PANEL ON NII AND GII - GOVERNMENT
AND INDUSTRY'S ROLES
PRIVATE INDUSTRY CONCERNS IN THE
GLOBAL INFORMATION INFRASTRUCTURE

Daniel C. Duncan

Senior Advisor, Global & Industry Affairs
Information Industry Association
Washington, D.C. 20001, USA

It seems that nearly everywhere you look, someone is discussing, analyzing, or envisioning the information superhighway. And it is no wonder. Within a few short years, information infrastructure and the Internet have become terms familiar to nearly every American, more importantly to citizens in every part of the world. If nothing else happens in the progress already made toward developing a ubiquitous, high-speed digital pipeline, the world's attention has turned to information and its potential for facilitating change.

These have been welcome developments for the Information Industry Association (IIA) and its member companies. For over 25 years, IIA members have strived to bring valuable information content to the marketplace so that government, business, and citizens have the tools necessary to make well-reasoned decisions about their societies and themselves. The products and services provided by IIA member companies cover every facet of what has come to be known as the emerging global information infrastructure (GII). Whether in creating, enhancing, or distributing content, the private information industry represented by the IIA -- by meeting the demands of customers -- has laid the groundwork for tomorrow's information marketplace.

Yet, as we approach an era in which prophets see every telephone, computer, television, pager, or any number of still unimagined technical devices as the key to a treasure trove of multimedia, those who provide content have developed serious concerns. There is not enough space to elaborate on all these in detail, but I briefly outline some of the issues that content providers are spending a good deal of time and energy trying to bring to the forefront of discussions concerning the GII.

Perhaps the chief problem facing information providers in today's age of tech-nological wizardry is that although nearly everyone is fascinated by the construc-tion of the hardware and wires that will carry information, very little thought seems to have been given to the importance of the content that users of the GII are awaiting. Providers are well aware that if the data needed to inform, learn, and entertain are not there, all the technology in the world will not bring value to the GII.

Of course, recognition of the value of information is growing daily. Govern-ments around the world would not be spending enormous amounts of effort and money on an infrastructure that will end up supporting nothing. Businesses in every sector of the world economy would not be investing billions of dollars in equipment to obtain even faster and better information to help gain the strategic advantages that are crucial to surviving in today's global marketplace.

Yet, curiously, the very architects and visionaries who devote so much time to creating the GII -- because of the value of information -- are ignoring realities that must be considered when dealing with the content that first prompted development of these plans. The exciting and promising prospects of a global information infrastructure will never be realized without adequate attention paid to the special nature of information -- whether to the importance of maintaining its accuracy, timeliness, and variety or to the consequences of restricting or misusing it.

That, then, is the first message that I wish to convey from content providers. The importance of constructing a worldwide information superhighway cannot and should not be diminished. However, none of us -- whether government offi-cial, information provider, or information user -- can expect to encounter many travelers along the digital road unless we work together now to make certain the information that appears there continues to improve in quality and variety. I can assure you that IIA and its members are committed to keeping the focus on infor-mation content. I know that many in the user community share our concern that issues relating to this subject also remain at the forefront of GII discussions. It is up to both of these groups to assure that government maintains a similar com-mitment.

It is in relation to government that I now outline some of the remaining con-cerns that information providers have expressed. The importance of government actions is particularly crucial to consider in the context of a GII. The amount of planning, investment, and coordination that is required to put in place even the rudimentary underpinnings of a global information infrastructure as currently envisioned cannot be accomplished without government. There is no quarter of the world in which government has not already become involved to some extent in planning or building the GII, and I believe that the likelihood of increased government activity is inevitable. Therefore, it is important to consider what policies government should adopt to assure the widest availability possible of a variety of accurate and reliable information resources.

First, we must all acknowledge that information is a commodity that is go-verned by marketplace economics. In this instance, however, the market can be subject to one enormous participant -- government itself. It is the largest origi-nator of information products and services in nearly every society. In many countries, government is also increasingly one of the largest consumers of infor-mation. Therefore, government should be always aware of its power to affect the marketplace for information that now exists and that is sure to grow in a global information infrastructure. Government should not favor one provider, product, or service over any other, nor should it impose conditions on any sector of the information economy that could hamper the competition. Marketplace competi-tion has long proven to be the greatest spur to innovation and development, and, as a general and primary policy, government should not lose sight of its duties in assuring that the free market works.

