The CHAIRMAN: The session is reopened. First of all I would like to state that it is an honour to have among us Mr. José Luis Pardos, Ambassador of Spain to Denmark and one of the Internet pioneers in Spain. By chance - which I am sure he will tell us about in his speech - he was Ambassador of Spain to Canada when the so-called turbot-war broke out, and as he had no other way of making himself heard, except by means of a new invention called the Internet, he created the first official Spanish web-site on the net. This was "Sí, Spain". Today it also happens that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has opened its own web page, and, curiously enough, I have found out that there is no link to this "Sí, Spain", and I hope that this will be corrected as soon as possible.
In addition, Mr. Pardos belongs to the "Internet Society" Board of Trustees, which means that he is the Spaniard ruling the Internet.
I call upon Mr. José Luis Pardos to speak.
Mr. PARDOS PÉREZ (Ambassador of Spain to Denmark and member of the "Internet Society" Board of Trustees): Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman.
You cannot know the respect and admiration with which I appear here today. It is a stimulus, a challenge and a ground for special satisfaction to be able to appear before this Committee.
Yesterday I had the honour of taking part, together with the Chairman, in a conference on "Policy and the Internet" at the "Fundaciò Catalana per a la Recerca" ('Catalan Research Foundation') in Barcelona, and I learned how the Spanish Internet users are closely following the work being done by the special Senate Committee on Computer Networks at such a high rate of progress, and which, by extrapolation from precedents, could be called "Senate of the Spanish People Using the Internet", S.P.Q.H.I., just like the ancient Roman Senate S.P.Q.R.
Allow me, first of all, to mention some facts about how Networks have reappeared and developed in Spain, in order to give you afterwards a review of the global situation in which we are, and its most significant characteristics, within the context wherein the Internet is born. The objective is to analyze the development of a very recent, but highly important, phenomenon that has made it necessary to set up, in the Spanish Senate, a Committee on "Computer Networks". I would like to make some comments about how the networks were created in Spain, from the largest to the smallest and the most recent ones, in order to give some ideas for preparing this Committee's report, which its Chairman told us about yesterday in Barcelona, and which, if I understood him right, is supposed to be a binding report for the Government, and which will undoubtedly further this new and essential subject. Finally, I shall elaborate on the human "product" that is the outcome of the Internet or, rather, on the society in which this technological "product" was born. While doing this, I shall try to continue learning through dialogue with you and from my own professional experience, and also to profit from the presence here today of a young colleague from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs who may very well transmit to our Minister, Mr. Matutes, the old and well-founded wish to be able to use this technology at our Representations abroad.
When beginning to talk about Networks, I have to mention those who set up the first Internet networks in Spain, and, in particular, also José Barbera and his later team, with Iñaki Martínez, Carlos Blanquez, and my young collaborator Iñigo López Cía.
José Barbera, father of the Internet in Spain, deserves a homage emphasizing his contribution among the pioneers of this technology in our country. Having profound knowledge of the MIT and of the technological vanguard that brought about today's Internet, his work is highly remarkable. Allow me to mention the origin of these Networks and the special attention that Dr. José Barbera and his team paid to them. Fundesco assumed the leadership of the RedIRIS Programme, of the National Research Plan, in 1987. The objective at that time was to create a computer network for the academic and scientific community, based on open standards, and which could unite different parallel activities that were emerging in many university groups. At the beginning, the communications of IRIS were based on OSI protocols in X.25 networks. But in 1990 it was seen that what was really working, were the TCP/IP Internet protocols, which were not official but de facto standards. Like other networks for research and development, the IRIS programme "migrated" to TCP/IP and to the Internet applications (SMTP, FTP, TELNET ...). Then came the HTTP and the WWW, which sent the growth of the Internet rocketing in 1993 and 1994. The work performed by Fundesco and by the team headed by Dr. Barbera, was to create the services and the model for the RedIRIS, which was the name given to the new network that later became the first Internet in Spain. The work of Fundesco comprised the design of the network, its topology, routers, etc., as well as its connection from Spain to the NSFnet, backbone of the Internet supported financially by the National Science Foundation (1990).
