Message-ID: <1.5.4b12.32.19960402004307.00737df4@monmouth.com> Date: Mon, 1 Apr 1996 19:43:07 -0500 From: Wilbur Streett <mailto:wstreett@MONMOUTH.COM> Subject: Re: Traditional I.T. Before the Internet ?! To: Multiple recipients of list DEVEL-L <mailto:DEVEL-L@AMERICAN.EDU>
Traditional I.T. before the Internet? Please define "Traditional I. T." for me.When I think of Traditional I. T. I think of the systems created by my father's generation for the monolithic corporations and their information processing needs. I think of the Mainframe based systems with their Data Centers, SNA Networks, and ISAM, VSAM, MVS, DOS and Cobol and Assember based systems. I think of the system that have less power than the systems that I have on my desk, and cost 10's of Millions of dollars to purchase, not the mention the specialized environments and training necessary to maintain them.
Certainly that sort of I. T. is something that is not appropriate for most opporunities that exist today. You can accomplish more with a few PC's and a network than any mainframe system of the past. Databases that even just a few years ago required a mainframe are now happily running PC systems. So, no, I dont' think that traditional IT is something that is appropriate in today's world. It's not appropriate here, and I can't imagine why it would be appropriate anywhere else in the world.
I grew up listening to my father describe Information Technology. Information Technology isn't really about about Mainframes or the Internet, but about the process and proceedures necessary to sustain the goals of the organization. America with the manufacturing era had a need for large organizations. The Information Technology of the time only provided a solution with the mainframe and terminal based systems.
I believe without a discussion of whether that same sort of large scale organization is a requirement along the road to "Development" the discussion of "Traditional I. T." is without foundation. Do the countries of Africa need to develop large organizations as a stepping stone to equal footing in the international world? (I wish I could phrase that question differently?)
In the USA the era of the "Great Monolithic Corporations" seems to be ending. Perhaps that period was a requirement in order to exploit the technology of the time and to build the infrastruture to support the technology growth that has brought us to the technology of today. But the technology of today doesn't require large investments in infrastructure that it once did.
We have the capabilities to create infrastructure with very low capital expenditures. Companies are creating satellite communications networks just for the cost of monthly cable bills. Telecom companies around the world are willing to put up satellites anywhere in the world with 20 Gigabit transmission capabilities just for the guarenteed access to customer market in the future.
On the other hand, back to a appropriate definition of Information Technology for the developing countries. Information Technology is the study of useful techniques in the processing of Information. I would say that the useful information processing techniqes for what I percieve is as "rural" Africa are paper and pencil, teaching methodologies, organizational skills, etc. Granted that the Internet can deliver a great deal of that sort of information, but the reality is that it will take individual "Human" effort to deliver Information Technology to developing countries. If the "Human" carries a laptop into the field with him with a celluar hookup, and can afford the phone bill, it still won't deliver the technology to the people of the developing country. It will take human relationships and understanding to be able to appropriately apply "Information Technology" to the problems at hand.
But based on my experience with corporate America, that is the way that it is here in America also. It takes people to apply technology. People to understand the political situation and find appropriate uses of technology. Technology doens't apply itself. Finding the nexus between cultural acceptance of technology and technology that is appropriate to the culture is the real challendge. Getting a group to accept the opportunites presented by technology and finding the opportunities that technology presents to a group are infinitly harder than delivering the technology.
Technology that isn't accepted is more of a waste than no technology at all.. Technology applied without a context is useless. So which first, Tradional I. T. or the Internet? What's the context?
Whatever is appropriate for the problem at hand is the first thing that should be implemented. And given where technology is today, that's probably going to be a PC with a modem, connected to the Internet and running a database.
Wilbur Streett --------------------------------------- Putting a human face on technology. ;-) ---------------------------------------