In addition to this overarching role for government, IIA has been working since 1987 with other counterpart information industry associations to discuss other, more specific policy recommendations of concern to information providers worldwide. These groups have formed the Global Alliance of Information Indus-try Associations (GAIIA) (see Appendix 5), which in turn has developed a set of 15 principles that address nearly every aspect of information policy in relation to the GII. Many of these proposals have already been endorsed and enacted in a number of countries around the world. The experiences of our industry members indicate that, where adopted, the principles provider users with many benefits. They enhance the flow of information, result in a wider variety of products and services with greater value, and maintain confidence in the accuracy and reliability of the content being disseminated.

The first set of GAIIA Principles deals with the issue of copyright law. Copyright law is and should remain the primary means of protecting intellectual property, including information content. Much progress has already been made on harmonizing these laws across the globe, and there will be continued debate about many of the details of which particular country's or region's provisions may require review and reconsideration. However, the crucial point that informtion providers emphasize is that in nations in which there exist clear and strong protections -- and enforcement of those protections -- for creative works, there also exists a great variety of high quality products and services. Maintaining these copyright standards, and assuring equal treatment for all in enforcing them, cannot help but greatly enhance the availability of information beyond individual national borders into the GII.

The next set of principles addresses the role of government in providing and facilitating the provision of information. As noted earlier, government is generally the largest originator of information within any individual nation. Neither IIA nor GAIIA advocates that government remove itself from the role of provider. However, as a provider, government should never seek to be the sole provider of information that relates to its activities. Some governments have imposed burdensome pricing structures that restrict access to government-generated information or have sought exclusive arrangements for the dissemina-tion of these products and services that effectively controls what it wants known about its activities. As recent history has dramatically proven, when a govern-ment seeks to restrict knowledge about its operations, society itself can only suffer, whether in terms of political freedom, economic livelihood, or the ability to make informed decisions.

The third set of GAIIA Principles addresses the involvement of government in developing information networks -- the backbone of a GII. The benefits of open competition in the provision of information have already been outlined. The same benefits can accrue if networks are also opened up to competition, and governments around the world should begin actively pursuing these policies.

Yet we all recognize that the infrastructure is much more than hardware and wires. An extremely important component are the standards that must be adopted to ease and harmonize usage of the information transmitted over the networks. In the area of standards, IIA and GAIIA strongly recommend against government-set standards. Government can best act to facilitate a discussion that includes itself, network providers, users, and content companies on the issue of standards. In this manner, it can play a crucial -- but not limiting -- role in encouraging the use of open interfaces.

A final, important role of government in facilitating the development of networks is the concept of universal service. Here I would like to make a clear distinction between a guarantee of providing information services universally, as opposed to providing access to those services. Some proponents of the GII would like to view the idea of universal service in the most expansive manner possible, that is, by assuring that all citizens anywhere in the world have at their fingertips all the information available. That notion, of course, is neither economically feasible nor likely to further development and innovation of content products and services. In regards to that guaranteeing access to the facilities of the infrastructure through government fiat, that is an issue which is at different stages of development or dismantling depending on the country in question. I would emphasize only that where government works to ensure true and open competition that creates a greater supply of facilities, it need spend less time assuring that demands do not go unmet.

The last general policy area addressed by the GAIIA Principles is privacy and data protection. Little detail is provided in the principles on this issue, reflecting the diversity of approaches to privacy among the different legal and business traditions around the world. Again, there will undoubtedly be a greater effort in years to come to harmonize these divergencies as the GII develops. However, IIA would suggest that a good beginning would be the continued strong support for the right to privacy. This, coupled with sincere efforts to assure that individuals are fully informed of information practices -- whether on the part of government or the private sector or other individual users of the network -- that could impact them, will greatly advance the adoption and maintenance of workable privacy protections worldwide.

From this, I hope that you will not lose sight of the importance of issues affecting the information providers as you research the effects of new information technology on the GII. The information industry has a long and well-regarded reputation for operating in a highly competitive economic sector, while successfully meeting demands for innovation, increased accuracy, and faster dissemination. They are always aware that their customers expect and deserve quality and reliability, for information providers recognize that the unique products and services they bring to the market can have far-reaching effects on society as a whole.

