanced concept and I would be very concerned about trying to unbalance that concept because I think that will have a lot of unintended consequences. Now, I understand there are other issues here that people may have in mind when they argue this, but I think the concept of fair use, leaving aside the privilege of not, is an extraordinarily balanced development over the last 20 years and fully recognizes the use of academics, the use of access by the public, and all the rest of what grew up in this country as the doctrine of fair use before it was codified. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: And I'm in agreement with that. I just figure if you can put a few more words in there that would say just that, that's all. MR. OPPERMAN: Well, I'm afraid you have to put in nine Supreme Court opinions, and as soon as you have more words -- CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Oh, no. No. We can cut your words down, Vance. (Laughter) MR. OPPERMAN: Del, you know the story about the fellow who visited the guru and wanted to know the meaning of life. Well, the answer to the meaning of fair use is going to be just as long. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Frances. MS. PRESTON: We've been talking about this paper not taking care of the user. Well, I think that Mega-Project I and Mega-Project II took care of the user, and, of course, our assignment was to discuss intellectual property. So, I think that we have reached a balance here because this was our assignment. And I think that when we talk about the public we have to look at our songwriters that are out there because they, too, are the public and this is their livelihood and this is how they make their living. They are from all walks of life, and this is their product. I don't think that we expect IBM to give away the computers, and I don't think that we expect the people to give away the desks in school rooms, nor do we expect the paper to be given away. So, the product which they produce, which is intangible, you can't hold it in your hand, but it's out there, and that is their livelihood. I think that's what we had to consider when we were writing this paper. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Perhaps, in the interest of time, John, I might suggest that you kind of go through the last eight points, or whatever there are, now. Then we can have a discussion of all of them together. MR. COOKE: All right. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Let's do that. MR. COOKE: Number 8. 8) The law shall seek to preserve and promote the ability of creators and copyright owners to exercise all the rights in the group of rights that make up a copyright, whether separately or in combination. 9) The NII must provide owners of rights with the opportunity through technological means to control, identify, monitor, and be compensated for uses. 10) In order to provide certainty to those developing the NII and reduce any need for new exemptions or limitations, intellectual property rights and the technological means to protect those rights shall be clear before significant growth takes place in the NII. 11) The basic principles of copyright licensing should be free market transactions involving negotiation between rights holders and users of works. The role of the government should be to establish a legal framework in which private parties can operate the license and enforce rights. The law shall allow flexibility in this respect, neither encouraging nor impeding any particular form of voluntary licensing. 12) Public education about the meaning and importance of intellectual property rights is critical to successful implementation of the NII. 13) Domestic intellectual property laws shall be consistent with international treaty obligations. 14) It is essential to provide meaningful incentives for the creation and dissemination of works in the global information infrastructure. Accordingly, the U.S. must strive to have other countries accept similar fundamental principles and give an equivalent degree of copyright protection to these works. 15) The U.S. shall seek harmonization of national intellectual property laws applicable to the GII environment to the extent consistent with U.S. interests, and shall support the principle of national treatment for all rights granted by such laws. Shall we start with #8 and go through #15 for comments? VOICE: John, I can do mine quickly, and I appreciate your patience. I don't want to sound like a broken record, but, on 10, for example, again, I think we need to recognize that there may be some limitations on copyrights owners to ensure to promote socially desirable ends, including non-commercial, educational, library, and other uses of the NII. So, again, it seemed to be the balance question, very strong on copyright ownership. But, on the user side, there may be some limitations and we ought to state that, and I have some language. In #11, again, in order to ensure access to copyrighted works for socially benefitive purposes, including, again, non-commercial, educational, and library uses, some form of compulsory licensing may be necessary. This issue you spoke -- this section you spoke -- the voluntary, which I certainly support. I'm not after more defined rules. But, in some cases, compulsory licenses may be necessary in order to get at beneficial uses and non-commercial uses. And the last one, on 14, just as we talk about GII, and we'll get into that, make sure the same public interest is transferred into the GII as we go down the road. That's all. My argument has been one of balance, one of the public interest, and to make sure that it's stated in some clarified way in the language. MR. COOKE: Thanks. VOICE: The law of unintended consequences again. In #10, I asked myself -- my scenario is, hey, look, the Internet is taking off, it is the NII. The situation is not clear at all and is unlikely to get clear about the intellectual property rights. If I read 10 literally, the principle leads directly to a law that says, stop building it. We don't understand how everything should work out, and the intellectual property rights are unclear. Now, I suspect you didn't mean that, but I'm not sure what you did mean. VOICE: #10 I took to be aspirational when we were working on it. VOICE: I think Vance is right. VOICE: Then it would be well to change the language to reflect that. VOICE: That's what I always thought should -- MR. COOKE: In most of the principles today there were certainly principles that were predictive in nature, you know. It was the feeling of the committee that this would benefit everyone. VOICE: Right. MR. COOKE: In the first principle, electronic commerce, this is going to benefit everyone. VOICE: Right. MR. COOKE: Well, I don't think you can write a law that would make that so. It's a prediction. This is probably taken in a similar vein. Perhaps everyone should clarify the thing. I mean, if we clarify here we should clarify in other places. You know, it is the feeling of the committee that we predict, or some other notion. And just sort of a general process question. Should these things include predictive opinions? We say, I don't think anyone's going to do this unless, which is really the nature that was meant. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I think so, too, although I would suggest in this case that maybe what you really meant is there's this sense of urgency and maybe it could be word-smithed to reflect a sense of urgency, because the network is being developed, rather than something that doesn't quite mean that the way it is now. VOICE: Yes. If you just took out everything after "clear" and put a period, you could still argue with the substance, but at least I think that's what the meaning is. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Toni? DR. BEARMAN: I just question the word "certainty." I don't think there's any certainty about the NII. But, in #10, perhaps the word "certainty" is what's throwing some of us off. I would hope, in #12, I think that we also very much need public education about fair use because a lot of people don't understand what it is and what is permitted, and I think that's very important. Many people honestly want to follow the law, but they don't know what it is. MR. COOKE: I would like to propose that those -- particularly, Mitch and Del have already said that they will do this, but I think that those who have specific language changes should offer them to the committee. And Toni and Mitch -- I mean, in other words, I would not like for the committee to sit here and try to conjure up the wording that you find acceptable. We'd like to receive wording from you that we can then work with, because it's going to be on some of these -- some of these principles can be very important to have your words on paper. VOICE: Will that be in addition to your own reconsiderations based on the general non-word-smith comments? MR. COOKE: Yes. Yes. Absolutely. In other words, we're going to take a fresh look at this. But on language that you have specifically in your mind, we can't read your mind, we need to see it. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Yes? VOICE: Just one comment. Since Mitch said he wasn't going to say it anymore, I'll say it. It is not clear in reading this. We have a mix of principles and we have an endorsement of the copyright laws. Both of those may be a good starting point because it is where we are, but I think there ought to be something in here that gives the flexibility in terms of principle that if the copyright laws don't prove adequate for how the NII is going to evolve, rather than the incrementalism, rather than patchwork, we step back, at least as a principle, and say we will take a look at it rather than stop the evolution of the NII, which would be the obvious reverse consequence. I appreciate things that are 200 years old have a lot of historical value, but it doesn't necessarily mean they're right forever. VOICE: Nor is the NII right. And maybe somebody will say, if you can't assure certain basic principle rights, maybe we shouldn't have an NII. VOICE: This isn't a principle of rights, it's the question of the endorsement of the copyright laws and incrementally expanding them and stating that we believe they are adequate as to how the network, or what we are talking about here, may be involved. I agree with the principles and I understand the point of balance, but we've gone one step further and we've said that copyright laws are the correct vehicle for going forward. They may well be. They're a starting point. But that's a pretty absolute statement. