The Unpredictable Certainty: Information Infrastructure Through 2000

• 1 INTRODUCTION AND SUMMARY
  • Defining the National Information Infrastructure
  • Driving Deployment: Business Transitions, Business Models
  • The Significance of the Internet
  • As a Barometer of Potential
  • As a Laboratory for Development of Workable Standards
  • As a Basis for Critical Flexibility
  • As a Vehicle for New Market Structures
  • Whither the Internet?
  • Realizing the NII'S PotentialThe User Perspective
  • Deployment of Infrastructure Technology
  • Access
  • Flexibility and Interoperability
  • Additional Technology Concerns
  • User Interaction with Networked Infrastructure
  • Public Versus Private Objectives
  • Organization of This Report
  • Notes

• 2 MAKING TECHNOLOGY WORK: INDIVIDUAL AND ORGANIZED END USERS
  • Who Is the End User?
  • Why the NII Must Reach the Home
  • Evolving Demand for NII Capabilities
  • The End User as Consumer
  • Access Devices
  • The Personal Computer
  • The Television
  • Advanced Television
  • The Telephone and Other Access Devices
  • Toward a Fully Integrated Home System
  • What Increasing Use of General-Access Devices Implies for Networking Technology Deployment
  • High Data Rates to the End Point
  • Adequate Bandwidth in Both Directions
  • Multiple-Session Capability
  • Continuous Availability of Service
  • Real-time, Multimedia Communication
  • Nomadicity
  • Security
  • Concluding Observations
  • Notes

• 3 WHERE IS THE BUSINESS CASE?
  • Factors Shaping Investment in Information Infrastructure
  • Investment in Facilities
  • The Problem of How Much Bandwidth to Invest In
  • Federal Licenses as an Influence on Deployment of New Wireless Systems
  • Investing to Achieve Infrastructure Generality
  • From Facilities to Services and Applications
  • Balancing InvestmentSoftware "Capital"
  • The Separation of Services from FacilitiesBroadening the Potential Content
  • The Internet and Its Use for Business
  • Effects on Provision of Goods and Services
  • The InternetLayering, Incrementalism, and Diversification
  • Incremental Increases
  • Arrangements for Interconnection
  • Economic Models
  • Usage-based Fees for Communications and Information Services
  • Embedded or Domain-specific Services
  • The Broadcast Model
  • End-User Devices Paid for by Consumers
  • The Access Subscription Model
  • Payment Models and the Internet Phenomenon
  • Notes

• 4 TECHNOLOGY OPTIONS AND CAPABILITIES: WHAT DOES WHAT, HOW
  • The Changing Nature of Technology and Communications
  • How Trends in Technology Are Changing Communications
  • Infrastructure and Services
  • Separation of Infrastructure Facilities and Service Offerings
  • Building Services on Each Other
  • The Tension Between Supporting Mature and Emerging Services
  • Resolving the Tension: The Internet as an Example
  • The Importance of the Internet
  • The Coexistence of New and Mature Services
  • Current TechnologyEvaluating the Options
  • Hybrid Fiber Coaxial Cable
  • Fiber to the Curb
  • Digital Services and the Telephone Infrastructure
  • Data Over the Telephone System
  • Asynchronous Transfer Mode
  • Local Area Networks
  • Wireless
  • Broadcasting
  • Satellite
  • Power Industry as Infrastructure Provider
  • The Internet
  • Change and Growth
  • Transport Infrastructure to Information Infrastructure
  • Open Interfaces and Open Standards
  • Standards and Innovation in the Marketplace
  • Management and Control of the Infrastructure
  • Notes

• 5 TECHNOLOGY CHOICES: WHAT ARE THE PROVIDERS DEPLOYING?
  • Introduction
  • Wireline Telephony
  • Summary and Forecasts
  • Local Access and the Larger System
  • Integrated Services Digital Network
  • Telephone Industry Fiber Deployment
  • Demand for Telephone Services
  • Data Communications
  • Summary and Forecasts
  • Data Services Provided by Telephone Carriers
  • Business Networking
  • Cable Television and Telephony: Advanced Services to the Home
  • Summary and Forecasts
  • Advanced Cable and Telephone Services to the Home
  • On-line Services and Internet Access for Consumers
  • Summary and Forecasts
  • On-line Services and Internet Access
  • Wireless and Broadcast Infrastructure
  • Summary and Forecasts
  • Wireless Telephony
  • Wireless Data Networking
  • Terrestrial and Satellite Broadcast Television
  • Wireless Cable
  • Direct Broadcast Satellite
  • Notes

• 6 PUBLIC POLICY AND PRIVATE ACTION
  • Introduction
  • Public-Private Engagement
  • NII Systems Issues
  • Defining Roles for Government
  • Regulation, Rules, and Norms
  • Protecting the NII: Ethics and Mechanisms
  • Security, Reliability, and Architecture
  • Government as User and Service Provider
  • Technology Development Through R&D
  • Architecture and Networking
  • Information Management and Ease of Use
  • Standards
  • International Issues
  • Systems Data and Analysis for NII Assessment
  • Government as Convenor
  • Conclusions
  • Notes

• BIBLIOGRAPHY

APPENDIXES

• A--Workshop Participants and Agenda

• B--Forum Participants and Agenda

• C--Call for White Papers (Abridged)

• D--White Papers Received

• E--NII 2000 Liaisons

• F--Letter from Vice President Albert Gore, March 6, 1995

• G--Acronyms and Abbreviations Used