Fundesco left the direction of RedIRIS in December 1993, when CICYT decided to transfer the assets to an institution closer to the administration, namely the CSIC. Fundesco continued to play an important role, no longer as an administrator of the network, but more in the field of activities based on the use of the Internet and its applications aimed at getting access to sources of information. In fact, Fundesco's web site was one of the first in Spain, when in March 1994 it created new applications to access traditional data bases through the www interface, on the basis of which were also created, pioneeringly, the first services of the Jaume I de Castello University, thanks to the dedication and research of professor Jordi Adell, as well as the establishment of the first civic and popular network, the Tarragona-based TINET, thanks to Manel Sanroma's personal effort and team.
Without leaving the context, I would like to briefly draw your attention to the great issues of today's society, to which traditional politics find it so difficult to respond.
They are: 1) The climate change; 2) The physical and cultural mobility; 3) The international financial instability. They are beginning to become present in our daily lives in one way or the other. How could I appear before you today, if I had not emitted, albeit on a small scale, part of my carbon dioxide quota on my journey from Denmark and Barcelona? The consequences of the changing climate are as real as the floods in Poland, the high temperatures in the southeastern part of Spain or the impact of hurricane Mitch on Central America. The supposedly 1,5 billion people today have sufficient financial means to travel to another part of the world, make it possible for countries so racially defined as those of Scandinavia, and in this case Denmark, to have a notable physical presence of so-called "black-heads" in very central quarters of the capital. The notorious Turkish majorities in Germany, Muslims in France, the attempts to put up a wall to prevent migrations from Latin America to California, like our problems with the dinghies in the Straits of Gibraltar, are a tangible and growing reality. Finally, although more related to the economic cycle, the international financial instability hits solid countries like Japan and in a way hitherto unknown since the end of World War II.
I mention these situations, because in the midst of them the Internet was conceived, born and raised. But although they are well-known today because of their effects, the climate change, the physical and cultural mobility as well as the international financial instability have been firmly rooted in our society for many years. Perhaps their germs have been here for more than 20 or 30 years, during which period the Internet appears.
For this reason, and although I am aware that you have probably already discussed this matter in this Committee, I would like to give you a brief review of the four or five crucial moments in the development of the Network of all networks.
During the sixties and seventies the Internet forms part of a defence plan, aimed at possible nuclear attacks in the midst of cold war, and part of the technology of the US Department of Defence and the Pentagon (DARPA). 1999 will mark the 25th anniversary of the invention of the TCP/IP protocol by Khan and Cerf. Later, the National Science Foundation was to create the NsfNET, which represented a moment of great research and development of the Internet inside the University and the students' environment. My earliest recollection of an e-mail goes back to the chair of professor Mario Bunge at McGill University in Montreal, around 1983, when electronic mail was beginning to gain popularity among professors and students. At that time I owned a portable computer, or rather a movable one, as it weighed 40 kilos. (Laughter) I did not yet have any knowledge of electronic mail. That phase in the development of e-mail at the University, from 1980 to 1985, was spectacular, as Canadian and American professors and students were rapidly and widely provided with electronic mail.
In the eighties the use of these electronic media is becoming popular, so that by the end of the decade, towards 1988 and 1989, the first net for civic use is set up in the city of Cleveland (OH), with great and popular success. All sorts of people, mainly young persons, took part in this, and the Net became so popular that at times one had to patiently make up to nine hundred calls to the Cleveland FreeNet to gain access to its different contents.
I experienced in Canada and in Ottawa the pioneering moment of developing the World's first FreeNets, with the creation of the NCF (National Capital Free Net) in the same year as I arrived as Ambassador, in 1992. From that moment I became interested in the said net, which I learnt about through the rector of the University of Toronto, where we had presented a programme on "Iberoamerican Languages and Cultures", which happened to be financed by the Northern Telecom company, which has one of its largest Research Labs in Ottawa.
