prompt_front: Now, answer the following question based on the text below, only give me the answer and do not output any other words.

Question: In which electorate was Simon English elected to the New Zealand Parliament?

Read the following text and answer briefly.

Context 1: Sir Simon William English  (born 30 December 1961) is a New Zealand former National Party politician who served as the 39th prime minister of New Zealand from 2016 to 2017  He had previously served as the 17th deputy prime minister of New Zealand and minister of finance from 2008 to 2016 under John Key and the Fifth National Government 

A farmer and public servant before entering politics, English was elected to the New Zealand Parliament in  as the National Party's candidate in the Wallace electorate  He was elevated to Cabinet in 1996 and in 1999 was made minister of finance, although he served for less than a year due to his party's loss at the 1999 general election  In October 2001, English replaced Jenny Shipley as the leader of the National Party (and consequently as Leader of the Opposition)  He led the party to its worst defeat at the 2002 general election, and as a consequence, in October 2003 he was replaced as leader by Don Brash 

In November 2006, after Brash's resignation, English became deputy leader under John Key  After National's victory at the 2008 general election, he became deputy prime minister and was also made minister of finance for the second time  Under English's direction New Zealand's economy maintained steady growth during National's three terms of government  He became a list-only MP after stepping down as an electorate MP at the 2014 general election 

John Key resigned as leader of the National Party and prime minister in December 2016  English won the resulting leadership election unopposed and was sworn in as prime minister on 12 December 2016  His tenure was only ten months, and included a three-month election campaign  In the 2017 general election, National won the largest number of seats but fell short of a majority  The parties holding the balance of power declined to support the existing government, and English was subsequently replaced as prime minister by Jacinda Ardern, leader of the Labour Party  English initially continued on as Leader of the Opposition, but resigned as leader of the National Party on 27 February 2018 and left parliament two weeks later 

Early life
English was born on 30 December 1961 at Lumsden Maternity Centre in Lumsden  He is the eleventh of twelve children of Mervyn English and Norah (née O'Brien) English  His parents purchased Rosedale, a mixed sheep and cropping farm in Dipton, Southland from Mervyn's uncle, Vincent English, a bachelor, in 1944  English was born in the maternity unit at Lumsden 

English attended St Thomas's School in Winton, then boarded at St  Patrick's College in Upper Hutt, where he became head boy  He played in the first XV of the school's rugby team  English went on to study commerce at the University of Otago, where he was a resident at Selwyn College, and then completed an honours degree in English literature at Victoria University of Wellington 

After finishing his studies, English returned to Dipton and farmed for a few years  From 1987 to 1989, he worked in Wellington as a policy analyst for the New Zealand Treasury, at a time when the free market policies favoured by Labour's finance minister Roger Douglas (known collectively as "Rogernomics") were being implemented 

English joined the National Party in 1980, while at Victoria University  He served for a period as chairman of the Southland branch of the Young Nationals, and became a member of the Wallace electorate committee  After moving to Wellington, he served for periods on the Island Bay and Miramar electorate committees, respectively 

Fourth National Government (1990–1999)

At the 1990 general election, English stood as the National candidate in Wallace, replacing the retiring Derek Angus, and was elected with a large majority  He would hold this seat, renamed Clutha-Southland in 1996, until 2014  He and three other newly elected National MPs (Tony Ryall, Nick Smith, and Roger Sowry) were soon identified as rising stars in New Zealand politics, and at various points were dubbed the "brat pack", the "gang of four", and the "young Turks"  In his first term in parliament, English chaired a select committee into social services  He was made a parliamentary under-secretary in 1993, serving under the Minister of Health 

First period in cabinet (1996–1999)
In early 1996, English was elevated to cabinet by Prime Minister Jim Bolger, becoming the Minister for Crown Health Enterprises and Associate Minister of Education (to Wyatt Creech)  He was 34 at the time, becoming the cabinet's youngest member  After the 1996 general election, the National Party was forced into a coalition with New Zealand First to retain government  In the resulting cabinet reshuffle, English emerged as Minister of Health  However, as a condition of the coalition agreement, NZ First's Neil Kirton (a first-term MP) was made Associate Minister of Health, effectively becoming English's deputy  This arrangement was described in the press as a "shotgun marriage", and there were frequent differences of opinion between the two ministers  After their relationship became unworkable, Kirton was sacked from the role in August 1997, with the agreement of NZ First leader Winston Peters 

As Minister of Health, English was responsible for continuing the reforms to the public health system that National had begun after the 1990 general election  The reforms were unpopular, and health was perceived as one of the government's weaknesses, with the health portfolio consequently being viewed as a challenge  English believed that the unpopularity of the reforms was in part due to a failure in messaging, and encouraged his National colleagues to avoid bureaucratic and money-focused language (such as references to "balance sheets" and "user charges") and instead talk about the improvements to services the government's reforms would bring  He also rejected the idea that public hospitals could be run as commercial enterprises, a view which some of his colleagues had previously promoted 

By early 1997, as dissatisfaction with Bolger's leadership began to grow, English was being touted as a potential successor, along with Jenny Shipley and Doug Graham  His age (35) was viewed as the main impediment to a successful leadership run  National's leadership troubles were resolved in December 1997, when Bolger resigned and Shipley was elected to the leadership unopposed  English had been a supporter of Bolger as leader, but Shipley reappointed him Minister of Health in her new cabinet 

English was promoted to Minister of Finance in a reshuffle in January 1999, a position which was at the time subordinate to the Treasurer, Bill Birch  After a few months, the pair switched positions as part of Birch's transition to retirement, with English assuming the senior portfolio  In early interviews, he emphasised his wish to be seen as a pragmatist rather than an ideologue, and said that the initiatives of some of his predecessors (Roger Douglas's "Rogernomics" and Ruth Richardson's "Ruthanasia") had focused on "fruitless, theoretical debates" when "people just want to see problems solved" 

Opposition (1999–2008)

After the National Party lost the 1999 election to Helen Clark's Labour Party, English continued on in the shadow cabinet as National's spokesperson for finance  He was elected deputy leader of the party in February 2001, following the resignation of Wyatt Creech, with Gerry Brownlee being his unsuccessful opponent 

Leader of the Opposition
In October 2001, after months of speculation, Jenny Shipley resigned as leader of the National Party after being told she no longer had the support of the party caucus  English was elected as her replacement unopposed (with Roger Sowry as his deputy), and consequently became Leader of the Opposition  However, he did not openly organise against Shipley, and according to The Southland Times "there was almost an element of 'aw, shucks, I'll do it then' about Mr English's ascension" 

Aged 39 when he was elected, English became the second-youngest leader in the National Party's history, after Jim McLay (who was 38 when elected in 1984)  He also became only the third Southlander to lead a major New Zealand political party, after Joseph Ward and Adam Hamilton  However, English failed to improve the party's performance  In the 2002 election, National suffered its worst electoral defeat ever, gaining barely more than twenty percent of the vote  English described it as "the worst day of my political life"  Both party insiders and the general public were split as to how much to blame him for the loss, but most of the party believed that English would be able to rebuild National's support 

By late 2003, however, National's performance in opinion polls remained poor  The party had briefly increased its popularity in the year following the election, but by October its support had fallen to levels only slightly better than what it achieved in the last ballot  English also appeared in a boxing match for a charity against entertainer Ted Clarke  This did not boost his polling or that of the National party either, with suggestions that it devalued his image as a serious politician  Don Brash, former governor of the Reserve Bank and a relative newcomer to politics, began to build up support to replace English  On 28 October, Brash gained sufficient backing in Caucus to defeat English in a leadership contest 

Shadow cabinet roles and deputy leader
On 2 November 2003, when Brash changed responsibilities for certain MPs, English became National's spokesman for education, ranked at fifth place in the party's parliamentary hierarchy  He remained in parliament after the 2005 election  In his new shadow education portfolio, English performed strongly, and remained a party favourite despite his election defeat as leader in 2002, eventually being returned to the finance portfolio in August 2004 as deputy spokesman (while still retaining responsibility for education) 

