Instantaneous communications have moved from our homes to our pockets and purses as cell phones continue to proliferate. It s estimated that 2 billion telephone transmissions take place each day growth that was inconceivable when the telephone was patented in 1876. Committing to Closing the Gap Telecommunications will have as profound effect on the 21st century as they did in the preceding one. However, instead of telephones connected by copper wire, we will depend on an array of communication devices linked by fiber optics, transmission towers and satellites. One important issue will carry over from copper wire to wireless, from 20th century to 21st and that is universal service.
Information is a necessary commodity today.
Those who have access to it will prosper, while those who don t will languish. Our national commitment to universal service that was seen in the Communications Act of 1934 was reflected in the Telecommunications Act of 1996. But today universal service goes beyond a telephone in every home. Universal service in the 21st century means access to the communications and information infrastructure, whatever form that infrastructure takes. Today the digital divide separates rich and poor, urban and rural, educated and uneducated.