Transcript of Al Gore's Remarks
15th International ITU Conference
Monday, October 12, 1998
This is the third time in four years I have had the honor of speaking to this
distinguished audience. The first time, I traveled 8,000 kilometers from the
White House to Buenos Aires. The second time, I spoke to you by way of
satellite in Kyoto, and invited you to come here this year. I want to thank all
of you for the distance you traveled to be here today, and on behalf of
President Clinton and the American people, I want to welcome all of you to
the United States of America.
We meet today in Minnesota: the land of 10,000 lakes, at the very center of
North America. One of our great writers, Sinclair Lewis, once wrote that "to
understand America, it is merely necessary to understand Minnesota. But to
understand Minnesota, you must be an historian, an ethnologist, a poet, and a
graduate prophet all in one."
Of course, people might say the same thing about the Global Information
Infrastructure -- a network of networks that transmits messages and images
at the speed of light and on every continent -- ultimately linking all human
knowledge. Its creation is so revolutionary -- the changes it has wrought are
so vast -- that even those of us who have worked on it for years cannot
predict its full impact.
For all the stunning capabilities of the Global Information Infrastructure, we
must remember that at its heart it is a way to deepen and extend our oldest,
and most cherished global values: rising standards of living and literacy, an
ever-widening circle of democracy, freedom, and individual empowerment. And
above all, we must remember that -- especially in this global economy and
Information Age -- we are all connected, from Minnesota to Mongolia, from
Madrid to Mali.
That is what I want to talk about today. Thanks to the people in this room --
and people listening around the world -- this is truly an open moment in world
history, a moment when we can come together across our communications
networks to rediscover and renew our shared values - and build the 21st
century our children deserve.
That is a vision that was not even imaginable back in 1947, when the
International Telecommunication Union last met in the United States. That
year, two scientists working at Bell Labs - John Bardeen and Walter Brattain
-- made an amazing discovery. Using a little slab of germanium, a thin plastic
wedge, a shiny strip of gold foil, and a make-shift spring fashioned from an old
paper clip, they were able to boost an electrical signal by more than 450
times. They called their invention a "transistor."
Incidentally, one of those two scientists -- Walter Brattain -- first learned
about quantum mechanics less than five miles from where we meet today, as
a doctoral student at the University of Minnesota.
There are now more than half a billion transistors manufactured -- every
second. Every hour, more than a trillion of them are packed into everything
from computers to car engines, satellite systems to gas pumps. Within two
years, a single microchip will routinely contain one billion transistors -- and the
patterns etched on them will be as complicated as a roadmap of the entire
planet. Fifty years ago, it cost $5 for every transistor. Today, it costs
1/100th of a cent. In just a few years, it will cost a billionth of a cent.
I once used the old cliche with a college audience that if the automobile had
made the same exponential advances as the transistor, a car would get
100,000 miles to the gallon and cost only 50 cents. And then one of the
students in the first row said, "Sure, Mr. Vice President, but it would be less
than a millimeter long."
These new advances are allowing us to explore new frontiers -- from a galaxy
12 billion light years away to the smallest genetic switch inside a human cell.
Within three weeks, the first of several brand new low-earth orbiting satellite
systems will make it possible to make a phone call from any point on the
earth's surface to any other point. Within three years, we will have
high-speed wireless Internet access from anywhere on Earth.
Just two short years ago, the United States was able to land a rover on Mars
equipped with an off-the-shelf wireless remote modem -- which prompted
more than three-quarters of a billion hits on the Internet when those images
were broadcast back to Earth. In the coming months, NASA will work with
several of your governments to launch the new international space station,
which is the size of two football fields.
At MIT in Boston, researchers are even busy adding a third sensation to
virtual reality: not just sight and sound -- but touch. By using an electronic
thimble, you can touch an object on a computer screen, and it immediately
appears as a hologram next to you. If you run your fingers over it, the object
can become rough or smooth -- whatever the computer commands.
It means that in a few short years, the blind will be able to feel a computer
image, and armchair tourists will be able to run their hands over the rough
sandstone of Stonehenge or the smooth marble of the Taj Mahal.
None of these stunning achievements would have been possible without
telecommunications. Thanks to all of you, we know that today, we are at the
dawn of a new technology and telecommunications renaissance, one that is
still in its infancy.
But perhaps the greatest promise of this electronic and digital age lies not in
what is new, but in the values that are renewed.
As each breathtaking new development brings us closer together in
communication, and in common cause -- building a true global electronic
village -- we have chance to spread a new prosperity, a new literacy, a new
love of freedom and democracy -- and even a new sense of community to the
farthest regions of the world.
That is why, four years ago, I set forth five principles that I believe are
essential to reap the full harvest of the Global Information Infrastructure.
Those five principles were: private investment, competition, open access,
flexible regulatory framework, and universal service. These are not just
common principles, but common values we all need to strengthen.
Internationally, one of the most significant commitments we have seen to the
principles overall was the signing of the World Trade Organization agreement
on Basic Telecommunication Services. In February of last year, 70 countries --
both developed and developing -- joined in this agreement to promote open
markets, private investment and pro-competitive regulations. Covering more
than 95% of global telecommunications revenues, this agreement opened the
way for a tremendous flourishing of the Global Information Infrastructure that
is helping the communications revolution reach ever more people.