In November 2006, Brash resigned as leader  English was considered as a potential replacement leader (running against John Key) or deputy leader (against incumbent Gerry Brownlee) in the ensuing leadership election  However, a contest was avoided when the MPs agreed a Key/English ticket would run unopposed in a display of party unity  English took over the deputy leadership and the finance portfolio in the Key shadow cabinet 

Fifth National Government (2008–2017)

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance (2008–2016)

At the 2008 election, English was re-elected by his electorate, winning by a margin of about 15,500 votes  He became Deputy Prime Minister of New Zealand and Minister of Finance in the fifth National Government, being sworn into office on 19 November 2008 and continued to serve in those roles until becoming Prime Minister on 12 December 2014  He was also made Minister of Infrastructure in National's first term of government and Minister responsible for Housing New Zealand Corporation and minister responsible for the New Zealand flag consideration process in its third 

He was comfortably re-elected in Clutha-Southland in the 2011 election but opted to run as a party-list candidate in 2014  

The pairing of John Key as leader of the National Party and English as his deputy has been compared to that of Bob Hawke and Paul Keating (in Australia) and Tony Blair and Gordon Brown (in the UK) 

English acceded to the role of Finance Minister in the continuing wake of the financial crisis  In response to New Zealand's rising debt, English made budget deficit-reduction his main priority  His first budget outlined three focuses in New Zealand's financial recovery: "improving the business environment and removing roadblocks to growth; investment in productive infrastructure; and improving the way government works"  One of his first acts was creating the National Infrastructure Unit, charged with formulating a plan for infrastructure projects and investments  He commissioned a government-wide spending review, with an aim to reducing government expenditure—with the exceptions of a two-year stimulus package and long-term increases on infrastructure spending 

In April 2011, the Opposition criticised English for suggesting that New Zealand businesses could use New Zealand's low wages to help it compete with Australia  The National Government campaigned for re-election in 2011 on its economic record  The Government boasted growth for five consecutive quarters up to mid-2010, totalling 1 6% of real GDP 

Strong growth resulted in a surplus of $473 million for the 2015/16 financial year, projected to rise to $8 5 billion by 2020/21  In his 2016 Economic and Fiscal Update address, English stated that reducing debt and tackling the costs of the 2016 Kaikōura earthquake were higher priorities than reducing rates of tax 

Allowances issue
In 2009, the media, including TVNZ and TV3 revealed that English was receiving about NZ$900 a week as part of a living allowance for ministers, to live in his own NZ$1 2 million Wellington home  At the time, English also received $276,200 in his annual salary as Deputy Prime Minister  It was also revealed other ministers with homes in the capital city were also claiming accommodation allowances  On 3 August 2009, Prime Minister John Key started a review of the housing allowances claimed by cabinet ministers  English subsequently paid back $12,000 and only claimed about $24,000 a year in living allowances  The Auditor-General's office said in September 2009 that they were making "preliminary enquiries" into parliamentary housing expenses in response to a letter of complaint from Progressive party leader Jim Anderton  Two days later English stated that he would no longer take up any housing allowance and had paid back all the allowance he had received since the November 2008 election 

Prime Minister (2016–2017)

John Key resigned on 12 December, and endorsed English as his successor in the resulting leadership election  Following the drop-out of both Judith Collins and Jonathan Coleman from the leadership election, English was sworn in as the 39th Prime Minister of New Zealand on 12 December 2016 

English appointed his first cabinet on 18 December  In a reshuffle, he appointed Steven Joyce to succeed him as Finance Minister, while most ministerial portfolios remained the same 

In February 2017, English did not attend Waitangi Day commemorations at the historic treaty grounds, reportedly in response to the Ngāpuhi iwi's decision to stop the Prime Minister from speaking at the marae  Ngāpuhi have protested the Government's negotiation of the Trans Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA), which the iwi believe infringes upon Māori sovereignty, and thus does not adhere to the Treaty of Waitangi  English had been invited to attend in an official capacity; his non-attendance was criticised by a Ngāpuhi elder and Opposition leader Andrew Little 

In his first overseas trip as Prime Minister, English travelled to Europe to discuss trade ties, including a prospective New Zealand–European Union free trade agreement  He first travelled to London on 13 January 2017 to meet British Prime Minister Theresa May  Discussing trade relations, English said the two nations were "natural partners" and would "continue to forge ties" after the UK's withdrawal from the EU  He also arranged to meet with London Mayor Sadiq Khan, Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel and German Chancellor Angela Merkel   In a meeting with Merkel, English received crucial backing from Germany for a trade deal with the EU  On 16 January, English stated that his government would continue to promote TPPA, despite the United States' decision to withdraw from the agreement  He explained that Southeast Asian countries would now be treated as a priority in negotiations—he also asserted that the United States was ceding influence to China by its rejection of the trade pact 

At a press conference at the Beehive on 1 February 2017, English announced that the 2017 general election would be held on 23 September  The Prime Minister later confirmed that his party would approach ACT, United Future and the Māori Party if confidence and supply agreements were required to form a government following the election  In his second cabinet reshuffle on 24 April, English appointed Gerry Brownlee as his new Foreign Affairs Minister; he also promoted Nikki Kaye to the portfolio of Education Minister, and moved Mark Mitchell into the cabinet to become Defence Minister  The reshuffle was perceived as an election preparation 

On 13 February 2017, English welcomed Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull to Wellington  The two leaders reaffirmed their shared trade agenda, and discussed changes to the Australian citizenship pathway which will affect permanent residents originating from New Zealand 

On 19 June, it was reported that Todd Barclay, who succeeded English as MP for Clutha-Southland, had clandestinely recorded one of his employee's conversations the previous year, and that John Key's leaders' budget was used to pay a confidential settlement after the employee resigned  English admitted that he had been aware of the illegal recording and the settlement, and thus implicated in the scandal 

During the 2017 National campaign launch, English introduced a $379 million social investment package including digital learning academies for high school students, more resources for mathematics, and boosting support for teaching second languages in schools, and maintaining National Standards in the school curriculum  Prime Minister English also sought to defend National's financial management and economic track record and claimed that the opposition Labour Party would raise taxes  Early opinion polling had forecast a poor showing in the election for the Labour Party, but in early August 37-year-old Jacinda Ardern took over as Labour leader and seemingly energised younger voters 

At the 2017 general election, National won the largest share of the party vote (44 4%) and the largest number of seats (56) in the House Representatives  However, National lacked enough seats to govern alone due to two of the party's support partners, the Māori Party and United Future, losing their parliamentary seats  In response, English stated that the party would be entering into talks to form a coalition with New Zealand First  Following talks with the two largest parties, New Zealand First entered a coalition arrangement with the Labour Party  English was succeeded as prime minister by Jacinda Ardern on 26 October 

Opposition (2017–2018)

Leader of the Opposition
English was re-elected as National Party leader on 24 October 2017  At the time of his re-election, English announced his intention to stay on as leader until the next general election  On 13 February 2018, however, he stood down as National Party leader due to personal reasons, and instructed the party to put into motion the processes to elect a new leader  He also retired from Parliament  English's resignation followed weeks of speculation that he would step aside for a new leader  On 27 February, he was succeeded as party leader by Simon Bridges as the result of the leadership election held that day 

Post-premiership 
In 2018, English joined the board of Australian conglomerate, Wesfarmers  English serves in Chairmanships of Mount Cook Alpine Salmon, Impact Lab Ltd and Manawanui Support Ltd  He is also a director of The Instillery, Centre for Independent Studies and The Todd Corporation Limited, and is a member of the Impact Advisory Group of Macquarie Infrastructure and Real Assets 

Political and social views

English is regarded as more socially conservative than his predecessor, John Key  He has stated his opposition to voluntary euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide, same-sex civil unions, and the decriminalisation of prostitution  As Prime Minister he opposed any "liberalisation" of abortion law 