The manager of the NCF, Dave Sutherland, who got the excellent idea to set up a section dedicated to "Foreign embassies in Ottawa", and in whose directories were already listed the French and Italian embassies, was directly the first promoter of the "Sí, Spain" programme, where we started to offer, through the cultural services of the Embassy, an entire series of information about our history, culture, our Constitution, the Autonomies, and when we found out, after a few months, towards the end of 1993 we already had quite a lot of information about Spain on the NCF, which was officially inaugurated on May 2, 1994, by the then Minister of Industry, Mr. Eguiagaray. The citizens' net in the federal capital of Canada was a great success, and I was able to celebrate three anniversaries with them.
Only the unfortunate fisheries conflict with Canada and its very special environmental aspects provided the popularity that "Sí, Spain" gained at the time. I shall give you a brief summary of its later development on the www.
Following my stay in Saint John's, Newfoundland, after giving the "Estai" and its crew back to Galicia, and as I did not have access to the traditional Canadian communications media, because every time I spoke, they would be performing a "cut & paste" on my words, I discovered that the Canadian Ministry of Fisheries had opened a page on the www full of absolutely false photos about our fishermen. The following day I therefore opened, by means of the HTML technology, a new directory of the "Sí, Spain" programme that, under the heading "Fisheries" - which you can still find by looking at
Incidentally, I would like to say that in addition to the capacity for penetration and broadcasting that the Internet has got, there is a very special place and support, which is the University, in the context of which the NCF as well as "Sí, Spain" were born, and which as an investigator, creator and educator of generations is a very important social class that should be taken very much into account in the future of the Internet. For this reason I was very happy to learn yesterday that the "Fundaciò per a la Recerca" was also sponsored jointly by the 11 Universities of Catalonia.
But allow me, Sirs, to digress. I am not a politician. I am merely a professional in international relations or in foreign politics, using to the extent of my abilities the instructions given by my superiors to maximize my selling Spain or, if you will allow me to use that expression, marketing our country. Before proceeding to analyze the civic networks in Spain, I would therefore like to make a few reflections on new or alternative policies, with a wide outlook and horizons in the midst of those great issues that I mentioned at the beginning, and which are floating around in the environment where the Internet is born and developed. You may consider them Utopian (they would only be "tomorrow's truth" or "a midway truth"), but in any case their concept, a little more detailed, is to be found in the leading article of the October edition of the series "Point de vue" published by "Le Monde Diplomatique".
Today's political game is made up by political parties, trade unions and, lately, by Non-Governmental Organizations, which play an important role, because they are being heard, sometimes they are feared, and consequently they also have power. The political parties are formed by generalists, and fortunately or unfortunately they have to try to solve everything, from environment to health, traffic, highways, safety, ... in short, all aspects of life. On the other hand, the political parties are also local, in the sense that their field of action is limited to the territorial space of the State. In contrast, the NGOs usually deal with just one subject. They are mono-thematic. Some deal with the environment, such as "Greenpeace" or the "WWFund", others with human rights, such as "Amnesty International", or health, such as "Médecins sans Frontières" or "Medicus Mundi", others with unemployment, such as the French A.C., and they are not territorially local but global. They work here, in Nicaragua or in Cambodia. Then those three pillars of political parties, trade unions and associations are in the centre of this key moment that we are experiencing at the end of this Century and the Millennium. This big challenge will only be overcome by the intelligence of men. This is my experience, and this is why I am speaking here today.
The civil networks in Spain made their appearance around 1994 and 1995. From Ottawa I had the first contact with the Generalitat de Catalunya. There was a time when in Catalonia the first movements of civic networks were beginning to appear, and I recall very well an NGO named PANGEA with which we had some very pioneering contacts from Ottawa. But without any doubt, one of the first civic networks in Spain was the TINET, which appeared in Tarragona almost at the same time as did it "Sí, Spain" in 1995. It was promoted by young people who one day showed up at the Ramblas of Tarragona, set up some posters and announced free Internet connection, and in a short time they got thousands of members. They have had civic help from the people, but also form the port authority of Tarragona, from the City Council and also from the Municipality, whereby they have set up an efficient citizen network for electronic communications whose third anniversary we celebrated on November the 3rd this year. We should also mention Villaweb, from Barcelona, as well as the experience of Gaztenet in Barakaldo. But today setting up a BBS is an old-fashioned exercise, in spite of the fact that it remains an excellent way of electronic communications among citizens.
