In the provision of many goods and services, reliable telecommunications infrastructure makes geography and distance irrelevant. The need for access to centralized databases, whether for libraries, inventory control and ordering, or updating of government records, has increased demand for data communications. Electronic mail and computer conferencing are spreading to rural areas, where they can save time or travel costs. Demands for access to a wider range of educational opportunities under restricted educational budgets have led to growing interest in distance education using telecommunications. Some recent innovations offer great promise to Appalachia.
Wireless technologies offer affordable access without stringing copper wire.
Digital compression allows more than an eight-fold increase in the capacity of existing voice transmission lines as well as substantial capacity increases through broadcast and satellite transmissions. Video compression allows for distance learning or medical imagery over as few as two telephone lines. Cable modems, soon to go into beta testing, offer much greater capacity than telephone systems and present additional opportunities for local value added products. The entry of electric utilities into the data transmission field should mean that costs decrease as access increases. The national data transmission infrastructure is beginning to groan under the stress of the popularity of bandwidth-intensive applications like the World Wide Web.