In 2004, English voted against a bill to establish civil unions for both same-sex and opposite-sex couples  In 2005, he voted for the Marriage (Gender Clarification) Amendment Bill, which would have amended the Marriage Act to define marriage as only between a man and a woman  English voted against the Marriage (Definition of Marriage) Amendment Bill, a bill that legalised same-sex marriage in New Zealand  However, in December 2016 he stated, "I'd probably vote differently now on the gay marriage issue  I don't think that gay marriage is a threat to anyone else's marriage" 

In 2009, English voted against the Misuse of Drugs (Medicinal Cannabis) Amendment Bill, a bill aimed at amending the Misuse of Drugs Act so that cannabis could be used for medical purposes 

Personal life 
English met his future wife, Mary Scanlon, at university  She was studying medicine at the time, and became a general practitioner  Both her parents were immigrants, her father being Samoan and her mother Italian, born on the island of Stromboli  They have six children: a daughter and five sons 

English is a practising Roman Catholic, but has stated that he considers his religious beliefs personal and thus separate from politics 

In June 2002, English took part in TV3's Fight For Life, a celebrity boxing fundraiser to raise money for the Yellow Ribbon anti-youth-suicide campaign, influenced by the death of a teenage nephew in 1997  He lost a split decision to former university colleague Ted Clarke 

Honours
In the 2018 Queen's Birthday Honours, English was appointed a Knight Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit, for services of over 27 years to the State 

See also

List of New Zealand governments
Politics of New Zealand

References

External links

Profile at National Party 
Profile on Parliament nz
Releases and speeches at Beehive govt nz

