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Backbone network for HK Net users urged

Danyll Wills

THE establishment of a backbone network that would allow Hong Kong Internet users to connect to each other without first having to 'bounce' off the United States should be a priority of the local Net community, a conference was told.

A panel discussion at the first Hong Kong Symposium on the World-Wide Web - held at the University of Hong Kong at the weekend - also highlighted the need for educational policies to be implemented that would encourage young people to use Internet communications.

The symposium was told that currently subscribers to different Internet Service Providers (ISPs) in Hong Kong could only connect to each other via a connection to the US - a situation seen as wasteful of both time and network resources.

One solution might be that each of the ISPs in Hong Kong be connected to each other through the HARNET (the Hong Kong Academic and Research Network), which connects various Internet nodes at the territory's tertiary institutions.

University and Polytechnics Grants Committee president Antony Leung Kam-chung said traditionally there had been reluctance among the academic community to allow its Internet resources to be used for anything that smacked of commercialism, though these attitudes were being relaxed, which could make it easier to create an Internet backbone in Hong Kong.

The reluctance to use the Internet for commercial purposes, Mr Leung said, stemmed from its origins, as it had been intended for use only by military and academic users.

Former health and welfare secretary Elizabeth Wong said that the Government must bear some responsibility for getting children involved in using the Internet communications resources, and should devise a formal policy for introducing children to the Internet and computers though schools.

'I think we need to inculcate in Hong Kong people a sense of what I call Cyber-consciousness,' Mrs Wong said. Currently there was no special Government policy toward information technology and education.

Mrs Wong said the community should also take a closer look at the information technology issues of both privacy and piracy.

The highlight of the First Symposium on the World-Wide Web was a panel discussion on 'Facilities and Policy for Hong Kong Community Access to Internet Information'. Among the speakers were Professor Wu Jianping and Professor Li Xing of China's Tsinghua University.

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