Monday, June 2, 2008

E-waste.

E-waste is an inevitable byproduct of technology and is currently a semi-hot topic for state and federal governments, making it an appropriate subject for this blog. What is e-waste? The term refers to any electronic device that is discarded, which includes computers, cell phones, cameras, TV's, microwaves, air conditioners, etc. The disposal of these items is particularly difficult due to the toxicity of the materials they're made of, such as lead or mercury, and even though some electronic gadgets are recyclable, systems for recycling them are sparse. In the material world in which we live, e-gadgets are a dime a dozen, and most people don't think twice about replacing their devices after only a few years, fitting nicely into manufacturers' planned obsolescence schemes. Furthermore, a trend has emerged where e-waste is shipped to developing countries for disposal, where environmental restrictions are less stringent.

How should governments handle this problem? The EU passed the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment Directive (WEEE Directive), which puts the manufactures of our e-gadgets in charge of disposing electronic devices free of charge to the gadget's owner. Here in the U.S., Best Buy is starting a pilot program this summer whereby customers can turn-in their used e-devices to be recycled by the company. Here is more on their pilot program.

Not much has happened on the federal level in the US pertaining to e-waste, leaving the problem largely up to state governments to solve. Some states have started banning e-waste from landfills, which is standard practice in Europe. Here in Washington, S.B. 6428 passed in 2006, which requires manufacturers of CPEs, (covered electronic products) to implement and finance a system for recycling and disposing their products. The new law also requires the manufacturer's brand to be clearly visible on the product. Manufactures of CPEs are also required to register with the Dept. of Ecology annually.

For more information about individual states' e-waste policies, check out the National Conference of State Legislature's article on the subject.

Tuesday, May 27, 2008

Web 2.0 & eGovernment

Web 2.0 technologies have been a common topic of discussion in our class this quarter. This term refers to interactive internet applications such as blogs, wikis, social bookmarking, etc. For more on the subject, read the Wikipedia article on Web 2.0.

The exciting possibilities Web 2.0 applications offer easily extend into the concepts of eGovernment and eDemocracy, with huge opportunities for increased citizen participation in policy making.

The Economist published an interesting (yet pessimistic) article this February on this topic. It raises a noteworthy point regarding technological advancement and eGovernment: even though opportunities for citizen participation in government are growing exponentially with Web 2.0 features, the potential may go largely unrealized due to lack of public interest in government, as well as fear on the part of politicians and government officials that technology is making government too transparent and accessible. They cite examples such as agency issue forums that garner public input, but end up never using it and sticking to "expert" opinion. Another example the article gives is that practically all elected officials now have public email addresses, which give the impression of accessibility and a desire for input, when in reality technology may have hindered citizens' access to their elected officials by allowing for computer-generated responses based on automatic word searches for keywords.

This Headshift blog post expresses a similar sentiment about the unfulfilled potential of eGovernment and eDemocracy. The author raises an interesting point that regardless of how accessible a governmental entity may seem, most people still recognize old power structures of these entities, which ultimately ignores public input. A fundamental change in the currently imbalanced power structure of government is required before the public will feel it worthwhile to engage in policymaking decisions.

I think this is a very important point that extends beyond the topic of egovernance to the underlying problems of apathy and disengagement within the American populace regarding government and politics. No matter how many technologies a governmental entity provides under the guise of "public outreach" or "public input," Americans living in the 21st century will remain cynical and out of touch with their governments until input is truly considered and the public has a clearly defined role in decision-making processes.

Thursday, May 22, 2008

The Rural Digital Divide

There's little argument about the enormous advantages one has with access to high speed internet. And the issue of the digital divide is one of the most widely discussed topics within the realm of IT.

In a previous blog, I discussed the issue of the generational digital divide, but a far greater problem (at least from a public policy perspective) is that of the rural digital divide. Millions around the world are disconnected from the Internet simply because they live in an area without high speed internet connections. In this blog, I will specifically discuss the rural digital divide in the US, as well as some proposed options for bridging it.

I grew up in rural West Virginia and attended high school in the late 90s. My family was definitely more tech-savy than most people who lived around us, but the entire time we lived in that area, the only internet connection option was dial-up. We used the Internet all the time, so we even had a separate phone line used exclusively for internet connection. However, back then that was a fairly common way to connect to the Internet, even in urban and suburban areas. Unfortunately, in 2008 if I were to move back to my hometown, I'd still be limited to a "high-speed" dial-up connection. The area is simply too remote and too rural to make it worthwhile for an ISP to offer broadband. And can we blame the ISP's? Or can we count on them (i.e. "the market") to eventually fix this problem? Or should government acknowledge the indisputable value and advantage high speed internet access provides and take measures to intervene?