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1961 births
21st-century New Zealand politicians
Candidates in the 2017 New Zealand general election
Deputy Prime Ministers of New Zealand
Leaders of the Opposition (New Zealand)
Living people
Members of the Cabinet of New Zealand
Members of the New Zealand House of Representatives
New Zealand farmers
New Zealand finance ministers
New Zealand list MPs
New Zealand MPs for South Island electorates
New Zealand National Party MPs
New Zealand National Party leaders
New Zealand Roman Catholics
New Zealand people of Irish descent
People educated at St  Patrick's College, Silverstream
People from Dipton, New Zealand
People from Lumsden, New Zealand
Prime Ministers of New Zealand
University of Otago alumni
Victoria University of Wellington alumni
Knights Companion of the New Zealand Order of Merit
New Zealand politicians awarded knighthoods
Context 2: HOFFMAN: I'm delighted to introduce the chair of the last session, Mara Liasson from the National Public Radio  Mara is Congressional correspondent for NPR, and covers activities in Congress in D C  Right now, this week, she has been covering the tax bill, which people currently are going at hot and heavy  She took time off from her busy schedule to come here to help us sort out some of these key issues for today, and more importantly, for what happens in the next decade and beyond  I'll turn it over to Mara to get the panel going 
LIASSON: Thank you very much  I am probably the only person here who has absolutely no background in technology  Anyway, I am the only one who does not understand what the panelists are going to be talking about (laughter), and although they have already told me that they do not appreciate people who think that that's a great quality and look down on people who are technical, and I certainly do not, I will reserve the right to insist that they all talk in terms that people like me can understand, since there is more of me out there than you, although not in this room today  (laughter) What we are going to do is introduce each panelist, and each one will make a short three- to five-minute presentation  Then my instructions say that we are going to have a McLaughlin Group discussion, which I guess means lots of yelling and screaming and talking at once  (laughter) After that's over, about 4:10, we'll open up the panel for questions from the audience 
To my left is Peter Denning, who is Chairman of the Computer Science Department at George Mason University and also the associate dean for computing  He is the program chair of this conference, has also served as the president of ACM, and he is currently the editor of Communications 
Simon Davies, to my right, also wears blue suits, but you can tell him from Mitch, because he wears a white hat  (laughter) He is from Sydney, Australia, and is the Director General of Privacy International, which is an international network of privacy advocates  He is also an author, a journalist, and radio commentator 
To his right is Roland Homet  He is an information policy writer and thinker who recently opened his own public policy writing firm here in Washington -- it's called Executive Ink, not Inc , as it is written in your programs, so you can scratch that out 
Esther Dyson, at the end of the panel, is among the most respected commentators on developing technology trends in the personal computer business  She publishes two newsletters, Release 1 0 and Rel-EAST  She has also been one of the driving forces promoting East-West relations through computer networks  She is a board member of the Electronic Frontier Foundation as well 
I'll ask Peter to start 
P  DENNING: Thank you  Starting around 1850, people of many countries looked to their governments to regulate commerce, erase inequities, and build societies of better human beings  For over a hundred years, many people, from peasants to intellectuals, had faith that strong governments would bring them a better life  This faith was part of the clearing in which Communist governments flourished; although the United States took an anti-Communist stand, the same faith fostered a strong government that promised salvation by great national programs including Social Security, welfare, food stamps, the War on Poverty, and the Great Society  This faith is now shattered  People no longer trust that powerful government can deliver a better life 
The dramatic collapse of Communism in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union illustrates this, as does the growing disillusionment of the American people for federal, state, and local governments  The poor track record of government is not the only reason for the shift  Information technology has accelerated the process  Communications that took weeks in the last century now take fractions of a second  Business success depends on what happens around the globe, not only on local conditions  Radio, TV, fax, and now E-mail are common worldwide, so much so that not even a powerful government can control what information its citizens have  Because the space of opportunity for people to engage in transactions with each other has been so enormously enlarged during the past decade, faith in marketplace democracies is on the rise worldwide; correspondingly faith in central management mechanisms is on the decline  This shift has brought with it a shift of the power of institutions  Government institutions tend to try to hold onto their power by regulatory coercion to enforce the old ways  This can produce big tensions and even promote breakage 
Nowhere can this be seen more clearly than in the cryptographic area which we have just been talking about in the previous hour  This technology, cryptography, produces mechanisms for digital signatures, authentication, electronic money, certificates, and private communication -- all offering a way for standard business practices now based on paper to be shifted into the electronic media  The success of worldwide enterprises depends on this shift being completed rapidly and effectively  As more people realize this, the momentum for incorporating cryptographic technology into the information infrastructure is accelerating 
In this country, the National Security Agency has long been given the authority to regulate cryptography  This authority was granted in another time when the success of the country depended upon the ability of its government to gather intelligence and communicate in secret  These premises made sense in a world where most of the power resided in governments, but the world is changing  Much economic power is now accumulating in large apolitical transnational corporations  These corporations place their own concerns and strategies ahead of those of governments of the countries in which they do business  Like governments, they are interested in gathering intelligence about competitors and in conducting business in private  Unlike governments, they want open access to the technologies of authentication, electronic money, digital signatures, and certificates that will allow them to conduct business transactions across the network  So it is no longer true that national power and national security are increased when government has the sole right to gather intelligence and encipher communications  Now the strength of a country depends not only on its government, but also on its corporations  The old premises have fallen away in the new reality, but the old policy remains  It's time to rethink the policy, before tensions between a threatened government and corporations produce significant social tension and perhaps breakage 
Well, digital media -- computer-based communications -- are the printing press of the 21st century, and as the printing press transformed society, created the modern individual, gave rise to the basis of the democratic state and to the notion of individual rights, I suspect that we will see a similar, radical transformation of the very constitution of global society in the next century, facilitated by this enabling technology  I would be the last person to try to sketch out the details, or tell you what the issues are going to be, but I want to share with you some feelings about what is really going to matter, as we go about this -- and I'll start with something about myself 
You see a guy wearing a suit; most of you know I have a lot of money -- I'm a successful businessman  God knows what images propagate around the media and settle in people's minds, but I've always seen myself, and felt myself to the core of my being, as an outsider, every bit as much as a self-proclaimed outsider, as Tom Jennings -- who spoke so eloquently about this at the Pioneer awards* yesterday -- was  *The Electronic Freedom Foundation presented its first awards at a related, adjacent reception which was not formally a part of the conference 
I think we are all outsiders; we are all different, all unique  We're not the same  We share an underlying common humanity, but we should not be asked to subjugate ourselves to some form of mass society that causes us each to become indistinguishable from one another  I believe that computer- based communications technology is an enabling technology to liberate individuals and to free us from the oppressive influence of large institutions, whether those are public or private  And I am talking about an economic restructuring that results in a much more decentralized society, and social restructuring in an affirmation of the simple right to be left alone  I think Cyberspace is good for individuals, and I think that's important  I also think that the flip side of the coin, the creation of community, which we so sorely lack in this country today, can be facilitated through these technologies 
I have experienced that for myself, as many of you have on your various computer networks on conferencing systems like the WELL  It is enormously liberating to overcome the artificial boundaries of space and time  We are prisoners of geography in the physical world, and our communities are largely a product of who we can see face to face each day, even though our real comrades and colleagues may be scattered all over the world and our interests -- whether they are hobbies or political interests or religious interests, whatever they might be -- can be facilitated if we are able to get in touch with, to form bonds with, to exchange views and ideas with other kindred spirits  And I believe this technology is an enabling technology for the formation of community  My hope is that we will have the wisdom to create policies which enable individuals to flourish free from the chains of mass society, and which enable voluntary communities of people, individuals, groups who come together to be with each other and to work together  I hope both of those become possible 
DAVIES: I feel very warmed by the various visions of the future that have come out of this conference, but I am a cynic, and cynicism is good, because it adds fiber  (laughter) How nice the world would be if everyone was like Mitch, but they're not, because the future is in the hands of ruthless, greedy little men 
I want to paint the vision of the future that I have, and I hope it's not too depressing because there is a future, a good future    possibly  I agree, as many of you do, that the future is going to be like some giant informational Yggdrasil* *Reference from Old Norse mythology -- the Yggdrasil was a giant ash tree whose roots held together the universe   We'll all be part of interconnectivity, the likes of which we can scarcely imagine right now  I imagine it will be like an organism where we're independent and interdependent, and so it's like a two-edged sword  That's all very nice, and we can see that we form part of that new community  But, I see a world with 15 billion beings scrambling for life, where four-fifths of the world lives on half a liter of water a day, where people grow up to see their children dying, where new political frontiers are destroying freedoms and the democracy that we have developed over the last two centuries  I see a world where there is very little hope for nearly everybody on the planet, except for the elite -- that's us -- except for those of us who are plugged into the informational Yggdrasil 
What I see is that 14 of those 15 billion people are a lot of pissed-off people who have their eyes set on what they see, not as a wonderful informational community, but as the beast  And they see that that is where the resources are, and that's where the opportunities are, and that's where the political power is  I can't see a future for us in a world where ultimately the great demon becomes information  It might be good for us, but for the disaffected four-fifths of the world, information is going to be something which, frankly, we can do without, because in a world with almost no resources left, surely information is selfishness 
