[Air-l] hmm, last mile and the amish

Denise N. Rall denrall at yahoo.com
Mon Aug 5 19:58:59 PDT 2002


RE: 
Last mile technologies and having an impact, following
the Hirsch & Silverstone's _Consuming Technologies_
(1992) chapter on the Amish which was followed up in
1999 in WIRED magazine with the Amish and cell phone
use.

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/7.01/amish_pr.html

While in the Wired article the cell phone was cast as
quite subversive and was forbidden by the men, women
in the community were using the phone to get the
Doctor and to get important community news. While
these things are always presented sensationally what I
notice in my own country-based friends (in Wisconsin,
where I grew up) is that the battle to get things done
in rural life is endless.  Which means my friends
would use any technology that would save them time,
and they used to do their yearly canning by
sterilizing jars in the dishwasher, etc.  The computer
came into their home to do the accounting, which gets
more and more complicated for small farmers each year.
The internet meant that they get to talk to their
remote relatives more - and in some cases, facilitate
the farmer's wife outside job, which she can do some
of it one the computer.

I find this utilitarian approach to comm. very similar
to the outback Australia, which has always focused on 
ways to improve the communication services, in the
early days by radio to reach the Flying Doctor service
in remote areas and also to offer remote education via
'School of the Air'.  Innovative comm. services
included the unfortunately doomed and now destroyed
Iridium satellite phone system (sponsored in part by
Microsoft). The serious nature of comm. in the outback
was recently highlighted in a news story where a boy
with asthma died because the phone was out of order,
and the old radio network for calling Flying Dr's is
of course, long gone . . . .

Which relates to another interest of mine - the
presence of technology 'orphans' when good working
technology, like the Iridium sat. phone system is
taken down, and the "NEW" technology, such as digital
mobile remote areas services don't work well, or at
all.

This is a long way to say that last mile service is
extremely important for anyone living more than 200k
from the nearest town, it's the biggest issue in a
place like Australia, a huge issue for anyone who
needs it for doctors, schooling, or transportation,
etc. . . 
Denise



=====
"it's easier to use your mouse than your brain"
Denise Rall, Sustainable Forestry Mentoring Coordinator &
PhD student, School of Education, Southern Cross University,
PO Box 157, Lismore, NSW, 2480 Australia
Phone +61-2-6624-8627 Fax +61-2-6624-8637
Office (Tuesdays) (02) 6620 3577 Mob 0438 233 344
http://www.scu.edu.au/schools/edu/research/deniserall/index.html

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