Community Computing in Japan

Conference proceedings are often useful for keeping current on cutting-edge research as well as unique projects related to the conference topic. While reviewing the Proceedings of the Pacific Telecommunications Council Fifteenth Annual Conference (PTC '93), I chanced upon the description of a project in Nishinomiya (a town between Osaka and Kobe).

The Ministry of International Trade and Industry (MITI) selected Nishinomiya as a test site for a new experiment in community communication, called the "New Media Community Plan." This plan aims at promoting increased use of data communications and fo stering an increased sense of community.

Junko Fukamizu's paper ("Propulsion for Activation of Community in the Region with PC Networking Services") in the PTC '93 proceedings explained how a host computer established in a community center could act as a community-oriented BBS system, one fo cusing on community activities and information. Intrigued by the possibilities of this type of system, I gave the Nishinomiya Community Center a call and try to find out more about the project.

The receptionist was happy that a foreigner would express interest in their project and promised to send me some information. Surprisingly, a package arrived the next day. The enclosed material outlined a very sophisticated community network concept a nd a community education center designed to bring new users up to the level required to use the new system. The system also provides a "do it yourself" data processing center for both personal and limited commercial use.

The Nishinomiya New Media Community Center Network

The Nishinomiya project got started in March 1988 with a few dial-up access lines. It offered community news and a cable TV guide. Expansion came later the same year, when MITI designated Nishinomiya as one of the 21 model New Media Community Center pr ojects. By the end of 1988, the network had 287 registered users.

Today, less than six years later, the Nishinomiya system has over 5,100 subscribers from a wide variety of backgrounds and locations. (One registered user accesses the system from the United States.) The largest percentage of users are from Nishinomiy a (1,467 accounts, or about 29% of the registered system accounts). Osaka users number about 1,128 (22%), and nearly every prefecture in Japan is represented in the member file. The typical New Media Center network user is a male professional in his 30s, which matches the profile of the average Nishinomiya resident: a young sarariman ("salary man," or office worker) who commutes to either Kobe or Osaka, has a university education, and works in a professional field.

Users can access the system either through one of seven dial-up access lines or via a recently installed X.25 connection from the Fujitsu network (Fenics). The Fenics connection permits access from any area in Japan with a local packet-network access point. The Nishinomiya host system is a minicomputer running UNIX, with a wide variety of applications software. Among the major applications available to users are:

• Electronic Mail
• Bulletin Board Services
• Electronic Conferencing System
• Community Information Databases
• Community Library Card Catalog
• Education and Training Services
• Translation Services
• Advertising and Directory Services

The electronic mail and conferencing systems are active forums in which users exchange information and debate topics ranging from community issues to general discussions on poiitics, world events, foreign languages, travel, and diverse other subjects. The atmosphere is informal, further promoting a sense of online community and increased use by the conference participants.

The Nishinomiya network also enables users to consult with the city office on matters of civic interest through conferencing or personal electronic mail. This gives participants a chance to directly voice complaints or query the city administration, a nd get direct personal replies. During the season, the system even offers near-realtime updates on the activities at Koshien, home of the national high school baseball tournament!

Library access The New Media Community Center offers users access to information on over 210,000 books in the Nishinomiya City Library. The library access system supports a separate online conference area for users to discuss, debate, and report on books or other literature, and it has a database that supports queries by subject, title, and keyword. The Nishinomiya Library staff inputs all new titles to the library database, which means that users can access a real-time listing of available publications.

The potential of this type of system is enormous. If the Nishinomiya Library were to make an online connection to other participating libraries, users would be able to query libraries in other parts of the country for titles and abstract information; this would be a powerful research tool for community members. Through a resource sharing agreement, titles could even be transferred between locations, giving patrons access to needed titles within days - books that they might never have known existed wit hout the search capability.

Although widely used in other countries, this type of resource sharing program is as yet relatively unknown in Japan. According to Mr. Ishihara, Manager of the Nishinomiya New Media Community (NMC) project, the center would participate in this type of activity "if the direction and funding were available."

On-line translation

There are other innovative services available to NMC network users right now. Have you ever needed to quickly produce several pages of correspondence or documentation in Japanese but not had access to a qualified translator? The NMC has a translation f eature that accepts text written in either English or Japanese and produces a translated output in the other language. This feature is available to all users, commercial or not, for a modest fee. And for quick reference, there is an online dictionary for single-word queries.

Any business person or student needing a quick translation - with the understanding that fine tuning will be required to correct grammar or usage problems - could knock off a fairly large document within hours, a task that may take days or weeks (and great expense) with a standard translation service provider. And this service is available from anywhere in the country through a Fenics network access point! The potential for this kind of service is amazing, but still largely untapped.

Future possibilities

Host features, such as the education and training areas, local advertising, and directory services, add to the attractiveness of the NMC project. But let's take this project one step further. in addition to the 21 locations originally selected as NMC C enters, 68 additional locations have been identified for future participation. Imagine if all these community centers could offers yet another set of features for the community that really sets it apart from other community centers: an education, consulti ng, and small business center with a large array of activities. These include

• Commercial Information Salon: A well-stocked library of books, magazines, newspapers, microfilm, and civic resources on local and national business topics.
• Office Automation Tools: Personal computers, copiers, printers, and other resources available to individuals and small business users. All the machines are state-of-the-art, and staff members are available to assist if required.
• Education and Training: There are formal classroom courses on data processing and communications, and self-study training courses. Training is conducted in a modern room, with hands-on training at individual PCs to enhance presentation and instructi on.
• Network Access: Access to the Nishinomiya New Media Community host computer is available at the center through directly connected workstations.