HOMET: Thank you  I'm grateful to the organizers for including me in these proceedings -- they are reminiscent for me of some information policy conferences that I organized 15 to 20 years ago for the Aspen Institute  The particulars have certainly changed, but the dynamics remain much the same  For me, these are well-represented by Peter Denning's image of a changeable clearing in the woods  At any given time, as I see it, the clearing is an acceptable standoff between the forces of modernization and of traditional culture, between freedom and discipline, between structure and spontaneity  Now we voice these as opposites, but in fact, they need each other  It is the creative tension between technological innovation and established order that allows society to hold together and progress to take place  Take away freedom and order will be overthrown -- witness the Soviet Union  Take away tradition, and modernization will be crushed -- witness Iran  The clearing must be respected and it must move  Just as Benjamin Cardozo of the U S  Supreme Court said 65 years ago, the genius of the American system is its penchant for ordered liberty  When both halves of the equation work against each other and together in Hegelian terms, the clearing that they produce is, at any given time, a prevailing hypothesis, which is challenged by a new antithesis  Together they can produce a fresh synthesis  And all that is very familiar  What is new and trying is the sweep and pace of innovation today, plus -- and this is what we sometimes forget -- the political volatility of the value systems that this can induce  If you doubt that, consider the Buchanan campaign and what's been going on with the Endowment for the Arts and public broadcasting  These are signs of people running scared, and they can cause damage 
So the answer for the 21st century is to proceed under power, but with restraint, to practice what Mitch Kapor in another connection called toleration for opposing forces and perspectives  We need each other to keep the enterprise together and on course  For computer practitioners represented in this room, this means restraint from provoking unnecessary and damaging social backlash  A good example might be New York telcos offering free per-call and per-line blocking with this caller identification service  For regulators and law enforcers, restraint means asking, "Do you know enough to freeze emerging conduct in a particular form or pattern?" I was very taken by the role reversal exercise organized by Michael Gibbons on Wednesday night  It led me to wonder what might have happened to the government's wiretapping and encryption proposals had they been subjected to a comparable advanced exercise before introduction 
Sixteen years ago in Aspen, Colorado, I convened a gathering of federal policymakers and invited them to consider a suggested matrix of policy values and processes in the information society  The first two of those values -- it will not surprise you to know -- were freedom of discourse and individual privacy  But there were more: freedom of economic choice is one; the general welfare another; popular sovereignty, worth pausing on, I described as avoiding concentrations of economic and political power in any sector of industry or government that impinge unduly on the freedoms or welfare of the citizenry  And then there is progress, social progress, the fostering, I said, of market incentives and opportunities for technological and service innovations and for widened consumer choice among technologies and services  Now obviously if you give just a moment's thought to it, you will recognize, as I think we have in this conference, that these values can collide with each other at key points, and therefore accommodations must be made  For that we need processes of accommodation  I also suggested some of those  After you identify the relevant values and goals, you then should ask yourself about the necessity and the appropriateness of having government make any decision on the matter  And this has to do with such things like the adequacy of decision-making standards, the availability of adequate information, and the adequacy of personnel resources to deal with it  Then you get into dividing up the possible roles of the various elements of government -- the regulatory agencies, the Executive Branch, the Judiciary, and the Congress  It doesn't stop there, because you need to ask about international implications, which we have done some of here  And federal/state implications -- very often allowing the state to make a stab at social ordering in the first instance is, as Justice Brandeis often said, the best way, through the social laboratory technique, to try out what is the right answer, without endangering the whole society  And as we have heard today, we need also to think about the availability of non-coercive instruments of accommodation, like a federal data protection board 
DYSON: I want to just say one thing about this business of crypto technology -- it is a very simple sentence, and everyone seems to slip slightly by it; that is, if you outlaw guns, only outlaws will have guns  Crypto technology is fundamentally a defensive weapon  It may protect murderers and thieves, but it is not a weapon that murders, kills, does anything bad; and so it is a very different kettle of fish from any other kind of weapon  The whole point is that information is powerful, and that the free flow of information, privacy-protected, empowers the powerless and is dangerous to the powerful -- and that's why we need our privacy protected 
Now let me just talk a wee bit about the future  A couple of days ago, a reporter called me and asked what the EFF stood for  I kind of floundered around and said, "Well, we want privacy, we want good hackers to be protected and bad crackers to be punished  We want people to understand the difference, and we want all these good things, but we really don't want to grab power " The guy kept on not quite getting it  The real answers were pro choice  We don't want someone else to make all these decisions for anybody  We don't even want the majority to rule  In every way that is possible, we want the minorities to control their own conditions in their own lives  There are very few things that are the province of government, but way too many things nowadays are being given to the government carelessly, fearfully, whatever  In my terms -- and I happen to be a right-wing person in terms of the economy and private freedoms -- I want more markets and fewer governments  Markets give choices to individuals  They let people trade what they don't want for what they do want  Again, to the extent possible, they want people to make individual choices 
What worries me is large concentrations of power, making choices for people  Big business, big government, even big media  The media until now have mostly been our protectors, because they go out and produce information, they use anonymous sources where necessary, and they make that information free  What protected global networking is going to do is give more and more of that power to individuals, and help reduce the power of big institutions of any kind  We are going to have small businesses flourishing, because it is easier for them to collect resources  You don't need to have a giant monolithic corporation to be efficient any more, and so a lot of marketplace economies of scale will even disappear, as we have better networking, better coordination  We have markets like the American Information Exchange, and if you don't know what that is, come and see me, or Hugh Daniel, or a couple of other people 
On the social side, I think 20 years ago    when you mentioned 15 years ago, I thought, Yes, that must have been about 1940  Then I realized    Anyway, some time ago there was all this talk about the global village  We're going to have mass broadcasting, we're going to have mass E-mail, we're going to have this global village  We don't  What we have is a lot of global villages, but as Mitch said, they're no longer geographical, physical villages  They're small, geographical villages of people with like interests  The big question becomes, How do we avert tribalism? It might not be nation against nation any more, but it certainly will be rich against poor, and franchised versus disenfranchised 
LIASSON: Thank you all very much  Now we can all try to stir up the pot a little bit  Somewhere between Mitch's paradise and the Simon's apocalypse is probably what's really going to happen  I want to just jump off from what Esther said about you all being in a minority and what kind of responsibility you owe to the rest of the world  We're in the midst of a presidential election and not one single candidate has said anything about Cyberspace  I am wondering if you think they should, and what are the kinds of extremely important issues that you think should be discussed? Should they be discussed in a kind of mass, political forum? Or should they be left to an elite like you to discuss and decide, and not really spend a whole lot of energy trying to translate or disseminate them to the great masses of people? I guess what I am wondering is, if you were an advisor to one of the presidential candidates, or a candidate yourself, how would you go about interjecting these things? Or wouldn't you bother at all?
DYSON: Does he want to get elected, or does he want to make a point?
LIASSON: I think he wants to make a point  If he wants to get elected, I think the discussion would stop right now 
DYSON: Let me just try a serious answer  I think what a candidate could say is, "I'm no longer going to protect the textile industry, the peanut butter interests, the sugar guys, the antediluvian steel mills  If I'm going to have an industrial policy and help anyone, it's going to be new technology  I'm going to focus on investment in R&D  I am going to create a national infrastructure for telecommunications, just the way we created a highway system years ago  I'm going to put people to work doing these things " I think that would go over reasonably well  I think it's something most of us would agree on  (laughter) We have an industrial policy -- we might as well acknowledge it, and we might as well have it be forward-looking 
KAPOR: Now there is something about the question as to whether this is presidential material that I think is ironic, given that most people really want to vote for "none of the above " We know in our hearts that we have come to a particular period in history in which the presidential spectacle seems to be particularly irrelevant to whatever set of problems we have on our minds  As a great believer in democracy, I think this is incredibly lamentable  We need to do something about this, because there are a lot of issues, but Cyberspace is not ready for prime time  It would be trivialized -- I have seen what Geraldo did to hackers, and I don't need to see any more 
It seems to me that the presidential candidates are really not the leaders that they ought to be, but are always putting their finger to the wind to see if they can detect some current of values or beliefs that can help get them elected  And I think that -- I'm not espousing utopian vision -- there needs to be an utopian vision out there, so people have something to give them some inspiration  But values are a lot more important than technology  There are some values in this community -- and I'm not sure if it's an elite or a minority or both -- but it's really in the propagation of a sense of values about openness and tolerance, acting on that basis and living one's life, and saving capitalism from itself and things like that where we can make a difference  If some of the expressions are technological, that's fine  We are living in an era where people like buttons, and so on  If we do that well, the presidential candidates are going to be coming to us 
LIASSON: You talk about Cyberspace not being ready for prime time -- I still want a definition of Cyberspace in 25 words or less -- but I think you want to transform prime time to a certain extent 
DYSON: Mostly I agree with this, but the press does have two roles: one is collecting information and uncovering things, and the other is setting the agenda  If 12,000 voices are crying out, who's going to listen to them? Who's going to notice when they do discover that the President did something wrong? Again, it's a check and balance sort of thing, but there is a certain community that is created by collective media 
KAPOR: Esther, what makes you believe that in Cyberspace Mara won't have two hours a day of her own that everyone listens to  (laughter) She might get more time than she gets today, because people trust her 
DYSON: But then she becomes prime time 
LIASSON: But you said before that instead of one global village, we have a lot of little global villages  I'm wondering if instead, we won't have millions of little huts  I mean individual huts  There are just so many different choices 
LIASSON: What I'm wondering is, if everybody becomes their own producer, publisher, what does that mean for the future?
KAPOR: I think we'll get a much more fluid, self-organizing state  I don't think in practice everybody is going to be what we think of today as a broadcast publisher  I just want things to be able to sort themselves out in a much more equitable fashion  We have this enormous, artificial scarcity today over the means of communication, because the government awards licenses which self-perpetuate  They are about to do the same thing, and give every broadcast television station another license for HDTV