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Esther. I'm sorry. MS. DYSON: It may be that if there are strong copyright laws, as you said, the market will work, people will start distributing their things with a free right to copy as opposed to maintenance of copyright. And those things will end up all over the Internet and new varieties of compensation will emerge. So, in some sense, a new body of contract law may emerge alongside the copyright system. VOICE: How do you contract something when you don't own it? If you don't have copyright law which is like real property or personal property, we might as well revoke those laws also and say, just let anybody use anything anytime they want, and eventually somebody will devise a system of property rights in this and say that the market -- then we can sell this. Then we're back to copyright law again. MS. DYSON: I'll write something. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Yes. VOICE: I guess there may genuinely be some benefit for people who have relied on copyright exclusively to learn from the terrible struggles within the software industry around this. It is a fact that you can use multiple different forms of protection-- copyright, patent, and trade secret--to protect one and the same work. Now, there's a lot of dispute about how much of one, and when is enough enough within my own industry. But the fact of the matter is, we already know that there are classes of works in digital form that are protectable under multiple regimes. So, I would just encourage people who have the feeling that if they can't cling to the life raft of copyright they're going they're going to drown, to look at other parallel experiences which may wind up broadening the vision. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Yes. I think we've passed this around. I think the Mega-Project team has the input. Obviously, there is a lot of interest. (Laughter) VOICE: Can I make one -- CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: No. Just -- there's a lot left open on fair use, and other issues. What I would recommend, John and the team, is that you consider the committee's input, the council's input. There's enough interest, I think, that not only would I suggest that people write their comments down so you can review them adequately, but perhaps also to find some way, perhaps through E-mail or something, to send redrafts, perhaps, to all the members of the council as you iterate--it's probably going to take an iteration or two--rather than just something like a final version so that all the members can, perhaps, respond more than once if they feel so led. MR. COOKE: May I talk a little bit about timing? It would be very useful -- we will all agree on timing. But it would be very useful if those who have precise wording suggestions, if they could get those to the committee -- Well, frankly, what I'd love to say is by Monday morning, but if I can't get that, I will accept it a date soon after that, because the committee really needs to digest that, come back through the mail, if you will, or through E-mail, or through faxes, or through some methodology to get this information back to all the members of the committee so they can, as you say, look at these changes as they're going on. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: So I think it's great. I think the sooner you can get your inputs to John, the better. Monday is probably not possible. MR. KAPOR: Yes. Given the degree of different voices on this, maybe what we should do is consider what end point we're trying to reach. And, if that does not permit enough time to have an efficient process, and still a reasonable one, maybe we need to extend this issue. But it just scares the hell out of me to even hear that proposed because we -- MR. COOKE: Hear what proposed? MR. KAPOR: To hear, we want comments by Monday. MR. COOKE: No, no. Wait just a minute, Mitch. Just wait a minute. I live in a world where I don't know when the document is going to get out. Maybe it's not going to get out until next December of 1995. I'd like to hear comments now so I can start to work. Now, that doesn't mean that you're going to get a final document next Tuesday. I'm just asking for a start. Second point. You were originally asked to be on this Mega-Project and moved to another one, so I suggest that you make your comments known to us and we will work in a process, if it takes a year and a half. MR. KAPOR: I have to say that the other project that I moved to is probably as needful of attention as the one I came from. MR. COOKE: I'm sure all the projects need attention. MR. KAPOR: And I would like to see a process as a goal that the bulk of the people here feel is fair and reasonable. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: So, when do you want to give your input? MR. KAPOR: Well, I would think having a week -- CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Good. Done. MR. KAPOR: -- is about as speedy as you can do and still do a thorough job when you're trying to do that. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Great. I don't think there's any -- VOICE: Can I transfer to Mega-Project III? They have a lot more fun. I'm just -- (Laughter) CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Okay. I think this is a real one, you know. This is a real one. I think this is a microcosm of America we have around the table here. It's real, and the kind of discussion we're having is real. I think we have to honor it. Frankly, if we can't get the job done by December, we'll do it in January. If we can't do it then, we'll do it in February. But I think the main thing is to really progress on this thing. We also have a second kind of issue here that John's going to lead us through. Let's see. Let's begin on that. We've also heard the Lehman report, and we've been asked for input on that. John, can you lead us through a process there? MR. COOKE: Yes. We were asked to comment on the green paper, and what we did is we -- I'm doing the preamble now. You've gotten a copy of our response, but I just want to say a couple of things. We thought the green paper was a good start at tackling the intellectual property issues. I recognize that will not be a view held by everybody around this table. We recognize that what we got was the preliminary draft from the green paper and we are essentially in agreement with a number of recommendations of the green paper. And we disagreed with a few, and those will become obvious as we talk about them. The bulk of what we did was we had a committee that had various points of view on this, so in deference to those who had different points of view, in those differences of opinion, you'll see in our report that in some cases there was a majority opinion and there was a minority opinion. And, when we go through it, you can get the feel that we definitely put the minority opinion inside our response. Also, I would like to say that one of the major controversies we had dealt with an issue regarding sound recordings performance rights. I don't want to belabor that now, but I don't want you to be ignorant of the fact that there was a major difference of opinion inside the committee on that. You should know also that we gave considerable attention to the issues of what was said about fair, and educational, and library uses. So, let's look at the document now and kind of go through it and talk about our response and see where you would like to see our response change. I just want to make sure that you know that Page 2 in our response, the public performance right issue is addressed, and on Page 8, the fair use issue is addressed. The reason I point those out now is because, having told you that, one, we dealt with both of them, and having told you there was a difference of opinion, I think you ought to know where they are. I am not inclined to read this document in its entirety, although if those of you who would like to come into San Franciso at night, I'll read it to you there. But maybe the process might be useful for simply, initially, those of you who have looked at it to say, I did not like the way you approached this, or you needed to change the wording on that, and maybe we could start with those who have read it and have clear opinions. How is that? MR. KAPOR: I have a procedural question. MR. COOKE: Okay. MR. KAPOR: Where are we heading with this? Is the path this is on to get stamped by the full council and submitted as the council's comments, or what? MR. COOKE: I'll let them answer. MR. KAPOR: Okay. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Yes, I think that's the answer. I think you're right, that it should come from the entire council if we can reach agreement on this. If we can't, there is a fairly short time frame on this. We do have just a -- we need to get this back to the administration within just a couple of weeks, unlike the principles, where we do have more time. But, if it's impossible, we won't be able to do it, of course, but we've been asked for input as a council. MR. COOKE: Did we agree on the timing? We know that -- VOICE: That's correct. MR. COOKE: The Mega-Project knows that, clearly, there are those at Department of Commerce who need the response. Now, that doesn't mean the response should be rushed, but they clearly would like to have this in their hands so they can -- CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: We've been asked for input here on a time schedule. It would be nice if we could do that. If it's impossible to do that as a council, then we'll have to deal with that. But let's begin the discussion here, and if we can't make enough process, then we'll have to devise a new process. MR. COOKE: The final report, as you know, is due within the next two months. