This article was originally submitted to The Flint Journal. Portions
of this article appeared in The Flint Journal in the Viewpoint section on
May 22, 1994.
Plugging in Flint
By Mike Mosher
Imagine a child, sitting at a computer, in a classroom, in the school
down the street from your house. Imagine that child sending an electronic
mail message to a biologist researching whales off the Atlantic coast. The
biologist sends a reply back to the student which includes a computerized
sound file of a whale's haunting call.
Imagine sitting at your home computer and submitting an inquiry to the reference
librarian at the local public library. The response to your query arrives
later on your computer.
Imagine families, having the ability to search local databases for affordable
housing, career training, and low cost health services, and successfully
retrieving that information.
Imagine being able to interact more effectively with your city, county,
and state government officials, empowered with the ability to discuss issues
of public interest in electronic community forums.
This all sounds like the future, where an Information Superhighway has connected
the resources together for our use. Well the future is HERE. All of these
applications could be made available to the public, to you, today. The mechanism
would be a public access, community information service; a free network;
a Free-Net. A Free-Net is not high-tech, it's NOW tech.
Today, millions of people communicate daily on the Internet, the global
computer network of networks. Best estimates suggest that 30 million people
have some kind of access to the Internet. Thousands of individuals rely
on the Internet as a tool crucial to their work and lives. For example,
environmentalists and human rights activists whose work, by its very nature,
circles
the globe, have been successfully exchanging information electronically
among pockets of supporters throughout the world for many years.
The Internet is a vast and valuable resource for education. The Internet
is being used extensively in classrooms to bring information, experience,
and knowledge on nearly every subject imaginable to the screen of the student's
computer. This access to information resources needs to be available to
all our students.
Some information available through the Internet does demand special attention.
The Internet is an open and uncensored environment. This openness has created
a breeding ground for free expression and thought. As a result, in several
areas, some very explicit and candid discussions ensue, from political arguments,
to religious opinions, to explicit stories with indecent themes. Schools
may decide to avoid access to these areas of the Internet, and parents should
be advised to supervise Internet access by students with computers in the
home.
In Genesee County, many individuals already have access to the Internet
and computerized information resources. All the colleges and universities
in Flint have connected their campus computer networks to the state-wide
educational network, MichNet. MichNet is the Michigan piece of the Internet.
Any student, faculty or staff member in a university can acquire the computer
access to local, regional, and world-wide resources. Large corporations,
like GM and EDS, can afford, and do support, network access for their engineers,
managers, and researchers.
The people involved in developing the Genesee Free-Net believe that every
individual in the community deserves this kind of access. The Free-Net will
allow the university model to be replicated for schools at every grade level,
for all the libraries in our community, government agencies, businesses,
and to all persons with a personal computer in their home.
The movement to create public access community networks for use by the citizenry
is nation-wide. The content and services offered by these civic networks
are as varied as the communities they serve. Locally, a Free-Net offers
a common electronic bulletin board for access to local libraries, community
services, and the opportunity to discuss topics of interest with expert
volunteers. Regionally and globally, a Free-Net can allow an individual
access to thousands of world-wide services through the Internet.
The Genesee Free-Net plans to offer citizens across the Greater Flint Area
a wide variety of services, databases, and dialogue forums on topics pertinent
to their interests and needs. Teachers, students, and parents will be able
to access the service from anywhere in the State of Michigan (through MichNet),
participate in educational discussion groups, consult library and reference
services, and send electronic mail (email) around the world.
Organizers of the Genesee Free-Net believe that computer literacy should
be a foundation of everyone's education structure and that this skill will
be more critical tomorrow. We want to see Free- Nets providing the infrastructure
and the opportunities for students of all ages to learn computing, networking,
and research abilities that will be part of crucial job/life skills in this
technology driven world we live in. At-risk youth in our community have
the most to gain from a civic computer network; we can envision our Free-
Net volunteers training youth to refurbish and install computers, in our
communities, putting their neighborhoods on-line.
The equipment and operations involved are real simple. Say you have a computer
and a modem hooked to your telephone line. (A modem is the device that allows
the computer to use the phone line.) You dial a local telephone number that
connects to the Free- Net computer. From there, simple instructions and
"menus" take you to the information or area you seek. Many Free-Nets
are set up on a Town Model. They have areas designated as "post office"
or "city hall" and so on. To send a message to a friend, you would
simply go to the post office, write your message, and "mail" it.
The flavor and richness of the community networks will be determined by
our communities. The organizers of Free-Nets require input from you, the
community, to determine its philosophy, direction, and priorities. Free-Nets
require volunteer participation from the public to fulfill its mission to
be a true, public access, information service.
You can help by contributing your time and expertise to the success of this
community resource. Please consider supporting a Free-Net with a contribution
financially, or with your vocational skills.
The applications and services which can be installed on a Free-Net are only
limited by our imagination: electronic encyclopedias; electronic town halls
to promote participation in government and proactive democracy; electronic
mail service for any resident. Access to the Internet, and calendars of
educational, neighborhood, and cultural events are just a few examples of
the role of a Free-Net.
The Genesee Free-Net organization believes that this resource has the potential
to create a positive impact on education, empowerment for our community,
Click Here to become a member of the Genesee FreeNet