ground_truth: The Wallace electorate.

prompt_front: Now, answer the following question based on the text below, only give me the answer and do not output any other words.

Question: Who is the program chair of this conference?

Read the following text and answer briefly.

Context 2:  So if you've got a license today, you get a second one; if you don't have one, you get nothing  That is going to be our policy about HDTV  I think it would be a lot better if we had more markets, more choices, and better values  I don't know how to do better values, but we know how to do more choices  So the point is, we'll wind up with some new regime which I don't think that we can particularly predict  I don't think that it is going to be chaotic or anarchic  I think there is something about people as social animals or creatures -- we will create some new forms of social organization  There will be information middlemen; there will be the equivalent of editors and packagers  There will be trusted intermediaries who help organize these new media  If you open it up and equalize things so that everybody can participate, you will get more diversity of points of view, you will get less homogenization  One of the reasons that tons of people have just dropped out, or are in terminal couch-potato-dom is that the sets of choices and the values that come across the tube are not ones that stir the human heart  And people know that  They can't figure out what to do about that, so they sort of fuzz out on drugs and alcohol  I say let's edit TV, which is the electronic drug  Let's do something about that 
DAVIES: I like your idea, Mitch  I think it's sweet  (laughter) The problem is that I really worry that the ultimate test of the future is going to be the outcome of the quest, the battle between those who are looking for the sort of vision you've got of the right of the individual, the individual being the producer  And that, probably, is the way we solve our problems on this planet  But there is the other side, and that's the planetary managers  Planetary management is the path of the least resistance  You know all the powermongers go for the planetary management model, because they all think they can clamber over the bodies to get to the top  Ultimately the test is going to be who comes out on the top, the individual rightist or the planetary managers  Unfortunately, I'm not a betting man, but at the moment I'd like to bet on the planetary managers 
DYSON: Part of this issue is reducing the value of incumbency, whether it's incumbency in prime time live, or incumbency in the government  There is much more fluidity of movement; you can't accumulate power because the unorganized forces have more power than you do 
P  DENNING: I feel a little strange being on the left end of the stage, because most people think of me as being on the far right sometimes, but right now I'd like to comment on something that is halfway between what Mitch is saying, and what Simon is saying  The way I hear what Simon is saying, is that there is a disease of today which I will call inward- centeredness  We are very worried about ourselves and our organizations  We find in that orientation a lot of instability of things and technologies that change rapidly  In order to achieve the world that Mitch is talking about, we need to cure the disease, and instead come from an orientation that we could call outward-centeredness, instead of inward-centeredness  The question is the shift from, How do we accumulate power? to, How do we help others accumulate power? How do we go from looking for stability in things to looking for stability in relationships? In watching my own children grow up, I am convinced that they know more about this than I do  In listening to some of the younger people here, I'm more convinced that they know more about this than I do  They know something about the outward-centeredness that I have yet to learn  Observing this among children and among students gives me a lot of optimism, as a matter of fact, against the apocalypse that Simon talks about, because Simon is talking about the world that would be created if we continued "us," and I think that the world that is being created by our children with their outward-centeredness is going to be the kind of world that Mitch is pointing towards  And I am much more optimistic about that than Simon is 
LIASSON: Roland, I wonder if we can interject you into this discussion a little bit  You have been a policymaker  What can be done to make sure that Simon's vision doesn't come true, and something a little closer to what Esther and Mitch describe does happen?
HOMET: I think we probably need both doom seers and paradise seekers  We'll always have them, and we should have them  It's between the swing of those two views that things happen  I think that this notion of replacing the gatekeepers and letting everybody perform his own dance, to the amusement of those who chose to tune in, is one that many of us were promoting 20 years ago  That's not 1940 -- that's 1970 (laughter), and we were quite convinced that was likely to happen by the end of that decade  Now it's 12 years beyond the end of that decade, and we're nowhere near having that happening  We just have newly-named controversies, and so, as you heard me say in my little short remark, I think that our objective ought to be more modest, and that is to keep the questions open, not let them be foreclosed -- certainly not prematurely, and not on the basis of inadequate evidence  I would say something about the apocalyptic view, which is, I think there is a difference between information policy questions and welfare questions  The poor we have always with us, as somebody once said, and whether information, Cyberspace -- whatever you want to call it -- is promoted or not, that is true  It may become more glaringly true in an advanced information society, in which case, more may be done about it  So I wouldn't despair about that, and I wouldn't hold back on the development of instruments of interconnection simply because we can see that there is and will remain an underclass  Perhaps if we do the one, we'll be better equipped to do the other 
LIASSON: In just a minute or two, we're going to open this up to your questions, but I want to try to end maybe with a discussion of something quite specific, which is, Who should own the new infrastructure and information systems? Should they be publicly owned? There are lots of conflicts even within the vision that you lay out 
KAPOR: The first point I'd make is let's not make the unnecessary mistake of betting on a single infrastructure  Technologically, we don't need to do that  In the 1930s, pre-digital, the old Bell system was the social contract  You get a monopoly, you have an obligation to provide universal service  We've learned a few things about how to do things with interoperable standards and how to interconnect multiple, independent providers and carriers  One of the fathers of the Internet, Vint Cerf, is sitting here in the front row, and he deserves an enormous amount of credit for insisting on this vision and promulgating it  A lot of the risks that come with private ownership of infrastructure go away when it's no longer a monopoly  The abusive problems that are sometimes experienced with local phone service and cable companies -- both of which are private sector monopolies -- I would say come more from not their private sector character, but from their monopoly character  If it is possible for there to be competition, that serves as the most effective check that we know of in this society against abuse  So I would opt for private infrastructure, but lots of it  Government has to make sure that everybody stays interconnected -- it's the referee that keeps the playing field level, doesn't let people cheat, and sort of bangs a few heads together when people get a little too greedy, or a little too selfish  If we do that, that will provide for the most choice and the most diversity 
LIASSON: Are we all in agreement on that?
HOMET: Not entirely  I think the question is less who should own infrastructure than how it should be classified  There may be a role for government in, for example, extending communication pipes to rural America for at least a period, as with the TVA  We have always had that question  There has always been a mixed economy with government doing some things and private sector others  It's a debate and should be a debate about who does what best  It should be revised from time to time, but the important question is, If we get a significant distribution system like cable television, how should we classify it? I speak here from the heart, because 20 years ago, I was trying to fasten onto, or gain the recognition for, cable as a broadband distribution system which was only trivially in the program production and publishing business, but was very much in the distribution business and ought to have been treated as a common carrier open to all information suppliers  Had that happened, we would have been very much further along in the vision that some of us had 20 years ago  (applause) It tends to support what I said about not going in for premature freezing or characterization of how things look  It was decided, because the broadcasters felt threatened, to treat cable as a species of broadcasting  That's the greatest frittering away of resources in my lifetime, and perhaps in the lifetime of the United States of America  Let's not make that mistake again  Let's be clear-eyed and ask the broad-scale questions about public use and benefit  Thank you 
LIASSON: Let's open it up to the audience  If you have any questions     oh my God, wrestle your way to the microphone!
AUDIENCE MEMBER: Let us not forget the history of the commons in which a wealthy society creates in its overflowing abundance structures on which all people can participate  This was originally, back in medieval society, the structure that was created for the support of the poor  In the abundance of the land in which the overpopulation was not a question, and there was much agriculture to go around, and the poor were supported out of the commonly-owned things that were jointly owned by all society  That's all I have to say 
LIASSON: Who wants to start?
DAVIES: Sticking to my apocalyptic vision just for the moment, because that's how I'm characterized, what I would like to see, just as my own social experiment, if you like, is for the various groups that this room represents and groups that you are all involved in, is to actually set up the apocalyptic vision, and then see how you as part of the information technology community can utilize it, stop it, or reverse it  It's only when you see the vision and see your own part in it that we are actually going to set up solutions  I mean, that is a straight, outright homework assignment, and I think would be a great benefit for everybody  Then go on and publish them through the E-mail, or the Internet, whatever 
DYSON: Something along the lines of go find the most influential person you know well enough to influence, who you do not agree with -- assuming that you all agree with me, of course -- and attempt to win that person over to your point of view  In other words, don't stick to your own community  Don't just talk to the people who only agree with you  Go out and evangelize or proselytize to people who don't understand what this stuff is about  Do it in such a way that you are not superior or offputting; don't try to be right; try to win and expand this community, not in terms of pressure or rightness, but in terms of understanding what we are about  The biggest problem is ganging up on some of these politicians and having them think that this stuff is not cute, or weird, or colorful, or irrelevant, but incredibly important  Make the rest of the world know about us 
HOMET: I would like to second that motion  The story is told that when a beautiful woman comes out on a street in Paris, every man within eyeshot becomes in that instant much more intensively himself  (laughter) What I would suggest to you, if you are energized by this subject, is to be yourself  To thine own self be true, and perhaps to add to that the biblical admonition to the apostles -- if I remember it correctly -- and this picks up what Esther was saying -- to be wise as snakes, and cunning as foxes  Go out there to persuade 