In addition, I am heartened to report enormous progress on each of the five
principles.
First, we have encouraged private investment, because private investment is
the lifeblood of innovation. Today, we see the results -- over $600 billion of
private capital has been invested in telecommunications since 1994. More than
48 telecom operators have been privatized. I invite any remaining doubters to
go back to Buenos Aires and ask Argentina how well privatization works -- just
since we met there they have gone from four million telephone lines to more
than 18 million. Not only is their privatized system more efficient and more
profitable -- it is bringing an entire generation of Argentineans closer together.
Second, we have promoted competition, because competition leads to
innovation, better services, and better prices for consumers.
In 1994, only seven countries had competitive markets for basic voice service.
Today, 47 countries either have full competition or are committed to it. One of
those is South Africa, which last year decided to license a second cellular
operator. And in just one year, the number of subscribers jumped from 40,000
to 340,000.
Here in the United States, we have also taken broad steps to promote
competition as well. Since 1996, when we signed a landmark
telecommunications law that advances all five principles, the birth of dozens
of new competitors has raised $20 billion to invest in advanced
communications, and created over 50,000 jobs. Now, we need competition
between fiber-optic cables around the globe, especially with the stunning
expansion of broad-band capacity. The bottom line is: competition works if we
let it.
Third, we have made open access a priority, because open access guarantees
that every user of the GII will be able to reach thousands of different sources
of information from every country, in every language. Today, the Internet is
turning that goal into a reality. Here in the United States, it took radio 38
years to reach 50 million people, personal computers 16 years, and television
13 years. The Internet took only four years.
Today, there are 100 million Internet users. By the year 2000, there will be
320 million. Maintaining open access means that we will speed up the day
when every child in any village or city is able to reach across a keyboard and
reach every book ever written, every song ever composed, and every painting
ever painted.
We have seen the dramatic benefits of open access to the telephone
network. Similarly, as new technologies emerge, open access will increase
competition and deliver great benefits to users and service providers alike.
The ITU's role in setting standards is crucial to this goal.
Experience has shown that competition among multiple standards is the best
way to meet users' diverse needs -- as long as each individual standard is
designed to increase, and not reduce the potential for interoperability.
Fourth, we have worked toward a flexible regulatory framework, because it
promotes competition and investment while protecting consumers.
A growing list of nations agree: over the past four years, 18 independent
regulatory agencies have been established in the Americas, 17 in Africa, and
11 in the Asia Pacific region. I was pleased to see 58 nations recently commit
to the World Trade Organization's Reference Paper on Regulatory Principles. I
want to commend one of them -- OSIPTEL of Peru -- which recently moved to
promote competition by ending Telefonica's monopoly one year ahead of
schedule.
Fifth, we have promoted universal service to basic telecommunications
services, because the ability to pick up a phone or hook up a computer and
have instant access to your village, your nation, and your world is one of the
most liberating and empowering forces in human history, and it should be
available to all people. Since 1994, the principal of universal access has led to
more than 200 million phone lines being added. For example, China is installing
14.5 million lines per year -- equal to half of Britain's entire network.
This isn't just a story of numbers and statistics, but families and faces. In
Thailand, a group of students with disabilities use the Flying Wheelchair
Bulletin Board to talk to other students with disabilities around the world. They
have been amazed to learn about legislation passed in other countries to help
the disabled become full members of society -- and now they are trying to
raise awareness at home. In Longreach, Australia, a woman named Christene
Chapel lives on a sheep ranch in the Australian outback. By telecommuting
through the GII, she recently earned a bachelor's degree at a university more
than 1,500 kilometers from her home.
Thanks to the work we set in motion four years ago, the structure for the
Global Information Infrastructure is largely in place. The information
superhighways of many nations are beginning to take shape. Now more than
ever before, we must all decide where they will lead.
My message to you is simple: today, on the eve of a new century and a new
millennium, we have an unprecedented opportunity to use these powerful new
forces of technology to advance our oldest and most cherished values. We
have a chance to extend knowledge and prosperity to our most isolated inner
cities, to the barrios, the favelas, the colonias and our most remote rural
villages; to bring 21st Century learning and communication to places that
don't even have phone service today; to share specialized medical technology
where there are barely enough family doctors today; to strengthen democracy
and freedom by putting it on-line, where it is so much harder for it to be
suppressed or denied.
Today, we are more connected than ever before. Now, let us use our new
tools and technology to build on that interdependence -- to build a stronger
global community, and make real our common values.
Today, I want to pose five great challenges that still remain to be met.
Together, they make up a Digital Declaration of Interdependence that can
create a brighter world for us all.
First, we must improve access to technology so everyone on the planet is
within walking distance of voice and data telecommunications services within
the next decade.
