Testimony Summary for "Networks of the Future" FCC Hearing Mitchell Kapor, Electronic Frontier Foundation May 1, 1991 By the end of the next decade, today's computer networks and telephone systems will evolve into a web of digital links connecting nearly all homes and businesses in the U.S. This "National Public Network" will support commerce, learning, education, and entertainment in our society. At its best, this National Public Network could be the source of immense social benefits. As a means of increasing cohesiveness, while retaining the diversity that is an American strength, the network could help revitalize this country's business and culture. To design the NPN we must nurture a diverse community of participants, who together will evolve the National Public Network to its fullest potential. The Commission is to be congratulated for seeking a diversity of counsel by undertaking such programs as today's "Networks of the Future". I am pleased to appear before the Commission today as an entrepreneur, software designer, and concerned citizen. I want to share my vision of the applications which will drive demand for services on the National Public Network. Applications are so important because users are interested in doing something new with technology in order to make a difference in their lives. They have an aversion to technology itself. We should therefore give as much attention to applications as we do to the construction of the underlying network. Key Applications We don't know and probably can't know the key applications of the NPN. The users and entrepreneurs of the network will surprise us, in the same way that the electronic spreadsheet came as a complete surprise. Just as the Apple II personal computer was a platform that allowed others to invent new applications, the NPN can be a platform for information entrepreneurship. While we can't predict which applications will open up huge new markets, we can make a few educated guesses, based on today's prototypes. These include the Internet, a decentralized, anarchic web of computers and electronic mailboxes, linking major universities and industrial research labs around the world. Other "Petri dishes" of social ferment include smaller, regional computer conferencing systems like the Whole Earth 'Lectronic Link (the WELL) and a turbulent mass of tens of thousands non-commercial computer bulletin board systems linked in the Fidonet network. Messaging will be popular: time and time again, from the ARPAnet to Prodigy, people have surprised network planners with their eagerness to exchange mail. "Mail" will not just mean voice and text, but also pictures and video -- no doubt with many new variations. We know from past demand that the network will be used for electronic assembly -- virtual town halls, village greens, and coffee houses, again taking place not just through shared text (as in today's computer networks), but with multi-media transmissions, including images, voice, and video. Unlike the telephone, this network will also be a publications medium, distributing electronic newsletters, video clips and interpreted reports. It will also be an information marketplace which will include electronic invoicing, billing, listing, brokering, advertising, comparison-shopping, and matchmaking of various kinds. Innovation Enablers I believe it is possible to identify several key innovation enablers which, if applied in the context of the NPN, will result in a more rapid emergence of high-demand applications. These factors strongly imply directions for national policy and business strategy which are mentioned under each point. 1. Design the NPN as an Applications Platform The most valuable contribution of the computer industry in the past ten years is not a machine, but an idea -- the principle of open architecture. In computing, the hardware and system software companies create a "platform" whose specifications are published openly and which seeks to attract independent third parties to develop applications for it. Similarly, we need to think how to make the NPN into an attractive platform for the development of new information products and services. The most useful role of Apple's famous "software evangelists" is not selling the virtues of the Macintosh to application developers, but listening to them to help Apple improve the design of its platform. Perhaps the RBOC's need evangelists too. It isn't possible for the platform vendor to identify an appropriate set of application developers, but a well-designed commercial platform will naturally attract developers. The platform must be designed to be appealing to the application developers. It cannot be thought up in isolation and foisted onto the market in the hope that it will be found interesting. A computer platform is more than the hardware. The NPN platform will be far more than the wires. It must include a basket of basic services for directories and billing that are accessible and available to all providers. 2. Understand and Capitalize on Market-mediated Innovation. In the early stages of development of an industry, low barriers to entry stimulate competition. They enable a very large initial set of products for consumers to choose from. Out of these the market will learn to ignore almost all in order to standardize on a few, such as a Lotus 1-2-3. The winners will be widely emulated in the next generation of products, which will in turn generate a more refined form of marketplace feedback. In this fashion, early chaos evolves quickly a set of high-demand products and product categories. This process of market-mediated innovation is best catalyzed by creating an environment in which it is inexpensive and easy for entrepreneurs to develop products. The greater the number of independent enterprises, each of which puts at voluntary risk the intellectual and economic capital of risk-takers, is the best way to find out what the market really wants. The businesses which succeed in this are the ones which will prosper. It is worthwhile to note that not a single major PC software company today dates from the mainframe era. Yesterday's garage shop is today's billion-dollar enterprise. Policies for the NPN should therefore not only accommodate existing information industry interests, but anticipate and promote the next generate of entrepreneurs. There should be thousands of information proprietors on the net, just as there are thousands of producers of personal computer software and thousands of publishers of books and magazines. It should be as easy to provide an information service as to order a business telephone. Just as every business is automatically listed in the Yellow Pages, every online provider should be listed in a national digital Yellow Pages. 3. Design the NPN for Transparency and Ease of Use "Transparency," in computer circles, is a subjective state of awareness -- and a desirable one. When a program is perfectly transparent, people forget about the fact that they are using a computer. The most successful computer programs are nearly always transparent: a spreadsheet, for instance, is as self-evident as a ledger page. Personal computer communications, by contrast, are practically opaque. Users must be aware of baud rates, parity, duplex, and file transfer protocols -- all of which a reasonably well-designed network could handle for them. When newcomers find themselves confronting what John Perry Barlow calls a "savage user interface" the excitement about being part of an extended community quickly vanishes. On a National Public Network, that would be a disaster. Therefore it is crucial the NPN platform be designed with the proper basic functions and capabilities to promote ease of use.