These companies' dedication to the business of information has laid the groundwork for the emerging global information infrastructure. To proceed with construction of the GII without due consideration to their role, and to the impor-tance and value of the content they produce, would jeopardize the hopes of many who have worked so hard to design a GII that can provide us all with opportuni-ties to explore -- and understand -- the world around us.

Q&A_______________
DISCUSSIONS
 

[Peter Young]

Thank you very much, Daniel. If that doesn't get everyone excited, I am not sure what will. You are on, Dave.

[David Penniman]

I would like to return to your statement on copyright law. It may not remain as a primary means of protecting intellectual property. Futurists take great delight in telling librarians that the book is dead, and we have to listen to that. Now we can say something similar. Just recently, John Perry Barrow published a paper in Wired that must have struck fear in the hearts of lawyers and the information industry. He said that copyright is dead; that copyright as a means of protecting intellectual properties simply would not exist in the future. He said that the only ways of protecting intellectual properties rested with technology and ethics. I put my bet on technology. I'd like to hear your response to what John said. John is a writer and the co-founder of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. He is also a lyricist for the Grateful Dead, which means he has some vested interest in intel-lectual property. He really is challenging us all, and is asking for a different way of looking at intellectual property.

[Daniel Duncan]

Well, I did not read his article, but from your summary of it, I would say from the information industry point of view, we certainly must realize that we are going to have to rely greatly on technology in order to protect the investment in intellectual property that has been made before we put out information on the network. But I am wondering if perhaps we rely on technology too much. Its essence is getting things done, the aim here is to make certain that people who take time and effort to produce quality products and have provided them also have protection from misuse, manipulation, and from a wholesale taking. If we cannot guarantee the accuracy of the information, nothing else of value can be there long [on the information highway]. The technology may or may not be in conflict with the principle of copyright law, but the important point is that you still have to have means to share those kinds of works which are protected some-how.

[Peter Young]

What's fascinating to me, however, is talking about ownership of intellectual policy, not in the national legal sense, but in the global sense, which is very in-teresting if you go into these discussions of a public library here in this country, servicing, for example, Alexandria, VA. With that public library's resources available on the net, you could serve Alexandria, Egypt just as easily as the resi-dents of this Old Town region in Alexandria, Virginia, USA. These are very serious questions. Especially for those who are sitting on a public library board trying to think of exactly how much investment we need to make to mount these resources. When the investment is going to serve some other interests, who are not paying tax dollars for the investment, it is a very curious arrangement. How many people did see that article in "Paper Wired on the Net"? I think that is a fascinating concept to me that this article generated public debate in a way per-haps some other old issues of copyright laws application to digital information resources have not.

[Unidentified]

I have heard Clifford Lynch at University of California at Berkeley recently speaking about how we are really facing Gopherbility, using the examples of students from halfway around the world using the catalog in UC. Library users have the rights to use the materials that were acquired by their libraries from publishers. Yet, how does the business community define its market in terms of the use of information?

[Daniel Duncan]

I think that information providers are very much concerned about that issue. They realize one of the things that the information industry has concentrated on is providing business information. That's what the core information industry is like now. It is certainly true that a large group within the industry provides educa-tional material and entertainment products. But, for the most part, the informa-ion industry has concentrated on business information; this includes hardware. What they are noticing is that there is a great increase in demand from the end-users, whether they are end-users in corporations, end-users sitting at home work-ing, or end-users who are sitting at home just seeking information for whatever purpose. I think that this is an area in which the information industry and the libraries should and could come together and try to determine how we can still help the libraries serve the customers they need to serve and remain a viable entity, without being bypassed by several end-users. One of the ways we could work together is to help to find means to supply information which can be trans-ferred to other users in an agreed format. Otherwise businesses may be compel-led to deal with only the end-users, as much of the business provider community is doing as they can. If demand comes to the business information supplier from the end-user, the provider more than likely will secure a contractual relationship with that end-user, before necessarily going into the library, which cannot attract and therefore cannot adequately supply information to the user. That's one possi-ble scenario.