This type of community center, with its state-of-the-art classrooms, a business library, and office automation equipment, is a testament to the concept of promoting data processing within the community. Although not free, it offers an economical metho d for any community resident to learn and access the tools needed to obtain an operator's license on the information highway.

Missed opportunities?

While fundamentally impressed by the Nishinomiya project, I find it odd that the information highway Japan is so desperately trying to develop should be missing great opportunities to enhance projects like the Nishinomiya New Media Community Center. By beyond to similar international community projects - Japan is missing a golden opportunity to promote free and seamless information exchange among residents.

Even more importantly, though, by not making this type of information network freely and immediately available to children and students, Japan will lag much of the rest of the world in telecommunications knowledge, aptitude, and capabilities. Regardin g the breakdown of NMC systems users (see figure), Ishihara cites emphasis on high school and college entrance examinations, and the amount of time required for preparation, as one reason students and educators have not embraced the system and PC-based co mmunications. He also mentions that there is a "very low number of teachers skilled in the concepts of data processing and telecommunications.'' programs in North America and Europe, such as K-12 and KidsNet, which actively promote data communications kno wledge and use down to the primary school student.

The advantage of emphasizing telecomputing concepts to students will become apparent in the coming years, as business begins to see the need for information-literate employees. This is a literacy that will be necessary for Japan to maintain competitiv eness in the virtual economic communities of the future. Just as libraries were emphasized as a social requirement for enabling the community to enhance basic literacy in the late 1800s, electronic resources will fill that role as we move toward the next century.

Distributed processing, linking of local networks to remote and foreign networks, and a gradual shift toward decentralized operations and management within companies will force business to flatten out the current standard vertical communications model . If emphasis can be placed on the concepts of telecomputing while students are still in primary school or high school, it will improve their ability to perform in college or in the workplace. The community computing concept could serve as a very inexpens ive medium for students (and teachers) to learn about and practice telecomputing concepts prior to getting into the workplace.

Community opportunities

Non-profit organizations could be among the big winners of the New Media Community project. Non-profit organizations usually share the common characteristic of low visibility; participation in the NMC system could make these organizations known to a la rge audience. Non-profit organizations could easily make position papers, statements, and conference areas available to anybody who logged into the system, without the need to spend large sums on printed promotional material. The collateral effect of not using paper or other traditional resources could also enhance the "green" image of the organization.

Community leaders need to be aware of the potential social and economic benefits of fostering a truly useful information resource such as the NMC. Leaders who are unaware of the technologies and potential will lack the ability to make informed decisio ns on future projects or to appreciate the opportunities inherent in New Media Community projects. Those leaders who do not emphasize action are doing their communities a disservice by not pursuing every opportunity to prepare its residents for the emergi ng information age.

A characteristic of successful community computing programs is volunteerism by experts and enthusiasts. Among the first uses of the Cleveland Freenet were making medical information available to the community, providing a forum for open (and anonymous ) questions and answers, and giving users access to professionals in the field. Doctors and other medical staff volunteered their time to participate in conferences on health-related topics as well as provide direct feedback and consultation to queries by electronic mail. The Heartland Freenet provided a similar service by volunteer members of the agriculture community, further enhancing the capabilities of farmers who would generally have to take long trips to consult with professionals in town. Instead, those people could use the asynchronous features of electronic conferencing, at their leisure, and save the time and money of travel or "telephone tag."

The social benefits of volunteerism do not stop at professional relationships within the community. Access to a community-oriented telecomputing center allows all persons - whether physically handicapped, geographically separated, young or old - to ha ve an equal chance at participating in online activities that can enhance their quality of life. Participation in the New Media Community Center has no restriction other than the requirement of access to a telephone line, personal computer, and modem.

Community computing in the future

People like Ishihara firmly believe in the service they are providing their communities. During the Japan Internet Symposium in Tokyo earlier this year, Mr. Chono from the Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications (MPT) addressed the problems Japan is f acing in trying to develop a plan to manage the extremely high rate of change in the communications industry. The MPT acknowledges that Japan may appear to be falling behind in some areas, such as Internet availability. The next step is to logically selec t the best way for Japan to meet the challenge of bringing the power of global telecommunications to the population and industry, and to determine what to do with it once there.

Nishinomiya's computing and information project is an exciting step toward meeting the information needs of the community. It will be even more exciting if the local system can connect to other information resources, those around the country and the r est of the world. Introduction and demonstration to members of the local academic community should encourage interest, with a possible by-product being the creation of telecomputing clubs at local junior and senior high schools.

Whatever course Nishinomiya takes in this experiment's future, and whatever the result, the important point of this exercise is that a need has been identified and at least one solution deployed. The New Media Community Center is a great start, one th at deserves encouragement and aggressive proponents to expand its utility and future capabilities.

John Savageau is regional services manager, Asia-Pacific Operations, Sprint International.

Try it Out

To get a personal taste of what the future of community telecomputing in Japan might offer, you can try connecting to the Nishinomiya New Media host yourself. (You'll need a Japanese language terminal software program and hardware.) Once you've tasted the potential of the system, consider how you might participate in the project and use it to enhance your own life, and the lives of others.

For a first-hand look at the Nishinomiya New Media Community network, connect via your PC and modem to 0798-35-3001. Log in with User ID NMC00007 and the password NISHI. If you aren't able to connect with the network, phone Mr. Ishihara (in Japanese) at 0798-32-8899.