P  DENNING: I'd like to add to that  It is not only within yourself that you have to look, it's within others  Don't assume that you know the answers, but go talk to people  Don't just talk to us, because we already know what "us" has to say, but go to talk to people that we haven't talked to and find out what concerns them 
AUDIENCE MEMBER: Hi, my name is Lou Woleneck  I'm from the LBJ School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas  I'm a graduate student  I have a question, a general policy question, about how we should go about providing the information resources to the have-nots that the information elites have access to now  What sort of strategy that you all would have for that?
KAPOR: A 30-second or less answer, which is to set a national policy that updates a universal service for the 21st century that says everybody needs to have basic minimal access to a digital platform that reaches into every home, into every office and school in the country  We should focus our attention on how to put in place the least expensive amount of infrastructure that will produce that  What we find is, if we do that, then the overwhelming majority of American families will find it already within their budget to be able to do that, because it will be priced like basic phone service  To the extent that we need to continue or even slightly expand the kinds of lifeline programs that subsidize today's basic voice telephone service for a small percentage of the population, we should be prepared to renew that commitment  We don't need to bankrupt ourselves to give everybody access to a digital platform 
JIM WARREN: My name is Jim Warren  Two quick observations: there were several cynical comments during the last several days about a number of IRS people being here  It turns out, because they never had a platform to say this, that the whole crowd from the IRS who are here, as I understand it, are from the IRS privacy project, intent on developing policies to assure privacy protection for taxpayer information  So let us not be so cynical about their being here; otherwise, remember that they are simply doing what they are told to do by our representatives  (laughter and hisses) I was also bothered by both Simon's, and (my God!) Esther's comments on those evil little men, and the men in politics, etc  Gee, this is a modern age, let's say "men and women," for evil deeds, as well as good deeds 
DYSON: There aren't enough women in politics for there to be any evil ones 
WARREN: Well, I am sure that I can find some evil ones for you  (laughter) Anyway, to the main points: I would say that we are not so much elite, in that we are open to anyone who takes the initiative to join us, and many of us are active mentors in trying to get others to join us  I would say simply that we are a minority, and it occurs to me that revolution has always been a minority activity  It was not millions of Russians who opposed the attempted coup several months ago  It was ten, twenty, or thirty thousand in Moscow, with the aid of communications  It was not a massive movement, a populist movement, in America that resisted the Crown, two centuries ago  It was a small minority of activists and we are the activists here -- we are the revolutionaries  Freedom has always been a do-it-yourself activity, but the key syllable in that word activity is act  Let us reaffirm freedom of speech, press, assembly, security against undue search and seizure -- the basic constitutional freedoms and privileges  Let us demand that our politicians and our political candidates do the same in explicit formal commitments to act in behalf of protecting electronic civil liberties, just as they validate and speak favorably for traditional civil liberties  We can write our politicians, write our candidates and say, "Take a position in favor of civil liberties, regardless of the technology of the moment " Thank you 
GLENN TENNEY: Thank you for the introduction, Jim 
LIASSON: Are you from the IRS?
TENNEY: No  (laughter) My name is Glenn Tenney, and I have a question for you, Mara  I think that I have enough supporters on the panel  I'm not too curious about their views, but they are welcome to them  You questioned if the presidential election and race is ready for Cyberspace  What about Congress? I'm running for Congress -- is it ready for me?
AUDIENCE MEMBER: Ms  Liasson, I believe that you have opened a can of worms called politics for this little hacker community  You certainly have with me in your comment about asking for comments for the Cyberspace era from presidential candidates  I have very strong reactions to that  I think that I am going to try to express them, as a pure statement, or maybe an actual story  Several years ago, I was discussing with a friend of mine the current presidential, the then-current presidential election  He was asking me why I wasn't rabidly supporting Jesse Jackson  I thought about it, and my first response was, "Well, let's talk about the other candidates for a second  What about -- and I'll take a random name -- Michael Dukakis?" And my friend looked at me and said, "Michael Dukakis, he's just an administrator, he's not a visionary " I thought about it, and I said, "Hold on, I'm an American, I'm not someone who's a slave of the Queen of England, or something like that  I'm my own visionary, I decide where I am going " I don't want the politicians walking around telling me that I am going to have an expressway system that's going to pave over all my favorite swamps to play in  I don't want the politicians walking around defining what I'm going to do in my life  I want to elect politicians to manage government for me, to provide the barest minimum necessities to keep us smoothly greased as individuals in living together, and I want those politicians to be of the people, and I don't want them to tell me what my opinions should be  Finally, I want to cap that off with when we have government deciding how our systems work for us, we can then end up with situations where we can say, "Oh yeah, that IRS guy or that government net guy, he was just doing his job when he banned cryptography," or something like that  That's not the sort of world that I want to live in  I want to live in a world, where each of us defines our little space in it  Thank you all 
LIASSON: I think we have time for just two more and then we'll have to wrap it up 
AUDIENCE MEMBER: Hi, to the apocalypse types  I'd like to say just one thing that somebody said: The truth will make you free  In that this technology is a vehicle of communication, I believe that it is a vehicle of the truth, and as long as we keep it free, the truth will be heard that much more  Now I have kind of a question with a bit of a statement  I am a learning-disabled college student  I didn't ever finish high school  I had a freshmen education in high school, because of educational problems, and adjustment problems, I never really got too far beyond that  I write probably a fifth of the speed of anyone in this room and I have a real hard time doing math without a calculator  That's part of the reason why I wasn't able to do well in school  I read very well, fortunately, so I was able to go in when I was eighteen and take my GED just flat out without studying for it  I'm not dumb, or uneducated by any standards, but what has allowed me to get an associate's degree in college, and what has allowed me to approach graduation and get a bachelor's degree in college is the kind of technology that we are dealing with  I have never had easy access to that technology  The barriers that I have faced have been ones of order, regimentation, and where people try and say, "Oh well, you don't fit in, you're not a CS student, you don't need those resources " I'm good with computers, I do a lot with them, I spend a lot of time with them  I hack, I don't do anything illegal, but I took a hacksaw to the frame of my nasty little 8088 about two years ago to cram some RAM into it, because that was the only way I could get it to fit and I needed it  Now I'm in a little bit better shape  I'm approaching the point where I would like to see ISDN real soon, because I need that kind of connectivity  You know, I'm doing interesting things that I find absolutely wonderful, but the idea that the kind of technology that is available to us, that is just there for the using, could be limited and unavailable to people, or that people would have to go through some of the things that I have had to go through, not being able to do well on tests, because I had no word processor available to me  That type of thing, even though they are all over the place, elsewhere  It was just that that wasn't an acceptable solution  That type of policy planning, that type of government, that type of order scares me  And I have to ask, what is your answer to that?
DAVIES: The apocalyptic vision of a world in grief and individual rights in crisis has nothing to do with a Luddite mentality, and it would be very dangerous for the people in this room to link the two together  I, for one, believe in technology  I am very grateful for it, and I think the world is a better place for it  I have great faith in the future, but technology's not a silver lining for the future  It's not an El Dorado, it's more like plutonium  The very great thing that technology does for all of us can also be used by the people who would repress our freedoms and all I am saying is be aware of that  Let's not marginalize people like me, who are saying, Hey look, we are going to have 15 billion people on the planet  We are going to have a political inversion, you know, that is going to create massive tensions that are going to repress our rights, or at least create a tension that we have never known before  Don't marginalize me -- don't shoot the messenger  I believe in technology, so please don't equate the apocalypse with Ludditism -- the two do not match 
LIASSON: We're about out of time  I'm going to turn this over to Lance 
HOFFMAN: Thank you, Mara  I'm really unhappy that we are out of time, but I feel that we have a contract to those who want to leave in a moment or two  Those who want to stay, can stay up here, are welcome to continue, until the hotel throws us out  Since Lu Kleppinger is in the room at the moment, I don't know when that will be, but we can probably have it for a little while  I just want to make a couple of comments before I formally close this meeting 
We have seen an awful lot happen in these last three days and there has been building, and indeed we will be continuing to some extent the work that Jim Warren started at CFP-1 -- a sense of community  It has been increased by the participation of various diverse groups  My one hope is that you do not stop that here  When each and every one of you goes home, contact -- I don't care whether it's by letter, or electronic mail, or even telephone, if you must -- three people that you have met here that you didn't know, or didn't know very well before, or perhaps only knew electronically, and now you know them in person, and continue talking with them and to their friends and colleagues  If you do that, this will be a success 
The other comment that I want to make is that Bruce Koball is going to need a lot of help for CFP-3  Please talk to him -- he is listed in the roster  Or better yet, don't do that, talk to him here, and then give him a month to chill out in Berkeley before he has to start working real hard  Check the message board, there are some messages that have not been picked up  You have your evaluation forms  If you haven't filled them out and you would like to, please do and turn them in  I have nothing else, except to thank you all for being such a good group and, hopefully, we'll see you next year in California  Thank you very much 
Support efforts at engaging society and government on the appropriate legal and social uses of technology 
Context 3: Margaret Way (b  Brisbane d  Cleveland, Queensland, Australia ) was an Australian writer of romance novels and women's fiction  A prolific author, Way wrote more than 120 novels since 1970, many through Mills & Boon, a romance imprint of British publisher Harlequin UK Ltd , owned by Harlequin Enterprises 