[Richard Quandt]

Let me just say that in discussing government and industry, the one issue con-cerning information infrastructure that I don't think I quite know about is that how the various pieces of this would be priced. The reason I am asking this is because what I heard is that NSF is moving in the direction keeping the field clear for the person who has the ball. The one thing we know is that if some products have externalities or generate positive externalities, or behave to some extent like a public good, then whether there is competition or not, the market is unable to deliver the socially desired amount of the products. And it's an empi-rical question whether indeed the information infrastructure does behave like that something with those externalities, or it does behave like a public good. But I do believe that it is the case. Under this circumstance, I think it is very important for us to know how these things will be priced now and in the future. Not just in respect to intellectual property pieces, in which individuals would be covered by copyright protection, but the entire structure.

[Chris Casey]

I am interested in the point of government being public information provider to any society (we are seeing a great deal of this lately), and how governments use new technologies to deliver back to their citizens. The information is essentially there, but their tax dollars have to pay for it to begin with. And that share of information we were so used to having, congressional record or census data or budget data at our fingertips, is not so accessible for people in the public. How can electronic format make it much more useful? For example, if citizens want to get their hands on the hard copy of the budget and bought those books from a local GPO (Government Printing Office) book store, they end up with a stack of books about 3-feet high, and there is more of a process of finding information they need. Whereas the ASCII text available via Internet would be searchable, thus people could find needed information easily. I can see the role of govern-ment in providing information, such as Congressional Records, either free or close to free in basically plain ASCII form of information. While a commercial service provider might like to take the plain form, add value to it, with links to an individual number of information links to other information, so they still retain their market over the type of business customers who are likely to pay for that extra value and elementary schools may find the simple vanilla version sufficient.

[Daniel Duncan]

Within the information industry, there are many issues surrounding the infor-mation infrastructure. Some companies are more adamant in their information policies for their business. And certainly the SEC database and the patent data-base are probably two of the examples we could say that are very obvious cases in controversy. I think most companies would agree that the government has an obligation to supply a certain amount of information, which the taxpayers have paid for, and that is public information, and that is necessary for a democratic society to work. As I mentioned in my earlier remarks, a publisher is certainly not unaware of what this country is economically, politically, and socially. There is no reason why the government cannot provide a certain amount of information -- what you call "the plain vanilla form" -- in putting out congressional records. But private industry has been out there doing this for a long time. You mention-ed in your remarks earlier how difficult it was and how nice it would be to get a copy of congressional documents available on a database. There are numerous providers in the marketplace who have been doing this for years. And the way they have fashioned the product, the way they make money, is that they add value to the product. Some people will be satisfied with having the plain vanilla version of the Congressional Record. Others will want to have something which is much more enhanced, and that is where private industry comes in. So the main thing is that someone adds value to this government information. But, in my view, I think it is becoming more and more the prevalent view of the industry that we can all only benefit if government continues to produce as much infor-mation as possible, but not doing the same thing the private sector has already been doing, undercutting the private sector's pricing and basically limiting the diverse sources of that information. And this I believe is the crucial thing -- that we do not allow it to happen for the very reason that it risks having government be the only source of providing its own information. In this way, the government basically eliminates other sources of information about its activity, and we risk having censorship, which is no good to anybody.

[Robert Hayes]

Your response was superb! While I think that I totally agree with you, I've got two problems I would like to point out. One problem is a policy that was fol-lowed: sole sourcing for distribution. I like to have you comment on that. The second is a much more difficult problem: the basics for pricing government information and its distribution. My position is that the price should recover only the cost of distribution. It has been argued that the pricing of government information, even when produced under congressional mandate (such as Index Medicus from NLM), should include the cost not just of the distribution, but also of the creation from the source. We have in fact seen that in reality in pricing, I think, of current government publication, but I am not sure. Would you comment on these two aspects?

[Daniel Duncan]

The first question was the issue of sole sourcing, that is, of government con-tracting with a particular private sector publisher for the distribution of govern-ment information to the exclusion of others, and the copyright protection. Sole sourcing is something again I think you would have a difference of opinion be- tween the companies that receive the sources and the industry in general, which has long had a position on this -- not wanting to have an exclusive contract that precludes others gaining access to government information. In fact, earlier this year on those bases, we know that the governments of some Baltic Republics had difficulties in gaining resources, and they decided to go into a sole source con-tract, under which one information provider was to disseminate their laws. The effect of that would eventually be, in our opinion, that the government would have sole control over the price that must be paid in order for any citizen of that country or any citizen in another country who may want vital information before -- perhaps -- investing in those same countries. They have total control over saying that you will not serve certain people if you are not going to do that, that is, to no one's disadvantage.