The second example of Civic Networks in Spain that should be mentioned, is that of Villena. Infoville is a programme of the European Union that you already know very well. Its participants are Turin, the Free State of Saxony and, among others, the Danish towns of Horsens and Næstved, but it has a different concept. Whereas other networks have arisen spontaneously, the decision of the Generalidad Valenciana was to modernize the Administration, and in this modernization there was an undersecretary, Mr. José Emilio Cervera, who created the model and selected Villena, a marvellous borderline village at the end of speaking Valenciano , near the border to Murcia and very close to the town of Cieza, which is one of the latest experiences with civic networks. I have visited Villena several times, accompanied by reporters from the United States and professors from Harvard University, I have met the Mayor, who today is one of the biggest defenders of the project that has reached the front pages of the Wall Street Journal and the Financial Times, which have seen it as an example to be followed. However, it must be pointed out that the experiences of "from up to bottom" have a problem of continuity in understanding and developing the citizens' network when there are rhythms and variables that are different from those pursued originally by the authorities.
One ought to reach a combination of popular movements, like TINET, together with an ample and flexible support from the Administration and always within a universitarian frame. This is the three-legged support that I would like to see, and please allow me, senators, to mention the latest experience that I know very well as far at city networks in Spain are concerned, and which is being created now in the town of Cieza, in Murcia.
Ciez@anet is still a project, less than a year old, but which includes educational establishments, the Town Hall, the Savings Banks, the Government of the Autonomous Region of Murcia, who have begun to support a movement "bottom-up" started especially within the schools, and which has been able to promote the creation of a Coordination Commission for Ciez@net, where there is a representation of the political parties, the trade unions, the economic forces of the town, the small enterprises, and where there is a wish to work by a majority consensus, which, among other things, is how the Internet was created. One has only to recall the working method of the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF). My personal opinion is that the subject does not have the agility that it ought to, perhaps because the rhythms of the different components of the project have not advanced at the same speed. The only personal experience that I can bring here, is that if they managed the involvement in these citizens networks from the grass roots of major interest, i.e. primary school students, from fourteen to twenty years, intermediate school students and, naturally, university students, together with the municipal services, which more than ever are in need of modernization, and the Regional Governments, it would be possible to go ahead at a faster speed and perhaps with greater success within a model that is being outlined more clearly every day. The report from this Committee could become a dynamic launchpad for the Spanish mayors, for the Autonomous Governments, the Universities and those Teaching and Learning groups who are very much involved in the improvements of the civic electronic communication networks.
I do not have any magic recipes, I only have intuitions, and I shall now elaborate specifically on some of them in the context of their "pros and cons". It concerns a certain negative aspect of the Internet. In the summer, on the last day of August, and published September the 1st on the front pages of the leading newspapers in the world, a report worth 1.5 million dollars from the Carnegie Mellon University of Pittsburgh was revealed. Drawn up at the request of the most important companies in the sector, such as Apple Computer, AT&T Research, Bell Atlantic, Intel Corp., Hewlett Packard, Lotus, NSF, Nippon TT, Panasonic Technologies ..., etc., its conclusions posed a serious question about the Internet, which has not yet been confirmed at a larger scale. Allow me, gentlemen, to make another last digression concerning this subject, which may be of interest for the report of this Committee.
It is my impression that we only know the tip of the iceberg of the Internet phenomenon that is becoming generalized in recent years. We do not know its social impact, nor its economic or political repercussions. We do not even know how to handle it. In the Board of Trustees of the "Internet Society" we have very serious problems with the domains, and even more so with how to wrest them from the US Administration. On the other hand, there are freedoms so new in the Internet that we still do not know how to manage them. Therefore, it is a good thing that reflections and positions come up at this time of social change - as Senator González Pons repeated yesterday in Barcelona -, but the consequences of which we cannot even foresee. If the report from the Carnegie Mellon University says that at a low-level usage of the Internet, on certain occasions and at some ages produces a dependency, a certain isolation - the psychological effects are much more difficult to judge -, they are very serious matters that should be taken into consideration, in order to rectify them and in any case consider how to avoid them. Perhaps there are already paths to follow. For instance, without going any further, within the international "non-profit" network which maintains "Sí, Spain", we are about fifteen persons working from ten different cities, in four countries and at two continents. Almost all of us know each other, and we have distributed our workload spontaneously and voluntarily among ourselves. Its is evident, as we have said, that inside a network where the agents know each other, it works in a different and more positive way than in a network where they not know each other.