Biography
Before her marriage, she was a well-known pianist, teacher, vocal coach and accompanist  She began writing when her son, Laurence Way, was born, a friend took a pile of Mills & Boon books to her, she read all and decided that she also could write these types of novels  She began to write and promote her country with her stories set in Australia  She sold her first novels in 1970  Margaret Way lives with her family in her native Brisbane  Beginning in 2013, Margaret began to self-publish, releasing her first "e-book" mid-July



ground_truth: Peter Denning.

prompt_front: Now, answer the following question based on the text below, only give me the answer and do not output any other words.

Question: When did Margaret Way start self-publishing her books as e-books?

Read the following text and answer briefly.

Context 3: 

Margaret died on the 10th of August 2022 in Cleveland, Queensland 

Bibliography

Single Novels
King Country (1970)
Blaze of Silk (1970)
The Time of the Jacaranda (1970)
Bauhinia Junction (1971)
Man from Bahl Bahla (1971)
Summer Magic (1971)
Return to Belle Amber (1971)
Ring of Jade (1972)
Copper Moon (1972)
Rainbow Bird (1972)
Man Like Daintree (1972)
Noonfire (1972)
Storm Over Mandargi (1973)
Wind River (1973)
Love Theme (1974)
McCabe's Kingdom (1974)
Sweet Sundown (1974)
Reeds of Honey (1975)
Storm Flower (1975)
Lesson in Loving (1975)
Flight into Yesterday (1976)
Red Cliffs of Malpara (1976)
Man on Half-moon (1976)
Swan's Reach (1976)
Mutiny in Paradise (1977)
One Way Ticket (1977)
Portrait of Jaime (1977)
Black Ingo (1977)
Awakening Flame (1978)
Wild Swan (1978)
Ring of Fire (1978)
Wake the Sleeping Tiger (1978)
Valley of the Moon (1979)
White Magnolia (1979)
Winds of Heaven (1979)
Blue Lotus (1979)
Butterfly and the Baron (1979)
Golden Puma (1980)
Temple of Fire (1980)
Lord of the High Valley (1980)
Flamingo Park (1980)
North of Capricorn (1981)
Season for Change (1981)
Shadow Dance (1981)
McIvor Affair (1981)
Home to Morning Star (1981)
Broken Rhapsody (1982)
The Silver Veil (1982)
Spellbound (1982)
Hunter's Moon (1982)
Girl at Cobalt Creek (1983)
No Alternative (1983)
House of Memories (1983)
Almost a Stranger (1984)
A place called Rambulara (1984)
Fallen Idol (1984)
Hunt the Sun (1985)
Eagle's Ridge (1985)
The Tiger's Cage (1986)
Innocent in Eden (1986)
Diamond Valley (1986)
Morning Glory (1988)
Devil Moon (1988)
Mowana Magic (1988)
Hungry Heart (1988)
Rise of an Eagle (1988)
One Fateful Summer (1993)
The Carradine Brand (1994)
Holding on to Alex (1997)
The Australian Heiress (1997)
Claiming His Child (1999)
The Cattleman's Bride (2000)
The Cattle Baron (2001)
The Husbands of the Outback (2001)
Secrets of the Outback (2002)
With This Ring (2003)
Innocent Mistress (2004)
Cattle Rancher, Convenient Wife (2007)
Outback Marriages (2007)
Promoted: Nanny to Wife (2007)
Cattle Rancher, Secret Son (2007)
Genni's Dilemma (2008)
Bride At Briar Ridge (2009)
Outback Heiress, Surprise Proposal (2009)
Cattle Baron, Nanny Needed (2009)

Legends of the Outback Series
Mail Order Marriage (1999)
The Bridesmaid's Wedding (2000)
The English Bride (2000)
A Wife at Kimbara (2000)

Koomera Crossing Series
Sarah's Baby (2003)
Runaway Wife (2003)
Outback Bridegroom (2003)
Outback Surrender (2003)
Home to Eden (2004)

McIvor Sisters Series
The Outback Engagement (2005)
Marriage at Murraree (2005)

Men Of The Outback Series
The Cattleman (2006)
The Cattle Baron's Bride (2006)
Her Outback Protector (2006)
The Horseman (2006)

Outback Marriages Series
Outback Man Seeks Wife (2007)
Cattle Rancher, Convenient Wife (2007)

Barons of the Outback Series Multi-Author
Wedding At Wangaree Valley (2008)
Bride At Briar's Ridge (2008)

Family Ties Multi-Author
Once Burned (1995)

Hitched! Multi-Author
A Faulkner Possession (1996)

Simply the Best Multi-Author
Georgia and the Tycoon (1997)

The Big Event Multi-Author
Beresford's Bride (1998)

Guardian Angels Multi-Author
Gabriel's Mission (1998)

Australians Series Multi-Author
7  Her Outback Man (1998)
17  Master of Maramba (2001)
19  Outback Fire (2001)
22  Mistaken Mistress (2002)
24  Outback Angel (2002)
33  The Australian Tycoon's Proposal (2004)
35  His Heiress Wife (2004)

Marrying the Boss Series Multi-Author
Boardroom Proposal (1999)

Contract Brides Series Multi-Author
Strategy for Marriage (2002)

Everlasting Love Series Multi-Author
Hidden Legacy (2008)

Diamond Brides Series Multi-Author
The Australian's Society Bride (2008)

Collections
Summer Magic / Ring of Jade / Noonfire (1981)
Wife at Kimbara / Bridesmaid's Wedding (2005)

Omnibus in Collaboration
Pretty Witch / Without Any Amazement / Storm Over Mandargi (1977) (with Lucy Gillen and Margaret Malcolm)
Dear Caliban / Heart of the Eagle / Swans' Reach (1978) (with Jane Donnelly and Elizabeth Graham)
The Bonds of Matrimony / Dragon Island / Reeds of Honey (1979) (with Elizabeth Hunter and Henrietta Reid)
The Man Outside / Castles in Spain / McCabe's Kingdom (1979) (with Jane Donnelly and Rebecca Stratton)
Winds From The Sea / Island of Darkness / Wind River (1979) (with Margaret Pargeter and Rebecca Stratton)
Moorland Magic / Tree of Idleness / Sweet Sundown (1980) (with Elizabeth Ashton and Elizabeth Hunter)
The Shifting Sands / Portrait of Jaime / Touched by Fire (1982) (with Jane Donnelly and Kay Thorpe)
Head of Chancery / Wild Heart / One-Way Ticket (1986) (with Betty Beaty and Doris Smith)
Heart of the Scorpion / The Winds of Heaven / Sweet Compulsion (1987) (with Janice Gray and Victoria Woolf)
One Brief Sweet Hour / Once More With Feeling / Blue Lotus (1990) (with Jane Arbor and Natalie Sparks)
Marry Me Cowboy (1995) (with Janet Dailey, Susan Fox and Anne McAllister)
Husbands on Horseback (1996) (with Diana Palmer)
Wedlocked (1999) (with Day Leclaire and Anne McAllister)
Mistletoe Magic (1999) (with Betty Neels and Rebecca Winters)
The Australians (2000) (with Helen Bianchin and Miranda Lee)
Weddings Down Under (2001) (with Helen Bianchin and Jessica Hart)
Outback Husbands (2002) (with Marion Lennox)
The Mother's Day Collection (2002) (with Helen Dickson and Kate Hoffmann)
Australian Nights (2003) (with Miranda Lee)
Outback Weddings (2003) (with Barbara Hannay)
Australian Playboys (2003) (with Helen Bianchin and Marion Lennox)
Australian Tycoons (2004) (with Emma Darcy and Marion Lennox)
A Mother's Day Gift (2004) (with Anne Ashley and Lucy Monroe)
White Wedding (2004) (with Judy Christenberry and Jessica Steele)
A Christmas Engagement (2004) (with Sara Craven and Jessica Matthews)
A Very Special Mother's Day (2005) (with Anne Herries)
All I Want for Christmas    (2005) (with Betty Neels and Jessica Steele)
The Mills and Boon Collection (2006) (with Caroline Anderson and Penny Jordan)
Outback Desire (2006) (with Emma Darcy and Carol Marinelli)
To Mum, with Love (2006) (with Rebecca Winters)
Australian Heroes (2007) (with Marion Lennox and Fiona McArthur)
Tall, Dark and Sexy (2008) (with Caroline Anderson and Helen Bianchin)
The Boss's Proposal (2008) (with Jessica Steele and Patricia Thayer)
Island Heat / Outback Man Seeks Wife / Prince's Forbidden Virgin / One Night Before Marriage / Their Lost-and-found Family / Single Dad's Marriage Wish (2008) (with Robyn Donald, Marion Lennox, Carol Marinelli, Sarah Mayberry and Anne Oliver)
Australian Billionaires (2009) (with Jennie Adams and Amy Andrews)
Cattle Baron : Nanny Needed / Bachelor Dad on Her Doorstep (2009) (with Michelle Douglas)

External links
Margaret Way at Harlequin Enterprises Ltd

Australian romantic fiction writers
Australian women novelists
Living people
Year of birth missing (living people)
Women romantic fiction writers



ground_truth: Margaret Way started self-publishing her books as e-books in 2013.