When it comes to the pricing of government information, I am going to step back a little bit from my association role and give a personal opinion here. I believe that there are certain mandates, regulations, rules for certain government agencies that make part of their official function the gathering of information. I believe that is a legitimate role of an agency, if that is what the agency is design-ed to do.

You mentioned NLM, I will only comment regarding NLM, because I think one of the reasons that people are looking more harshly on NLM's prices is be-cause of the restricted nature of what NLM has tried to disseminate and that NLM itself is in fact prohibiting widespread availability of information in the marketplace because the way the database is restricted. I think that's why people are concentrating on NLM. However, there are increasing numbers of govern-ment activities for agencies. They have not traditionally seen the need to dis-seminate information; all of a sudden for budgetary reasons, they go into the creation of products and services, many of which to some extent exist in the private sector, for the sole purpose of getting revenue to fulfill other mandated functions of that agency. In that case, I believe that we should look from the start and ask how much money it will cost the taxpayers for the government to create this, and is it worth it to the taxpayers to add this function to create revenues.

[Woody Horton]

Just a short comment following this discussion. The price of information does not depend just on its cost, but is a composite of its cost and its perceived value. And whether or not we distribute or sell information on a full-cost recovery policy, or some other policy oasis, or just how we do it, must take into account the value of the information. And what is concerning me now and what is behind the market proposal I made earlier is that we have too many divergent and con-flicting views. We have a pretty good consensus (although even disagreement) in terms of the cost component, but we don't have such consensus on the value component side. And it is with that in mind, in part, that I was hoping that we could vocalize the institutional role more clearly. Perhaps somebody will speak on this matter from the Commission.

[Marjorie Hlava]

First, I have to preface by saying that Ching-chih made it very clear to me that I cannot speak from the information industry perspective, but I am permitted to speak on behalf of the American Society for Information Science. But, I have to say something. First of all, John Perry Barrow can give away all that stuff. He does not have to own copyright. He has already made his millions. Secondly, I am not talking about fair use. There is no such thing as fair use from a publi-sher's point of view. We talked a lot about government information at the pro-ducer level, but the government is a major information user as well, so we should talk about it on both sides -- producer as well as user. I think that since we are obviously focusing a lot on the U.S. effort, it is fair to point out that the govern-ment has about 34% of the gross national product, and not-for-profit organiza-tions are 32%. That means that the for-profit sector is really the minority group. So, we shouldn't lose track of that as we talk about how important it is to have competition in the market force and all that; we should not make fun of the for-profit-making people -- they are the only ones in the marketplace paying taxes. The other 66% of the market is tax free.

The last comment which I would like to make is that most of the U.S. infor-mation companies are in fact owned by non-U.S. corporations. If you look at the recent acquisition data, like the sale of Information Access Company, they were all acquired by non-U.S. corporations -- we don't own the information we depend on as a country.

[Peter Young]

Thank you very much. If you guys have panels like this, I think that Ching-chih Chen will have to increase by a factor of three at least for the time made available for that.

[Ching-chih Chen]

First of all, I think that we have had very wonderful and productive time this morning. Personally I have a lot of things which I would like to contribute, but I have tried hard to keep myself quiet. Marjorie, I am so delighted that you actually spoke up. In fact, you must have misunderstood me. You were asked to specifically deliver a paper with ASIS's view, but in discussions you are free to say anything you want. I just want to make that clarification!

I would like to ask all of you to thank Peter for doing such a wonderful job. Actually, after lunch he is going to leave us. This afternoon he is going to role play our Vice President Gore. Talking about that, in your package, we do have two statements from Vice President Gore on GII. They can be useful background information. Having this meeting in the Washington, D.C. area is to have the privilege to bring together leaders from different fields in different capacities. We realize that some of them will have to fulfill different roles; so, thank you, Peter, and let's give him a big hand of appreciation!