I certainly wouldn't have been alone without such access. This May 23, 2008 PC World article cites a recent study by the California State Broadband Task Force that found 1.4 million California residents do not have access to broadband networks. A Penn State study released this month examines the positive effects broadband access could have on rural communities.

There are many debates within the issue of broadband policy. To start one the issue Bob Bocher discussed in his presentation about net neutrality: whether broadband internet access should be considered a public utility the same way electricity, water, and other basic services are now considered. As Mr. Bocher told us, in 2005 the FCC determined that this was not the case, and that the "common carrier" rule that applies to essential utility services is not applicable to broadband services. Despite this decision, the nature of broadband service is still highly contentious and is likely to continue to come up in future broadband policy debate.

So should government play a bigger role in broadband policy? And if so, what should that role be? In 2004, President Bush promised country-wide broadband access by 2007, which was no where close to being achieved. His approach includes tax breaks and deregulatory policies for broadband providers. Other ideas for government involvement include private-public partnerships like the Connected Nation program in Kentucky that helped to provide 95% of Kentucky residents with high speed access.

However, the broadband policy debate is still wrapped up in minor debates such as lack of competition of providers, and net neutrality issues. According to the linked PC World article above, universal broadband access has been an issue discussed by both Democratic Presidential candidates, indicating the debate will continue in the next presidency.

After considering the issue of broadband access, I find myself airing on the school of thought that says high speed internet access needs to be considered an essential public utility, and therefore access to it a basic right. In my opinion history has proven that leaving such major social problems up to the private sector to resolve is not the best course of action. Especially where a basic, cross-country service is concerned. I think major broadband policy reform is in order and modeling after state-regulated European approaches would be a good course of action.

Wednesday, May 21, 2008

eVoting via the Internet & thoughts on our group project

After completing a group project on designing a business model for Internet voting, I think devoting a blog post to discuss this issue and analyze our project is in order. As my group members pointed out, voting via the Internet should be considered at the core of eDemocracy & eGovernance concepts.

And the time to start is now. People already conduct daily transactions on-line (i.e banking, shopping, etc.), and many have come to expect certain governmental services, such as voting, be available on-line. In a 2007 survey conducted by YouGov, a British marketing firm, half of those surveyed said they'd be more likely to vote if they could do so on-line. This is especially true of people ages 18-34. (http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/04/27/evoting_poll/)

As Mark, Rick, Cornelia & I discussed in our presentation, the benefits of Internet voting extend much farther than increased voter turn-out. Internet voting has the capacity to drastically reduce election expenses and error. Internet voting systems are also more accessible to people with disabilities, the elderly, and non-English speaking voters by enhancing the layout and appearance of the ballot. Furthermore, many states (like Washington) are currently well-situated to start pilot Internet voting programs because state-wide voter databases are already in place and on-line registration is already an option.

Before embarking on this group research project, I was definitely an advocate of the concept of internet voting, but it turned out I was quite naive about the enormity of the debate. It seems the two major hurdles of internet voting are lack of secure technology and lack of public trust. Without much understanding of network security issues, I found the debate on internet voting confusing and intimidating; however, in a nutshell, I think the main concerns are: verifying voter ID's and ensuring secure election results.

Countries that use internet voting (and they're few and far between), like Estonia, already have national identification card systems in place, which makes verifying voter ID much easier. For example the Estonian ID card has an electronic chip that works with the public key infrastructure, so that voting can be secure at any remote internet location. Here is the Wikipedia article about Estonia's internet voting system. Of course, the requirement of a national ID card is highly controversial for other reasons, making this solution less of a possibility...at least in the U.S.

It was concerns like these cited above that led my group to a modified internet voting proposal. We suggested the Office of the Secretary of State could team up with a private vendor like SafeVote.org to offer the service of internet voting to interested county auditors, who could use the systems for local elections. Our idea was that this would "get the ball rolling" with internet voting while keeping the risks relatively low by only using it in local elections. I really liked this idea, and I hope public-private collaborations in internet voting like that will continue to occur over the next few years.

Additonally, I wanted to mention that I found the business case model to be a great tool to investigate such a proposal, and was useful in mantaining a narrowly-focused scope in our project.

Saturday, May 17, 2008

Think Global, Act Local : Community Networking Websites

Through class discussions and both class groups' business case models, the topic of web-based community networking forums has emerged multiple times. In fact, my classmate Monica astutely pointed out in class today that both group presentations were in some way related to community-based forums, indicating many class members had similar ideas of the potential of eDemocracy applications at the local level. This is an exciting prospect for me since, as they say, the best participants in democracy 'think globally, but act locally.'