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Right. If we don't get input into them soon, we won't have an opportunity to get -- MR. COOKE: ...by our group. I think we can make that clear. But I just wanted to let you know, the majority position was that since it had been referenced in the green paper, that we should address it, and we did, acknowledging a minority position on our Mega-Project committee that said, let's leave it alone. So, I'm just clarifying for the members of the council that I'd like for differences of opinion to be clearly open and acknowledged. Could I have comments on any portion of this that you would like to comment on? VOICE: I will kick it off. On the performance issue that you mentioned -- MR. COOKE: Right. VOICE: -- the performance right issue, I'm persuaded by listening to Bert and Mitch on the copyright law, even though I'm not an expert, by any means. Again, it goes to that basic question of relying on it as our end all, be all. But, also, on the performance right issue, if I understand it, we're adding this right to the copyright law. Is that a correct interpretation? MR. COOKE: It was one of the green paper's major recommendations. VOICE: And my question is, it has some pros and cons and I'm basically of the minority view that we should leave the status quo alone. However, having said that, if you are going to take a position and agree with them, then again I would give my same speech, that some limitation on that right be placed so that we could have the public beneficial use of that. So, I'm still right back where I was early on. I would prefer not to amend or to add, but, if you did, maybe you could -- again, it's one of those balancing acts. Maybe on the transmission question that was brought up, maybe in the world of the future, you could have a protection on digital transmission, for example. You could say that would be permitted and protected. But, on other things, we should allow for some beneficial uses. So, I'm really of the position of siding with the minority on this, that if we are going to add that right, that we ought to have some limitation. MR. COOKE: And you would not, I assume, be persuaded by the fact that many places in other parts of the world that right exists, and if U.S. law had that, that this would help U.S. trade policy, and so forth, and so on? VOICE: I hadn't gotten there yet. That has some merit, to me, like so many other GII issues that we should probably get to somewhere down the way. But I'm not persuaded that I'm ready to take that step. VOICE: Yes. This isn't going to make me any more popular. I have, just conceptually, trouble with the whole idea of submitting any response on behalf of the whole council for the reason that this delves into matters of extreme technical detail about the statutes and comments on it. And I don't believe we, as a council, have the time or the expertise to represent ourselves on that. I certainly know that I'm not comfortable. Before I were to take a position, for instance, on, is there a digital transmission right or not, a lot more work would have to be done. I mean, I'll just remind everybody that we're undergoing, like, a lot of work. A lot of hard work has already been done by the Mega-Project just at the level of principles. There's been a very substantive discussion here, and there's a lot more to be done before we get to a consensus on principles, let alone comments on specifics. So, just in the interest of looking to, what seems to me, an inevitable conclusion, how are we going to, in the space of however many minutes we have here, do anything that gives us confidence that on these very detailed issues, of which there are half a dozen in here, we are going to come to any conclusion that we feel comfortable with? I just don't see that. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Please stay in order here. Put your hands up and get called on. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Yes. Stan, go ahead. MR. HUBBARD: Yes. I don't meant to upset you, Bob, but I had my hand up quite awhile. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: You didn't upset me, Stanley. MR. HUBBARD: I think it would be very helpful to -- CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I didn't see you. MR. HUBBARD: Pardon? CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I didn't see you. MR. HUBBARD: I know that. It would be very helpful, perhaps, for the group if somebody had told them what we're talking about. What we're talking about here is one paragraph that says this. As a matter of principle--and I'm going to try to be fair; if I'm wrong, correct me--a majority of the Mega-Project supports the green paper's recommendations that a public performance right for sound recording should be added to the Copyright Act. Now, what happens right now, and has happened since I've been in this business, the broadcasting business, for over four years, as a matter of practice, is those of us who run broadcast stations pay licensing groups money, about $300 million a year, and that money is split up among the recording companies for the right to play the records on our television and radio stations. What we're talking about here is using this group to try and somehow change the law. There were two bills, one before the House, one before the Senate, in this last session of Congress, which, once again, this happens almost every time there's a session of Congress, trying to change the rules. I have a very definite, parochial view as to why things are good the way they are. Now, my good friend, Al Teller, and some others, have a good reason to think that things are not right the way they are. My point is, I don't think is the forum, I don't think we should put our -- on a technical issue until the Congress -- changes the rules. I think it's the wrong place to do it. That's the only place I have an objection, is the question of performing rights. Ed, you had a thought. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Let's have Bob, first, and then I'll go ahead. MR. JOHNSON: Thank you. I'm concerned a little bit about procedure and the process, and I don't understand why we are obligated or obliged to respond to this here. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: We have no requirement to respond, it's just that if we want to get input into the Administration, now's the time; a month from now they will have completed their document. MR. JOHNSON: I understand. But that still wouldn't preclude us from getting input into it at a later time. It goes to the point that -- CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: John, do you have a -- MR. COOKE: I have a suggestion that may solve this whole problem. Much of what we do in our response is just raise questions. In other words, if you go through it, there are a lot of questions we raise. If we have a divided house on this for a lot of reasons, maybe the solution is just to take everything out but the questions we raise and help the government by simply saying, these are the questions we came up with. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I think that -- MR. JOHNSON: I think it makes sense to me, because if you recall, while we're in this process -- and there's a big concern of mine that Senator Hollings' legislation was moving at a pace, and I don't think there was an opportunity -- I don't think we were invited to prepare our response to the current legislation that was on the floor, and that would have had a far more significant impact than a working paper by an Assistant Secretary of Commerce. I think that we ought to take John's position, forward to him what we've developed, and, through our own individual resources, make our case on the matter of some of the various points raised by the green paper. I think, as a council, for us to try to come to some sort of consensus on this document when it's fraught with a lot of industries, parochial kind of issues, I think it's going to get very complicated. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Nathan? DR. MYHRVOLD: I think it would be a pity if we -- it's not a bad suggestion to forward the questions on. Another suggestion for a compromise might be to forward on the remainder of the part with the proviso that it is not the consensus of the committee, but was the majority opinion of the Mega- Project assigned to it. I'm a little bit uncomfortable with the notion here -- VOICE: No. VOICE: No. VOICE: No. DR. MYHRVOLD: -- that we're going to be completely impotent as a group because if, in fact, we need to have -- as these things are happening, even as we speak, it's the most fast-moving part of American society. And if, when the government asks us, we're about to do something, give us some input at all, and we can't even give them any input, they're going to go ahead. They're not going to wait. So, anyway, we certainly shouldn't do anything that goes under the name of the entire committee without having people have their input. I certainly would never suggest that. But I think some compromise that we have some say is better than having no say. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I agree with that. On the other hand, we have to be real careful with our charter. Our charter recognizes the council, but there's no charter that recognizes the Mega-Projects. So, whatever it is we send to the government needs to come from the council and not the Mega-Projects. Eduardo, we've passed you up here. MR. GOMEZ: Well, thank you. I was just going to finalize what Stanley started, that, speaking as a broadcaster and representing about 350 Spanish language radio stations, I think the idea that we broadcasters would have to start paying performance rights fees as well as composer's use fees, would be devastating to the constituency that I bring. As Stanley said, at this point, broadcasters are paying $300 million a year, more or less, to utilize the music that is written and composed by people who don't have any other means, normally, of getting paid for their works. The recording business is a $10 billion business, and, internationally, I think a $25 billion business, that needs no more subsidy. And I would plead, beg on my knees, if necessary, that this council not endorse this document with that language in it that would virtually devastate the minority broadcasters of this country, particularly those of us who broadcast in the Spanish language. There's just a whole lot of problems that we have with this whole thing, and I, too, would subscribe to the idea that we not take any action today and have the opportunity to submit positions further. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Yes. Just thinking it through, because I certainly agree with Stanley -- MR. FISHMAN: Del, can I just say something? CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Go ahead. MR. FISHMAN: I mean, some comments were made here that I think need some answer. I, too, have an obligation to some of the people that I represent, and I represent about four million people who are creators. They are scientists, engineers, teachers, librarians, social workers, and, yes, musicians. And many of those musicians, strangely, are Hispanic. And they're a little bit tired of people saying that we make $26 billion a year, but it's outrageous that we have to pay $300 million to the creators for all of the programming they use. The use of the minority groups and exploitation of minority groups in this discussion, I think, is totally irrelevant, whether they are black, or white, or Hispanic, or English-speaking, because, for every Hispanic broadcaster, I assure you, there are hundreds of thousands of Spanish-speaking performers who cannot afford to be here to speak to you and tell you that they, too, need to be paid for their services. Now, this gets to the crux of everything we're talking about here. I mean, the basic principle here is, do we believe that a person that performs services for someone else is worthy of their hire? These Hispanic and other artists are providing services to your broadcast station, albeit they are not there in person. But, because of technology, they don't have to be. You can take their work without asking their permission. MR. GOMEZ: Jack -- MR. FISHMAN: That's the way our laws are now. MR. GOMEZ: Do we not provide a service to them? MR. FISHMAN: Give them the privilege of saying if they want your service or not. You don't even ask them. Yes, I think artists want recognition, they want promotion on broadcast stations, but some of them also want compensation. But you never ask them. This is a fundamental principle of property rights. I own some property, I till the soil, I work the land, and then somebody comes over and says, well, I think I have the privilege of taking your stuff because, after all, I'm a good guy. Now, do we believe that a laborer, a worker, an artist, is entitled to consideration, to compensation--I'm not saying pay--in consideration for their work, and do they have any say in it at all? That's all we're talking about. Now, you say we're creating a new right. We are not. We are closing the gap in existing law. If you read the green paper, we have created an anomaly in our law. The sound recording is the only copyrightable item capable of being performed that does not have a performance right attaching to it. Now, that's discrimination. Why is the performer left out in this country? I will tell you why. It is because, over the years, the power of the people who are the broadcasters who want to use this stuff without paying. I think it's just outrageous, a $26 billion industry, and they're complaining about paying a quarter of a million dollars. What is it, $200 million? MR. GOMEZ: The recording business is the $26 billion. MR. FISHMAN: It's a $26 billion industry, and they can't pay for the product that they use. MR. JOHNSON: I am very concerned that the council is taking an awful wrong turn. If we're going to have this kind of debate based on purely selfish interests of industries that people are compensated to represent, or people benefit from through their ownership, then I have to go back to your point that maybe this is an industry council and we're using it as a lobbying forum. That's not the reason I believe we were all appointed. (Applause) MR. JOHNSON: And, if that's the case, then I think we might as well bring in our lobbyists and sit here, and I've got 1,500 minority items I could throw on the table, everything from set-asides in construction to the NII, to minority of procurement and ownership of it; a host of issues that reflect my own personal view, as well as I can think of about 30 from the cable industry I could throw on the table. That was not the intent, as I understand it, of the council, it was to look at this whole issue of the infrastructure from the perspective of the public interest, the private interest, the social interest, the economic interest, and to try to rationalize something that would redound to the benefit of the society as a whole. And, if we turn it into this kind of lobbying forum, then I think we're going to lose the mantle of any kind of public interest. I'm just afraid that we ought to get away from this before it turns into something in which I would not want to be a participant in. (Applause) CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Thank you. Thank you very much. John. VOICE: I think later on you can -- CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Excuse me. Just a second. John, and then -- MR. COOKE: I'd like to put my suggestion back on the table that we simply send the questions and nothing else. It would seem to be one that made sense. We're just raising questions about the green paper, not taking positions. It seems to me that that will end this debate. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I concur with that. I think we should discuss that as a council, that proposal of John's, that we send in a group of questions. Even that, of course, would require those of you that have strong feelings to document those feelings, get them to John immediately or very quickly --a week is suggested--and then have the team turn that into a set of questions as a result. Let's take just a few minutes and discuss that as a proposal here as a response to the Lehman report. DR. BEARMAN: Fine. That's what I want to respond to earlier when I had my hand raised. I think that's an excellent suggestion. I also had a question. I realize that each of us had to select a Mega-Project, although we wanted to be on all three because we have concerns in all three. I had sent in five pages of, I thought, fairly carefully thought out comments on the response, none of which seemed to have gotten incorporated into revisions. And I wonder, how do we ensure that we have a way of getting our comments in there? I would be happy to rewrite them as questions, but all of us on the council want to make sure we have our voice heard, no matter which Mega-Project we can be on. That's not meant as a criticism, it's meant as a frustration of, how do we make sure that our voice gets heard, even if it says only one member things. MR. COOKE: Send your comments in. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Yes. DR. BEARMAN: I did. Want me to send them again? MR. COOKE: Please. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Mac? MR. NORTON: I was just going to say that I think everyone in the third Mega-Project who has reviewed the questions, and I believe all of us have, would agree that none of us had any question about the questions. Wouldn't you say that's right, Stan? MR. HUBBARD: That's right. MR. NORTON: Al, wouldn't you say that's right? MR. TELLER: I'm sorry? MR. NORTON: Al, wouldn't you say that's right? MR. TELLER: I'm perfectly prepared to let the issue specifically of public performance right for sound recordings to be taken off the table. However, I would just like to say a couple of things. I object to the use of the word "subsidy." We're not here looking for subsidies on this issue. It's a legitimate economic issue. But, beyond the economic issue, and the reason that it is an important issue for us, is beyond, let's say, traditional, conventional, parochial business terms, beyond what our lobbyists would normally be pursuing on behalf of our industry, as they do on behalf of the industries represented around this table. Specifically, our efforts were geared to the digital reality, the fact that, in the digital era, music will be able to be broadcast with CD quality sound, and that was the impetus and the driving force behind the effort to seek a public performance right. And, in all the attempts at trying to carve out some legislation to enact this right, very specifically, analog broadcast was excluded from any of the new, hoped-for legislation so that it wouldn't attack the economic infrastructure of the radio industry that's currently in place. That's the last I feel like saying about it right now. In other words, Bob, I think we were coming from a more lofty place rather than from the narrow, parochial place where we all come from basically every day. And to assume for a moment that any of us sitting around this table are not bringing the baggage of a point of view on any of these subjects is really asking for a very large stretch of the imagination. I assume we all come with a perspective on virtually every issue that we've discussed. That being said, I'm perfectly happy to support John's suggestion that we just take this issue off the table. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Well, I don't think we're talking about taking it off the table, I think it's one of those questions. And we don't have the answer, but it is a question, performance rights. There's enough divergent point of view here that it's important to air the fact that there are people that want it and people who don't. Lynn, you haven't said anything before. MS. FORESTER: No. I was just going to say that I think it's important that if the Commerce Department has asked us to respond, that we do submit something. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Yes. MS. FORESTER: Because, although I agree with Bob, a lot has happened and is happening that is more important than the Assistant Secretary of Commerce's report, but I think that if we're asked to do something, we need to step up to it, with all the problems. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Good point. Good point. So, I think Del and I will work with John and develop a process to do that, and I think the hallmark for all of us is to get written issues, comments, about the relevant set of questions to John, and we'll pass a draft by everyone as well. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: My comment earlier was to say that I agree with this approach, and I certainly was -- in my comments early on, was trying to elicit balance. That has been accepted to be reconsidered. The other point is, my concern is that I don't want us to think, as a council, that we will run away from controversial issues. I don't think we will. I think in this case, this may not be the appropriate way to do it in response to a report, but I do think that it's not dead, it's not gone. In this case, we're going to raise the questions, but we may come back to this and maybe fulfil that obligation if we feel it's appropriate. So, I don't want the council to think that once we get an issue that we can't seem to come to consensus, that we drop it. I just think that this group has decided that, in this case, it's probably not the best way to proceed. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Yes. Vance, do you have a concluding remark? (Laughter) MR. OPPERMAN: Well, no. I just wanted to echo something that Nathan said. I have a certain degree of frustration about this resolution. When Commissioner Lehman presented his paper to us back in, whenever it was, May or June, many of us who have some background in these issues were, I think, fairly impressed with the effort. I certainly was. I came here today assuming that we would take a position. I didn't know about performance rights, frankly, because I hadn't heard the arguments and it's something that I have absolutely no background in. I thought the issue, from my perspective, would be the BBS recommendations on liability if you carry various services, and that's been very important to people that belong to the associations I belong to, and I was prepared to discuss that. But I think it's too bad if our response to the Lehman report, which, again, I think is an excellent effort and is a terrific guideline -- if all we're able to do in response to that is to give questions, I think that's useful, but I'm sorry we can't do more in terms of positive recommendations. I don't differ with taking the performance issue off the table. In the interest of keeping the body together, in the interest of saving our ammunition and going forward, in the interest of keeping Mega- Project III talking to each other, whatever it happens to be -- MR. COOKE: Actually, there's no problem in Mega-Project III. (Laughter) MR. COOKE: None whatsoever. MR. OPPERMAN: And I don't have a dog in that fight. I don't have any opinion on that part of the matter. But there's an awful lot more in the Lehman report that is substantive and is extremely well thought out, at least from our point of view, and I'm sorry that we're not going to be able to respond substantively to those other issues in the Lehman report. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Well, I obviously will be able, again, in December, to work on the principles. That has major influence, I think, as well. MR. OPPERMAN: Okay. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: So it's not something we're going to drop. We're going to have a lot of time over the next few sessions to discuss intellectual property. Stan, you have concluding remarks? MR. HUBBARD: Yes. I have a question. I have to ask my friends, Al, John, Jack, and the rest of them. I think these guys did a hell of a good job, and I was very impressed with the green paper, the Lehman report. I'm not a lawyer, as you are, Vance. But, from my non-legal look at it, I was darned impressed. MR. OPPERMAN: Yes. MR. HUBBARD: And I have no problem at all if we just say the question of performing rights is a subject that we don't agree on, leave it that, and endorse the rest of it. I think you did a good job, John, and the rest of you, in putting this to the board. I'd be very proud to endorse that report. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Yes. Stan, I understand what you're saying. I think there are some other issues around the table. I think John's suggestion is the right one, turn it into a set of questions for now. Then we will revisit and we will work through a process to do that, you all will be involved, and then we will come back and work on principles in December. John, do you have any other comments? MR. COOKE: None at all. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: You did good, John. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I think it's probably best to take about a 10-minute break right now. Then when we return we'll hear from Silicon Valley's own Dave Barram. By the way, this is great. This is what the council is all about, to discuss these kinds of things. It's great. (Brief Recess.) AFTER RECESS CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I really appreciated the last discussion. I believe that the issue of intellectual property is one of the major issues we have to grapple with as a council. I think it can either get in the way or contribute to the development of a national line of global information infrastructure, so the discussion is good. It's really the first chance we've had to air the views and principles in the committee and the council as a whole, and I really appreciate your being willing to express your views. I know John would really appreciate, again, getting written feedback in. The follow-up plan that we talked about was to get your issues in to John, he and his team will write up a series of questions, we'll get it in, Del and I will have a chance to review it, and get it back to the Administration, and, of course, also get you questions about the principles. I think we may also come back in the December meeting and discuss the response to the Lehman report again in more depth, so it's something on which you've spurred our interest. We understand the issue a lot better as a council. That, in itself, is, I think, indicative of what has to happen in this country. This is such an important issue and it's difficult to understand. I think, by airing the issues here, we understand better how millions of people out there are going to relate to things as well. So, again, thank you very much. Next on the agenda we have a special guest whom those of us in Silicon Valley know very well. He's spent a lot of his life out here, both in political circles and in Silicon Valley industry, and has gone back to help Secretary Brown out in the Department of Commerce as Assistant Secretary. It is really a pleasure to see you back here, Dave, and to turn the floor over to you for a few comments. REMARKS BY DAVID BARRAM, DEPUTY SECRETARY U.S. DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE SECRETARY BARRAM: Thanks very much, Ed. I wanted to meet with you for two reasons. One, I want to express to you my strong sense of how extraordinarily important I've always felt this council was to the success of this very interesting public/private partnership. I want to say something very briefly about that, and then I want to give you my perspective on education, because I know it's something that you're taking on. I understand that you worked through the framework discussion the Secretary's responses this morning, so I won't talk about that. I don't need to. You're doing good work on that and it's very important that he get his points across and that you work back through it. But why I think this council is so important is that you've got a great opportunity here to provide thoughtful, insightful perspective, for a couple of reasons. One, we are working on this very hard in the government and we need this perspective to help enhance this vision that people have. But, second, I think it's real important that we in the government get all the help we can to make sure that we don't do anything more than we should do, and you can help make sure that happens, too. I also think you need to take the chance that you have being appointed to this council to talk in a tough, insightful, well-heard voice and to make sure that the comments that you make, the advice that you give to the Secretary, are clear and straight. This is an outstanding cabinet member, Secretary Brown, and he has an open mind and unequal skill at advocacy, and great access. I probably don't need to tell you all that, but I want to make sure that you hear it from me, like I think you will from others, how important this committee is. On the subject of education, this is a subject where you have a great opportunity, and one that I think you want to take, but a lot of other people have felt this too, and have taken on this opportunity. So far, as I have read the first draft of your principles--and I wasn't able to be here yesterday or to hear what happened this morning, so maybe there's much more there that you've worked on, and I'm looking forward to that, and the November 20th weekend, and what comes out of that--I'm very impressed with the insight and knowledge that those principles show. But I want to challenge you to a new level, maybe one that's even past your interest. Let me express what that is. Education is a really big part of America, just like health care