High Tide
High Speed, Island Style
Internet-Driven Change Is Moving Quickly
Well over a decade ago I attended a roundtable discussion organized by the World Bank with a number of other Fiji journalists, community workers, business people and churches to discuss the Internet, and what it might mean for Fiji and the Pacific region more broadly. This was before businesses and government offices had broadband connections and Internet cafes dotted the main streets of our towns.
Now anyone lucky enough to have a reliable Internet connection and time to kill can find out what business consultants in Suva, Peace Corps in Pohnpei, scientists in Honiara, film makers in Bougainville and graphic designers and missionaries in Guam think and experience via their blogs. Pacific Islanders all over the world are connected via MySpace and hi5, sites such as the excellent yokwe.net and the discussion boards of national newspapers, radio stations and web news services.
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There’s a sense that’s already happening. Marshall Islands activists recently launched an online petition aimed at getting the United States to increase compensation offered to Marshallese affected by nuclear tests.
And if Fiji’s 2000 coup was characterized by the speed with which news was dispersed by the websites of established media companies, the 2006 one was notable for the proliferation of often anonymous bloggers, which has caused the interim government no end of frustration.
A number of people have been questioned in relation to these blogs, questioning that according to one man detained, allegedly involves being punched and left naked in cells for several hours. An online campaign for opponents to the coup to miss work on May 1 in protest appeared to have no measurable effect. However, the willingness of a spokesman from Fiji’s international telecom provider FINTEL to publicly discuss blocking access to various sites did ring alarm bells for businesses—current and prospective—with Internet-reliant operations in Fiji.
One of the concerns raised by those gathered at that long-ago meeting in Fiji was the entry of undesirable elements to the country and culture—that the digital superhighway would instead become a dirty little backstreet. It’s something Tuilaepa cited last year when he said, “the rise in computer crimes and the use of cyberspace to disseminate pornographic materials and propagate extremist ideologies are but some of the consequences we are already experiencing.”
Tuilaepa was quick to say that these problems shouldn’t deter us from the aim of building an information society. So what’s next? Recently Christine Kuper-Wini of the Pacific Islands Chapter of the Internet Society (PICISOC) flagged Voice Over Internet Protocol (VOIP) and the next generation of Internet as emerging issues for the Pacific, and said much of the world is well ahead on these technologies. As to the question, will the Pacific be left behind, Kuper-Wini says, “We do not believe so.”
PICISOC’s motto is “Internet For Everyone.” Some might say, well hey, what about water for everyone or education for everyone? But the importance of this technology and how it can be locally adapted to the benefit of Pacific Islanders (and not just those in towns) shouldn’t be dismissed.
The key is to take ownership. That means not only more Pacific Islanders writing blogs and more Pacific Island web resources designed and maintained by Pacific Islanders, but an investment in infrastructure. And where the size of the economy can sustain it, an opening up of the telecommunications markets, so users are not beholden to monopoly holders.
