Telecommunications represents a large and growing sector of the economy, and in the next century people will need to have access to the digital tools that are becoming an increasingly important part of our everyday lives. Telecom access, in short, is the key to unlocking economic opportunity. Today, telecommunications technologies allow us to communicate and work any time, any place, and in any number of ways. Time and distance are no longer the barriers they once were to communications and work. Now, with a push of a button or activation of speech recognition, people with disabilities can gain access to information, contribute in the work force, and participate in society in ways like never before.
Technology is a remarkably powerful tool that can transform lives.
We must be the civil rights pioneers of the Information Age. We must make sure that this country does not end up with a world divided into Haves and Have-nots. Last September we took a large pioneering step in the right direction. We released rules in conjunction with Section 255 of the Telecommunications Act, using the Americans with Disabilities Act as our blueprint, that will give people with disabilities access to telecommunications equipment and services. We said that people with disabilities must have access to the digital tools of the twenty-first century, and in doing so we made the first curb cut on the Information Sperhighway, creating the ADA for the Information Age.