NOTICE: The project that is the subject of this report was approved by the Governing Board of the National Research Council, whose members are drawn from the councils of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, and the Institute of Medicine. The members of the committee responsible for the report were chosen for their special competences and with regard for appropriate balance.
This report has been reviewed by a group other than the authors according to procedures approved by a Report Review Committee consisting of members of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, and the Institute of Medicine.
Support for this project was provided by the following organizations: Air Force Office of Scientific Research (under Contract N00014-87-J-1110), Advanced Research Projects Agency (under Contract N00014-87-J-1110), Apple Computer Corporation, Department of Energy (under Grant DE-FG05-87ER25029), Digital Equipment Corporation, Intel Corporation, International Business Machines Corporation, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (under Grant CDA-9119792), National Science Foundation (under Grant CDA-9119792), and Office of Naval Research (under Contract N00014-87-J-1110). Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the sponsors.
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Copyright 1995 by the National Academy of Sciences. All rights reserved.
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STEERING COMMITTEE ON KEEPING THE U.S. COMPUTER AND COMMUNICATIONS INDUSTRY COMPETITIVE: CONVERGENCE OF COMPUTING, COMMUNICATIONS, AND ENTERTAINMENT
DAVID C. NAGEL,
AppleSoft Inc.,
Chair
PETER F. COWHEY,
University of California at San Diego (at press time, Federal Communications Commission)
ESTHER DYSON,
EDventure Holdings Inc.
JANICE OBUCHOWSKI,
Freedom Technologies Inc.
ALEXANDER SINGER, Film Director
Special Advisors
SAMUEL H. FULLER,
Digital Equipment Corporation
ROBERT W. LUCKY,
Bell communications Research
IRVING WLADAWSKY-BERGER,
POWER Parallel Systems Inc., International Business Machines Corporation
Staff
MARJORY S. BLUMENTHAL, Director
LESLIE M. WADE, Project Assistant
COMPUTER SCIENCE AND TELECOMMUNICATIONS BOARD
WILLIAM A. WULF,
University of Virginia,
Chair
FRANCES ALLEN,
IBM T.J. Watson Research Center
JEFF DOZIER,
University of California at Santa Barbara
DAVID J. FARBER,
University of Pennsylvania
HENRY FUCHS,
University of North Carolina
CHARLES M. GESCHKE,
Adobe Systems Inc.
JAMES N. GRAY,
San Francisco, California
BARBARA J. GROSZ,
Harvard University
DEBORAH A. JOSEPH,
University of Wisconsin
RICHARD M. KARP,
University of California at Berkeley
BUTLER W. LAMPSON,
Digital Equipment Corporation
BARBARA H. LISKOV,
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
JOHN MAJOR,
Motorola Inc.
ROBERT L. MARTIN,
AT&T Network Systems
DAVID G. MESSERSCHMITT,
University of California at Berkeley
WILLIAM H. PRESS,
Harvard University
CHARLES L. SEITZ,
Myricom Inc.