Although I may be considered too reiterative in doing so, I would like to repeat once again that we are at a time when the report that you intend to prepare is becoming increasingly necessary. I is highly possible that it will also be a pioneering Report, and perhaps it will contain a vision of "tomorrow's truth" or the truth that is still being created "half-way", but where the word and concept of Utopia will often be essential.
I would also like to reflect upon which kind of human prototype emerges from the Internet, or produces and diffuses it. "Wired" magazine has published a splendid article last August, entitled "The Digital Citizen", whose outlines I would like to go through now together with you, while adding some further details.
In general, those people who work around the Internet have a certain dose of optimism, and think that human intelligence can overcome the global challenges. At the same time, they possess a high degree of intercultural tolerance and an excellent civic-mindedness, being drastically committed to the change that is already taking place. I would take the liberty of adding some further points about this: It is that one learns how to work as a team, in an attitude of constant education and learning, and being open to a gradual development. Today I do not at all think the same about the Internet as I did in 1994, when we created "Sí, Spain".
I would like to conclude this address the same way as Aurelio Peccei did it in the report to the Club of Rome in 1978: "No Limits to Learning". If one has got that attitude towards learning, we may progress at I do not know what speed, although I have the intuition that they will be different speeds from those we have known up to now. You have seen it in this Committee, which began its work in March, and I do not know how many appearances it has already had, as well as the broad attraction it is causing.
I would therefore like to conclude this presentation in the most practical and possible way, trying to communicate with you what I have learned at Ciez@net: Because, although it is a very recent, small and young experience, it might be useful to present it to this Committee. At the outset of the Ciez@net we made an analysis at the end of last year in which we saw the necessity of taking the following steps: In the first place, inform the citizens of what was being planned, in order to proceed immediately with education, beginning with the education of educators, i.e. teachers. Cieza has got many educational institutions of high quality and perhaps some of the best in the Autonomous Region of Murcia. Then would follow education. Primary education, secondary education, education in and from the people. The next objective for the project would be the municipal services. I have seen in towns like Silkeborg or Næstved, in Denmark, that they have halls almost the size of this one filled with PCs where the municipal employees spend more than one hour everyday learning. The same thing goes on in municipal libraries. It is therefore, I repeat, a process of information, teaching, education, special attention to municipal services as well as to the communities of physically and psychically handicapped people, to whom these networks are truly invaluable, not only for their social rehabilitation but also for the possibility of finding youth employment. It would also be useful to bring before this Committee the ONCE, in order that they may tell you, if they have not already done so, about the wide activities that they are displaying on the networks. The services to small and medium enterprises should also be a priority to stimulate commerce. In Infoville, at Villena, this has been done in a spectacular way: They have sold shoes even to Australia, but I am not quite sure whether this is what the small towns need, or if it is more important to provide incentives to create enterprises, nor how to help the existing ones, etc. Neither should one forget the leisure and recreational services on the civic networks, such as seeing a movie, listening to music or watching sports. They are all services that can be incorporated into these citizens' networks. But in order to firmly support these networks, a good and stable tripod is required. As I see it, the first leg is the world of education, the university, primary and secondary schools. I remind you once again that the Internet has emanated from the University, and that everything involved with research means giving it a complete priority to that attitude of permanent education, which is essential for the civic networks. The second support is undoubtedly the associations, and together with them the Municipal services. The third leg of the tripod is the Government and also the Autonomous Governments, even more so in these times of highly necessary decentralization.
BTW, I would like to ask you to forgive me for having asked you to have this equipment at hand to connect us with the Internet and no having done so. If you wish, gentlemen, and if it is convenient during the question time, we may have a look at the Spanish Embassy "on-line" in Denmark, or I could show some directories of "Sí, Spain" 2.1.
Please excuse me for having exceeded the time, and I thank you very much for your attention.