is. If we think back to what happened on health care, how difficult it has been to develop a consensus on health care, it makes it even scarier to think about education reform and it sort of suggests why it has been moving so glacierly over the years. Everybody uses health care, but a lot of people don't have kids in school anymore, they forget they went to school, I think. But there is a very different public consensus around education. It has always frustrated me that we have moved so slowly, because I think the answers were more readily available. It isn't about education, or it isn't about technology. As you well noted, it's about learning. We have a goal, I think, in this society to be able to be governed, to govern, to work, to manage, to live rich and full lives, to enhance the way we live as members of the various communities that we're a part of. In this country we think we know things, and then we test ourselves and find that we don't like we thought we did. That's true of kids in school, it's also true of adults, I think. There was a devastating poll recently by Times Mirror that talked about how little Americans really understand about what their government does. One of the findings which I am sure just drove the people inside the Beltway crazy was that the American people, 40 percent, four to 10, think the Republicans have a majority in Congress. So, we have a really big task ahead. If the question was asked, do they control Congress, then you could understand, but I don't think that was the question. I am tempted to leave aside the society issues like hungry kids, too much TV, too much MTV, not enough good parenting, drugs, and so forth. I have a feeling that those issues will be helped when we use technology and learning in a really significant way. I think I believe that one of the reasons kids, particularly, are disaffected is because there's a general feeling that's what's out there to use, the tools, the technology to use, are just not being used. They don't get to participate in it. So, the things that they know that they can learn best with, we don't let them do. We know a lot about learning and we even know a lot about using technology for learning, but do we continue to reinvent, or we continue to restate the same issues again, maybe sometimes with a little bit of incremental, clever distinction. But sometimes I think educators don't really want to solve the problem. Sometimes I think it's good enough to restate the issue another way. You've done a good job, I think, in the principles in suggesting what the major issues are, training. I always looked at this as really staff development as the connection between teaching schools and teachers, between library schools and libraries. I've always thought there's a big disconnect there that just doesn't need to be, the structure of schools. But I think there's another big question and it has two parts. It is this: how do you in this committee, and particularly the people on the Mega- Project with education, operate from data and not just opinion? One of the great lessons of the last few years in industry in the quality movement is that you have to make decisions based on data or they're not the kind of decisions that are the right ones. You can't revisit them properly. It's an absolute fundamental that you would get data, truth, reality, all those kinds of good things as a basis. And the second part of this big question, I think, is how do you here stand for the knowledge of the subject? Sort of, what right do you have, what right does anybody have, to talk about this subject without being intimately involved in how this will all play out, how this will work technically? For example, I would be interested to know how many people have ever played Sim City. (A showing of hands.) SECRETARY BARRAM: Very good. Very good. Four nerds, I think we have. (Laughter) SECRETARY BARRAM: It's an interesting thing, because Sim City is a simulation game. And when you do well in Sim City it's because the grades you get as the mayor reflects having accomplished a whole lot of different things that you could only get by putting a lot of synergy together, articulating back, and so forth. People in our group of society probably don't want a lot of MTV, but that's the way a whole generation is growing up, thinking it's the main way to communicate. Do we use technology as a working tool? I don't know. I'm not sure that -- just like I don't think, when we're trying to operate businesses, we can make it if we don't understand the product on the market. I think that to understand technology and education, people have to use technology a lot. And I don't think you have to do that necessarily, but you have to be clever about how you stand for the idea of doing that. I'll talk about that in a second. That brings me to the next issue, which is that, as I said earlier, we know a lot about learning, we know a lot about technology and learning. There are some people working on it, and have been working on it, and they're very good. Most committees would not -- I think it would be most valuable to select out those really good groups and people, but I don't think that's very easy to see as politically correct. So, if you can do that, I think you'll make a huge contribution because you'll make things happen faster. Your tendency is going to be to ask to get the same old suspects, drag them out, and do it constituent-based versus knowledge-based study, school- oriented versus business learning. You know, AT&T today won its third Baldridge award, which suggests that they probably have a pretty high-quality company. They're doing a lot of business learning using technology. They ought to be central, I think, to your work, the way you bring together people to talk about learning because they've got money and they've got technology, and they're going to make these things work. All of us, I'm am sure, in this room spend all day teaching and learning. Not many of us are making things. So, our lives are all about teaching and learning. In regular classroom education and technology, I think I know of three, sort of -- I'll call them groups who have done it or are doing it. I think I would start with them and then, if I didn't get enough out of that information, if you don't, out of that group, then I think you could add to it. But I think you ought to start with the people that we know are doing it well. For example, on the company-based stuff, ACOT, the Apple Classroom of Tomorrow, and TCI Learning Center in Colorado Springs, have first-class understanding, longitudinal studies on what actually happens to kids, teachers, staff, and parents in the classroom when you use technology extensively, which is what you really want to do. If you look at states and districts, the NCEE has an alliance restructuring education that's been in existence for about four years. And it has -- I don't remember now, but at least 10-12 states, and cities, and districts that are working together fundamentally on the issue of how you restructure around high technology. And then the NGA itself has worked on this for seven or eight years, and has a good handle, I think, anyway--and some of you may know better--on the politics of technology and education, buying textbooks or not buying textbooks, buying technology instead. So, there's an awful lot of things happening over there that I think we need to draw from, and there are some great examples. We visited a Ralph Bunch school, and I'm always excited when I do that. But I know that there are two or three other schools that I've been to that are much richer and fuller in terms of the technology that they use and how they do things. You need to get those people into the mix as well. I visited Vanderbilt a few years ago and saw tremendous classroom use of technology for a college- aged classroom, but it was -- and I won't describe it here, but it was very exciting. It was the kind of stuff that you say, being a technology company, I thought, boy, that's really using it. I don't know where that is, but it would be certainly important to find that out. On the medical side, the use of technology for medical is really learning and it is being used. The NII test bed, which is a private group of companies, is doing some real serious work on that. There's stuff happening in Oklahoma, and in other states, North Carolina. So, if you remember that learning is the goal, there are a lot of things that we can draw together, and I would really like to see you do that. I will close in a second. What I would like to see you do is outline a really big dream and also express some specific outcomes that you'd like to see. On the big dream, I'd like to see you really step way out. This is a powerful group and I'd like to see you use the force of the group to nail the big issue of how the NII can really change the paradigm. How can the NII be a powerful factor in all the aspects of learning, the network, the software, the organization, the parents, the teachers, universities, corporate trainers, all of this, all in the service of kids and teachers learning well enough to compete in the world? It's a very big issue, but all the other people who worked on it could never quite take it to that level. And then I think it would be valuable if you can be specific or be a cover committee for others, so to speak, to use to be specific. You can be a constituent-based group. This is a very diverse group that gives voice to knowledge-based ideas and problems. But I don't think that, as you gather information, you should try to be constituent-based, I think you should try to just get it from the best place that it is. And then lay out some interesting metrics that show the way, that, if achieved, would pull in this greatness and accomplishment. So, that is what I think about that. I wanted to make sure that I got that across to you. I think this is an incredible opportunity and it may be more than you want to do, and I can understand that. But, if you're interested in it, I think it may be the one time