Right now, 65 percent of the world's households have no phone service. Half
of the world's population has never made a phone call. Iceland has more
Internet hosts than all of Africa. Today, I challenge the business community
to create a global business plan -- to put data and voice telecommunication
within an hour's walk of everybody on the planet by the end of the next
decade. This plan should include ways to stimulate demand. It should involve
local business. It should allow for access to distance learning and
telemedicine. It should provide hands-on training. We know it can be done --
and it must be done.
Second, we must overcome our language barriers and develop technology with
real-time digital translation so anyone on the planet can talk to anyone else.
Just imagine what it would be like to pick up a phone, call anywhere in the
world, and have your voice translated instantly so you could have a
conversation without language being a barrier. Just imagine if the translation
many of you are receiving through your earphones here today could be
accomplished digitally and instantly. I can see the day when we have a true
digital dialogue around the world -- when a universal translator can instantly
shatter the language barriers that so often hold us back in this global
Information Age.
Imagine also a world where computers don't need keyboards, where you can
simply speak into your p.c., and have every word perfectly translated and
typed. Imagine how much it could reduce the cost of doing business, and
increase international cooperation. Imagine if there were no barriers between
basic literacy and computer literacy -- where any person who can speak can
operate a computer and tap into the world's information simply by speaking
into a small device.
Today, I want to challenge the research community: take these discoveries
and develop new technology that allows people around the world to
communicate with each other; that makes international cooperation easier;
and that allows people to participate in our global community without losing
their linguistic and cultural heritage.
Third, we must create a Global Knowledge Network of people who are working
to improve the delivery of education, health care, agricultural resources, and
sustainable development -- and to ensure public safety.
Just imagine what it would be like if a sick child in rural Mongolia could be
linked through videoconference to the Sydney Children's Hospital. A small
sensor, like a mouse, could broadcast x-rays or an MRI back to Australia. A
blood sample could be put on a slide and scanned for leukemia. A leading
doctor could prescribe treatment -- and the tests would be waiting when the
child arrived. Within a few short years, this technology can be in our hands.
In an age when information is everywhere, we should be able to find ways to
group information by need. Just think if every farmer in Africa could tap into a
local weather channel that provides them with the information they need to
plant and rotate their crops. And in natural disasters, we know that just an
hour's advance warning can save thousands of lives.
Today, some of the most forward-thinking companies are using new
"knowledge management" techniques that share best practices and take
advantage of accumulated knowledge. Today, I issue a challenge to the
education community to use these same techniques to link practitioners,
experts, and non-profit organizations that are working on our most pressing
social and economic needs.
For example, in the world today, five billion people don't have access to
secondary and higher education. If we can create a "knowledge network" that
extends distance learning around the globe, we can quadruple the number of
people who have access to higher education and lifelong learning.
Fourth, we must use communications technology to ensure the free-flow of
ideas and support democracy and free speech.
Four years ago in Buenos Aires, I said that the GII would promote democracy
and greatly increase people's participation in decision-making, by making
available the information they need to express their speech freely.
Self-government is built on the assumption that each citizen should have the
power to control his or her own life. More than five centuries ago, this
concept was alive in Europe -- but it didn't become functionally possible until
the printing press helped to widely spread a large body of shared civic
knowledge to an informed and engaged public.
Just as the printing press delivered that knowledge 500 years ago, I believe
the GII can deliver a new wave of civic knowledge -- comprehensive enough
to strengthen the capacity for self-government everywhere. The continuing
challenge to all of us -- governmental and non-governmental organizations
alike -- is not to tell other nations what to do, or what values to pursue, but
rather to empower people to recognize and act upon their own choices. We
must continue to work to ensure that the GII promotes the free-flow of ideas
and supports democracy around the globe.
Fifth, we must use communication technology to expand economic opportunity
to all families and communities around the globe. Everyone in every part of the
world should have the opportunity to succeed if they are willing to work for it.
We must work together to dramatically increase the number of people on the
planet who can participate in the digital economy.
In a remote farming village near Chincehros, Peru, life has changed more in the
past two years than in the previous half century. In 1996, an Internet service
provider set up a Net-link for 50 peasant families. The village leaders formed
an on-line partnership with an international export company, which arranged
for its vegetables to be shipped and sold in New York. Before e-mail, the
village's income was about $300 a month. Today, it has jumped to $1,500 a
month.
Across the globe, microenterprise -- which often starts with initial loans of as
little as $50 -- has been a path out of poverty for millions. Today, there are
more than 500 million micro-entrepreneurs-- like those Peruvian farmers who
eke out an existence by selling their wares and service to their immediate
communities. There are countless micro-entrepreneurs whose quality of life
and incomes would change dramatically overnight if they had access to the
same tools.
Today, I challenge the non-profit community to work with development
organizations to provide more of these opportunities. These networks will
create jobs and enable micro-entrepreneurs to avoid a middle-man and keep
more of their profits.
Some estimate that global electronic commerce will grow to more than $300
billion per year in just a few years. By the year 2010, we can triple the number
of people who are able to support themselves and their families because they
are able to reach world markets through the Internet. It will also help give
consumers access to a whole new world of goods and services.
Today, I want to announce two additional steps our government will be taking
to increase opportunity and empower micro-entrepreneurs across the globe.
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