At the beginning of class, we learned about models in the Minnesota that are highlighted on E-Democracy.org, where neighborhoods maintain issue forums of local significance on topics such as recycling and waste management, road repair, local elections, historic preservation efforts, local digital divide issues, etc. There are many vendors that offer internet voting systems and/or on-line community networking systems. Some of these include:

http://www.safevote.com/
http://www.regenesys.co.uk/home/

E-Democracy.org has an interesting list of model community forum sites as well. As we breiefly discussed in class, these local on-line forums are, in a sense, at the forefront of eDemocracy. A great example of this is Hawaii's new http://www.hawaiiconcon.org/, a website designed for Hawaians to "learn, discuss, and decide" whether a 2008 Constitutional Convention should happen. In Hawaii, the state constitution can be amended by a vote of the legislature, or by means of a Constitutional Convention, where citizens radify amendments by a majority vote. This website educates citizens on the process and provides a forum for discussion, which especially useful considering the geography of the state.

Friday, May 2, 2008

net neutrality

I really enjoyed Bob Bocher's presentation last week on the topic of net neutrality. I especially appreciated how Mr. Bocher discussed the topic in the context of the history of telecommunications and the Internet. His explanation helped me to better understand the distinction between telecommunication and information services, as well as the "common carrier" issue.

Even though Mr. Bocher brought up some disturbing facts regarding the future of net neutrality issues, it appears there is also some good news on the horizon for proponents of internet freedom. Apparently Comcast and BitTorrent have reached a deal. Now both companies will take steps to improve software and increase transferability when it comes to peer-to-peer file sharing. This is good news for me because I am guilty of downloading bit torrent files from time to time, and I have read things on-line that have led me to believe my own ISP may be interfering in peer-sharing transfers. However, as Marvin Ammori, general counsel of Free Press said in the above-linked Wired.com article,
"This agreement does nothing to protect the many other peer-to-peer companies from blocking, nor does it protect future innovative applications and services. Finally, it does nothing to prevent other phone and cable companies from blocking. Innovators should not have to negotiate side deals with phone and cable companies to operate without discrimination. The Internet has always been a level playing field, and we need to keep it that way."

In other net neutrality news, I read in this Information Week article that Rep. John Conyers introduced the Internet Freedom and Nondiscrimination Act this week in Congress which attempts to promote competition among internet carriers. Interestingly, the bill approaches this issue of net neutrality from an anti-trust (anti-monopoly) angle rather than the common carrier rule that once protected dial-up connections.

Thursday, May 1, 2008

thoughts on the generational digital divide...

There are many divisions at play in the so-called Digital Divide: geographic, generational, economic, racial, and so on. I've been fortunate that I've mostly ended up on the "connected" side of the fence in all of these categories, and after this week's discussions and readings on the Digital Divide, I've been thinking about how certain points in my own childhood were defined by my ability to access technological resources, namely the internet.

For example, I remember in 1992, (when I was a fourth-grader) having a pen pal from London who I corresponded with via faxes. By '94 I was using the closed-network version of America On-line that Bob Bocher mentioned in his presentation, via dial-up in rural West Virginia. My friend in London used her mom's university email account. By the next year we were arranging meeting times in chatrooms on AOL, a service my British friend even had access to by then. Once I hit middle and high school, the internet was a key resource in my life for not only socializing, but also for downloading music, writing papers, choosing a college, etc. Of course, this influence was probably true for many of us Generation Y-ers.

The internet has clearly played a similar role in the lives of many other people from my generation, which has been aptly nicknamed the "Net Generation." And much has been written about the Net Generation's relationship with the virtual world, including a lot of discussion focusing on the divide between Gen. Y and older generations. I found this article about how Gen. Y employees demand high-tech communication technologies to thrive in the workplace.

I have observed a generational divide at my current job, for sure. In fact, many resources are allocated at my job for the purpose of bridging it, including several computer training courses that are mostly designed for beginner-level computer users, as well as efforts to accommodate older employees' preferences for outdated software. As a Generation Y-er, I find the pace of these classes painstakingly slow, but I also appreciate the need for them.

How much of an advantage do digital natives have in the workplace of the 21st Century? A lot, I think. There's no doubt that those who've grown up with computers and the internet are simply fast and efficient at navigating a computer's files or searching for something on-line; it's second nature to them. However, I think people who didn't grow up with computers and who weren't the computer techies of the 80s and 90s are quickly catching up. Really, it doesn't take too much practice before you can master those basic computer tasks, and the internet is no longer a new thing for most people. Still, you can't always teach old dogs new tricks. My babyboomer boss still insists on keeping a paper copy of the phone book around the office, while (of course) my first instinct is to Google it.