Up Front
Wired for Change
New Design, New Technologies Begin Pacific’s 2003
A round of recent elections in the region brings changes to Guam, Kiribati and Hawaii. We look at these changes in our Notes section and in a page 61 interview with Hawaii’s new Republican governor, Linda Lingle, who has some definite ideas about how Hawaii and the U.S. fit into the region.
Our first annual almanac, which we’re calling Pacific 2003, debuts in this issue, as does a slightly altered graphic look to Pacific Magazine, designed by our talented art director, Charlie Pedrina. The new look includes some technical things, like fully-justified columns and a dropping of the diacriticals we’d been trying to master for the last seven months. The changes were slight, but important. It’s all part of having a “look” that reflects our substance, that is, we want to look like what we are—a regional news magazine.
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We hope that the 23 pages of our Pacific 2003 section, which gives a profile of most of the major political jurisdictions in the region, will become an important reference resource for anyone concerned with the Pacific. We will post it on our Web site, www.pacificislands.cc, and we will update it throughout the year as the data and the personalities change.
What makes all this possible—that is, gathering the news and getting it out in print and digital form—is the “information infrastructure” that connects all of us in the region. This was a phrase used by Pacific Telecommunications Council Executive Director Hoyt Zia in our interview with him for our other cover feature, an update on the state of the telecom industry in the Pacific. Both the PTC and PITA, the Pacific Islands Telecommunications Association, will be meeting in Honolulu this month. We welcome them and look forward to a fascinating few days catching up on new developments in the region’s information infrastructure—satellite communications, wireless telephone, fiber-optic cable and Web-based media.
As we were going to press, Guam was hit by Supertyphoon Pongsona. And that’s when we start seeing the importance of telecom—an importance emphasized by the post-storm absence of communications. We were cut off from our Guam correspondents and even from contributing editor Giff Johnson in Majuro, since Marshall Islands’ email is routed through Guam. We talked with PEACESAT director Christina Higa in the days after the storm as she tried to reestablish the satellite link between the PEASESAT at the University of Hawaii and the ground station at the University of Guam, which was operating on emergency generators. Once up, this telecom link helped deliver emergency communications to Guam and back to Hawaii—a far cry from the days when a few amateur short-wave radio operators were the only backup to normal communications.
Although there was only one storm-related fatality, we still send our sympathy and best wishes to our friends and readers on Guam and Rota, who are facing many difficult months of rebuilding ahead.
For Pacific—both the magazine and the region—the year 2002 ended with a reminder of the vicissitudes of nature and of politics. The year 2003 promises to be nothing but challenging and fascinating for the Pacific—both the magazine and the region. Please stick with us as we keep bringing you the most timely and accurate Pacific news and analysis we can.
Scott Whitney can be reached at: scottw@pacificbasin.net