EDWARD SHORTLIFFE,
Stanford University School of Medicine
CASMIR S. SKRZYPCZAK,
NYNEX Corporation
LESLIE L. VADASZ,
Intel Corporation
MARJORY S. BLUMENTHAL, Director
LOUISE A. ARNHEIM, Senior Staff Officer
HERBERT S. LIN, Senior Staff Officer
JOHN M. GODFREY, Research Associate
RENEE A. HAWKINS, Staff Associate
GLORIA P. BEMAH, Administrative Assistant
LESLIE M. WADE, Project Assistant
COMMISSION ON PHYSICAL SCIENCES, MATHEMATICS, AND APPLICATIONS
RICHARD N. ZARE,
Stanford University,
Chair
RICHARD S. NICHOLSON,
American Association for the Advancement of Science,
Vice Chair
STEPHEN L. ADLER,
Institute for Advanced Study
SYLVIA T. CEYER,
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
SUSAN L. GRAHAM,
University of California at Berkeley
ROBERT J. HERMANN,
United Technologies Corporation
RHONDA J. HUGHES,
Bryn Mawr College
SHIRLEY A. JACKSON,
Rutgers University
KENNETH I. KELLERMANN,
National Radio Astronomy Observatory
HANS MARK,
University of Texas at Austin
THOMAS A. PRINCE,
California Institute of Technology
JEROME SACKS,
National Institute of Statistical Sciences
L.E. SCRIVEN,
University of Minnesota
A. RICHARD SEEBASS III,
University of Colorado
LEON T. SILVER,
California Institute of Technology
CHARLES P. SLICHTER,
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
ALVIN W. TRIVELPIECE,
Oak Ridge National Laboratory
SHMUEL WINOGRAD,
IBM T.J. Watson Research Center
CHARLES A. ZRAKET,
MITRE Corporation
(retired)
NORMAN METZGER, Executive Director
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Preface
This report on digital convergence is the third in a series of Computer Science and Telecommunications Board (CSTB) reports focusing on the competitive status of the U.S. computer industry. The first series report, Keeping the U.S. Computer Industry Competitive: Defining the Agenda (National Academy Press, Washington, D.C., 1990), provided insights from leaders of computer-related businesses and research programs on the broad industry complex and its various segments. The second series report, Keeping the U.S. Computer Industry Competitive: Systems Integration (National Academy Press, Washington, D.C., 1992), presented expert examination of a technology and business arena in which the United States has shown leadership, systems integration, to further understanding of how to maintain if not extend that strong performance. This third report builds on a theme in the first two, the close coupling of computing and communications in the development of new technologies, goods, and services. It explores the broader integration of information processing, communication, and generation that is reflected in the convergence of computing, communications, and entertainment. It reinforces the importance of communications that has been evident in each report by broadening the series title to Keeping the U.S. Computer and Communications Industry Competitive . In addition to discussing conditions, opportunities, and risks for competitiveness, it also addresses implications of the subject technologies and their uses for the daily lives of citizens.
Digital convergence is the most volatile topic considered in CSTB's competitiveness series. From the time CSTB selected the topic, through the time it held a colloquium on it, to this time of publication, several waves of interest and opinion have coursed through the news media and, by extension, the business
community and popular attention. As project special advisor and industry executive Robert W. Lucky observed, there has been a "hype cycle." Opinions of where digital convergence is heading and when and how it will get there have varied over that cycle. Although this is hardly a time of stability, enough has happened to allow for greater reflection and more sober assessment of prospects than at earlier times in the past two years. Toward that end, this report is directed to decision makers in government, industry, and academia. Because so much of its subject matter is new, time-sensitive, and lacking in scholarly consideration, this report has drawn to an unusual degree on items reported in the news media. News articles are cited in part to document the hype cycle that, as noted by Lucky, itself has fed the very activity that was being reported.
In keeping with the previous volumes in this series, this report draws directly on statements made by principals from industry and academia (Appendix A) that were aired at an invitational colloquium (Appendix B). That stock of statements was updated and enlarged in this instance by a series of interviews (Appendix C) conducted by Virginia Quesada of VQ Productions Inc. The interviews were developed to support a CSTB experiment, the production of a video for limited distribution to the federal policymaking community as a companion to this report. As a few colloquium participants noted, it is out of keeping with digital convergence for CSTB to publish only in text form. The concept for the video and its initial framing were championed by steering committee member Alexander Singer, an independent film director.
Keeping the U.S. Computer and Communications Industry Competitive: Convergence of Computing, Communications, and Entertainment benefited particularly from the advice and support of special advisors to the steering committee, Samuel Fuller, Robert Lucky, and Irving Wladawsky-Berger, each of whom had contributed to the first two reports of this competitiveness series. Early drafting and organization, background consultations, and data gathering were conducted by Laura Ost, an independent science writer retained as a CSTB consultant. As always, the anonymous reviewers provided criticisms and suggestions that helped to refine and extend the discussion.
Comments on this report and suggestions of topics for future activities in this series are welcome via Internet to CSTB@nas.edu or fax to 202/334-2318.