in 1994-95 when you can make a huge difference in moving this discussion to a whole new level. I thank you also, and I'm sure I speak for Secretary Brown in thanking you for taking all the time that you take on this. You're highly productive, esteemed people in the community and we're very delighted that you're doing this. I don't want to sound critical, because I'm not. I'm really suggesting something that goes beyond what I think maybe you've even signed up for. But, thank you again. The country is going to benefit from this. If the previous discussion is any indication, I suspect you'll take on this in a pretty exciting way. Thank you. (Applause) CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: David says he has time for a couple of questions from the council. MS. BRACEY: My question is, are we just going to talk about it or will we do something that will provide some models? Maybe test beds are already there, but some way of communicating what's out there that people can have on a video, on a disk, or in a teacher institute that can be replicated geographically, because the thing that happens in education -- you're right, there are these great things out there, but who knows about them? The people who wrote them. So, it seems to me that one of the things we would do after talking about what's great, is to do some implementation on a national basis. I don't know who would fund that. But, if we have one of those kinds of things, is that an idea you have in mind? SECRETARY BARRAM: Yes. Let me respond on two levels. One of my observations over the years is that schools do not talk to each other. VOICE: That's right. SECRETARY BARRAM: They do not educate each other. It's really bizarre. And I suppose I could say what the reasons were, and I have sort of an idea, but it's not acceptable. So, yes, we've got to communicate that. We actually are doing some things in the Federal Government lately to bring together some money that might be in different agencies to do some big-time work on this. I won't say any more than that, because it's very nascent. But what I envision for this committee, for you, is something that I've not seen done for, maybe ever, and that is to be willing to describe what has to happen in very powerful ways rather than asking the question another six ways. And, if you begin to do that, then I think everybody would have to get in line behind you, like this activity that I was talking about in the government. I have probably told five people in my year in Washington about Apple Classroom of Tomorrow, Hornet's Nest school in Charlotte, Steven's Creek school in Cupertino, TCI in Colorado Springs, and nobody, out of the people I have talked to, has yet gone to visit those schools, which leaves me as the only one who has, and that's not enough. I don't get it yet. I just don't understand it. But I think, if you see yourself as not a committee of educators looking at this, but a different kind of committee in the special position you have to describe something and say, this is where we should go, I think you have a different voice than any other committee I've seen. MS. BRACEY: Thank you. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Thank you, Dave. Thank you for the challenge. It's on the agenda. Thanks for the encouragement to take a bigger look. Del, did you have something? CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Well, no. I'm just sorry I wasn't here when you first started. But, welcome. SECRETARY BARRAM: Thank you. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: We're pleased to be with you, as usual, and we appreciate the challenge. I think this group is already taking many of the things you've said to heart. I was saying to someone at the break, what I have been most impressed with about this group is that somehow we work out a way to step forward and to develop a consensus to move forward. And, even though we come from varying perspectives, this group is coming together, I think, in a very unique way. I do believe we've got a special obligation. I gave a little talk this morning about that obligation. It's a great one of leadership, and that's what you're talking about. So, we accept that. SECRETARY BARRAM: Great. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Thank you. (Applause) CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I have a couple of announcements, and then I'll turn it over to Del to facilitate the public hearing. We're going to obviously skip the critical issues discussion today. I think we've had enough. (Laughter) CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: But one of the critical issues, I would like to have you think about, and that is, we've been talking for some time about the global information infrastructure and what the role of this team is on that. What Del and I would like is, for those of you that are interested in working specifically on the Global Information Infrastructure, get your names in to Del or I, or staff, and we'll probably put together some small group to take a harder look at the Global Information Infrastructure and its issues. And, if you're interested in working on that amongst all the other things you're doing, then please get your names in to us. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Yes. I was on the phone trying to make some calls and I missed the first part of that discussion. You may have covered this. This question came up on the global piece at our press conference--I don't know if Ed mentioned it--and we both said that we would possibly talk about it this afternoon if we had time. But I just want to share with you that I think there may be a natural connection between what we're doing and obviously what's happening around the world, and that, again, it's a leadership question. We can't do everything. But there may be some natural nexus here that we might be able to offer some help to the Administration as we plod through this and look at what's happening globally. So, I would encourage you to get -- those of you who are interested, let us know, because I think that we might be able to put something together. And, if we can, we might have some impact on the February meeting. MS. BRACEY: I have a question, and I would like to ask this of the whole committee. I'm not an educator with my hat in my hand. But when the lotteries came out, what they said to us was, the lotteries will change education. And I'm sitting in a state now where the PUCs allocated $40 million for educational technology, and I don't understand PUCs well enough to understand why it is that the taxpayers want this money back. We all talk about our constituencies. I believe you're right, we all do have constituencies. But one of the things that happens to us in education is we don't have the funding and the staff. So, I would like someone who is a PUC person or someone with a background to help me understand what it is I don't understand about why the taxpayers want this money back, and why, if it was given to education -- since California is the state -- it's the 50th level in computer use, and the 42nd in allocation of computers per person, why this is a big issue or concern. VOICE: We'd have to have -- I'll tell her later. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: All right. We'll cover it later, she said -- MS. BRACEY: Thank you. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: -- and see if we can give you some help. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: I have a second announcement. I just wanted to make clear when the next meetings were. The December meeting is December 6th in Washington, D.C. The next meeting after that is January 26th in Raleigh, North Carolina, and then March 10th in Los Angeles, and April 12th in New Mexico. Beyond that, we've approved dates for June 14th, August 9th, October 11, and December 13. We don't have places for those finalized as yet. Any questions about the schedule? VOICE: What about the 26th? What is that, a Monday -- it's not a weekend? CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: No. VOICE: No. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Are you suggesting weekends? VOICE: No, I'm suggesting that Super Bowl is close to that time. (Laughter) VOICE: -- the days are? CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Excuse me? VOICE: Did he ask what the days are? CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Yes. VOICE: I'm sorry. Oh. December is a Tuesday, January is a Thursday, March is a Friday. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Back to you, Del, for public comments. PUBLIC COMMENTS CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Yes. We only have two. We will limit the two to five minutes because we're at the tail end of our agenda. We do welcome public comments. The persons signed up -- the first, was Robert Cosma, of, I think, SRI, International. MR. COSMA: I have a written statement -- CO-CHAIR LEWIS: That's good. Thank you. VOICE: The mike's not on. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Not good. CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Could we have the mike turned on in the audience area? Perhaps you might want to try the other one. MR. COSMA: How are we here? CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: Good. MR. COSMA: Okay. Great. My name is Bob Cosma. I'm at the Center for Technology and Learning at SRI, International. I'm pleased to be able to comment after the Deputy Secretary's comments because we agree with many of them, and that there is a need for the big dream related to education and technology. The statement that I have here is titled, "Use of the NII to Build Communities of Understanding." The prospect before us is that the convergence of computer, telephone, and television technologies will dramatically change our education system. But, if the prospect of change is to be promise of improvement, the development of the NII must be considered within a larger context of collateral, social, and pedagogical policies and practices that affect education. In recent years, we have experienced dramatic social and economic changes. Yet, as society has become more complex, diverse, and demanding, schools have continued to teach in ways that were relevant to a simpler time, a more homogeneous world, and a slower rate of knowledge growth. Consequently, schools have become detached from the real needs of communities and students have been unprepared to meet the demands of the real world. Dramatic improvements in our educational system require fundamental changes in the relationships between schools, homes, and work places. Today, each of these entities operates separately, connected by geography and circumstances, but infrequently by intent. We must reconnect what goes on in schools with what goes on in homes and the workplace. Digital technologies are capable of interweaving schools, homes, and work places, and reintegrating education into the fabric of the community. To make this happen, two questions must be asked when policies are considered for connecting schools to the National Information Infrastructure. The first, to what will schools be connected; the second, once they are connected, what will schools find there? The Center for Technology and Learning, which I direct, contends that it is necessary but not sufficient to connect one school to another or to connect both schools to a scientist or a library, even if it is the Library of Congress. Connections between schools and homes will allow students to extend their academic day, allow teachers to draw on significant experiences from students' everyday lives, and allow parents to become more involved in the education of their children and to have extended educational opportunities of their own. Connections between school and work will allow students to learn in the context of real-life problems, allow teachers to draw on the resources of community experts, and allow employers to contribute to and benefit from the fruits of an effective educational system. We suggest that the Advisory Council make education a central focus of the NII and facilitate connections between schools, home, and work to create communities of understanding. To make these connections pay off, the NII must be filled with effective and engaging materials and tools that challenge students and motivate learning. When users access the NII, they must find rich, multi-media resources in mathematics, science, and humanities, along with tools that allow them to communicate with others, consider ideas from multiple perspectives, express their ideas in multiple ways, and build and explore models and simulations. Federal agencies, such as the Departments of Education, Health & Welfare, Labor, and Commerce, and the National Science Foundation should create coordinated programs and policies that encourage collaboration between public and private sectors and foster the development of tools, materials, services, and resources that make the NII pay off for education. Finally, it is vitally important that differences in socioeconomic status not result in an electronic form of segregation between the technological haves and have nots. Policies will be needed to assure acceptable -- CO-CHAIR LEWIS: -- San Franciso. MS. BUTILLEA: Good afternoon, committee members. Thank you for the opportunity to speak. My name is Sibyl Butillea and I'm a member of the Telecommunications Policy Committee for the City of San Francisco. I'm also involved with various city networking programs through the public library. We're bringing the libraries online and also developing interconnectivity and data bases for 11 city agencies which we just got some NTIA funding for. Speaking as a member of the Telecommunications Policy Committee, I'd just like to say that I believe that this council does have a duty to enter an opinion on behalf of citizens on the upcoming legislation on the side of the public interest. Cities are very concerned about the protection of local voice, and also local control over public rights of way and the use of those by various telecommunications providers. In fact, the City of San Francisco recently passed a resolution supporting the right of the cities to negotiate franchises with all telecommunications providers, and have asked their national legislators to see that this kind of a requirement is written into legislation that is currently being considered, or will be considered again in the next Congress. There are a couple of very important issues here. One, is the economic interest, and the other, is the interest of the public good. Our city, San Francisco, stands to lose over $3 million annually in franchise fees if we lose the franchise authority over the private use of public rights of way for video services. With the upcoming video dial-tone interests of the telephone companies, we believe that the cable operators will make an argument that this would be unfair competition and the cities will lose the right to maintain the franchises that they currently have, or that they will have in the future, with these operators. I'd like to point out that taxpayers' money was used to develop the infrastructure which is used to provide some of these services. In fact, the Internet itself, which is the backbone to the NII which we're all talking about, was developed with public monies. I think that that is an important point. We do not want the public to lose out in any way as private services are developed on this public resource. Also, we have to realize that local governments are spending large amounts of money to develop online services, such as these data bases and local services, which will really start attracting large numbers of people to going online. Also, cities are providing online access through the libraries, the schools, and other institutions, and providing training. For example, in San Francisco we're going to have free training in all the libraries for online services. These are all ways that public monies are being used to develop a marketplace, really, for the kinds of services that the private companies will be offering. So, I think it's important to recognize the need of the local governments to continue to have franchising authority over some of these private providers. My second point, is that in the recent House version of the telecommunications legislation, which you are all familiar with, I am sure -- originally, in the House version, 20 percent of band width was set aside for public access. By the time the Hollings bill reached the Senate floor, that amount was reduced to five percent, and state, tribal, and city governments were specifically excluded from being able to participate in that access. Currently, there are over 3,000 public, educational, and government access cable channels which are providing more than 20,000 hours of locally- developed programming for their local communities. Most of this is provided and developed by more than a million volunteers, providing an important community service. Now, we think it's important that this local voice continue to have access to all types of telecommunications services that are being developed now and are being included in what we're calling the National Information Infrastructure. The right to access has been protected in the past. I mean, the 1934 bill provided certain access, and, of course, 1984 legislation provided the specific PEG access provisions. So, now, as we advise our government, both on the local and the national level, regarding these developing telecommunications policies, I think that it's important that we ensure that these local voices continue to have access to all the services that are being developed. I think it's important that the public resources are not being turned over only to private use and that the broadest possible public voice be protected and enabled. Our concern is that, if it isn't written in, it's going to be written off. Thank you very much. CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Thank you. Any questions? (No response) CO-CHAIR LEWIS: Thank you very much. This comes to the end of our day, a very, very productive day. I just have a couple of comments, and I know that Ed would want to close out. That's just to say thank you, first of all, for, I think, very productive discussions. We got into some issues that I think were important for us. We will probably get into many more as time goes on. And, as I said before, I've always been impressed that this group has the greater good in mind as we go through this, and we usually come out with the right kinds of decisions. So, I want to thank you for the interaction and the dialogue. We didn't hit the critical issues, but we hit some of them, intellectual property, certainly, and others. We will cover those, I am sure, on the next agenda, so we will give you plenty of lead time to get to those. I want to say thanks to Ed McCracken and his group. I know that Ed will have some specific thank- yous, but it's great to be here. I missed the dinner last night, but I know it was done well, and the whole two days has been terrific. It's a lot of hard work and we really appreciate it. So, let's give the group a round of applause for a job well done. (Applause) CO-CHAIR LEWIS: We will look forward to seeing you in D.C. in December. Ed? CO-CHAIR McCRACKEN: It's been a real pleasure to host you all in Silicon Valley. Thanks to the City of Mountain View for lending us this facility. Thanks to all the people that helped out. Again, it's been a pleasure. I guess the only other thing I'd like to say is, the staffs have a meeting at the Windham Hotel at 5:00. Again, thanks for all the hard work. It is getting fun. (Whereupon, the meeting was concluded.) C E R T I F I C A T E This is to certify that the foregoing proceedings of a meeting of the United States Advisory Council on The National Information Infrastructure, held on October 19, 1994, were transcribed as herein appears, and this is the original of transcript thereof. Susan A. Gilmour, Transcriber MOFFITT REPORTING ASSOCIATES, INC.