>The Internet is not going anywhere and, if anything, it will
>become more accessible in the home and more people will become >comfortable using it. However, rather than use the
>Internet to buy clothes or shoes, people can learn to
>sell their own products or promote community activities online.

You're missing my point. A successful promotion is about awareness & access on the part of those receiving the promotion. Unless someone tells a person about an event, product, etc. he or she will have to stumble onto that information on their own. I'm still not hearing from anyone HOW once our people gain access to this vast superhighway, they will be made aware information pertinent to their lives. How do people find out about your cable access organization? How do people find out about programs that will air?

>The multimedia center aims to do the same thing via the
>Internet. Sure, community content may not reach millions but
>that is not the purpose. People will be able to create and >distribute community content via a web site to the people that >need or want to view it. Plus, if they learn about promotion >they can reach a larger audience.

And this differs from traditional forms of media in what way? In the end we all know that much of successful promotions revolve around the ability to get the word out & that typically (though there are exceptions) requires loot.

>The Internet is a reality. People who have it have
>more options that the people who don't and this is a fact.

No, that's not a fact. People who have the net have DIFFERENT options at times they are more at times they are less. There are successful businesses & business people who do not use the internet at all.

>The Internet is not like TV or film, it's not owned by
>Hollywood or a small elite group of owners. Right now, it is a >vast network and anyone who wants to have a presence on
>the Net can have one.

The internet is like TV & film in plenty of way. The internet is a vast connection of networks supported, run & paid for by an alliance of private organizations, government agencies, & universities. The Internet society which dictates standards & protocols & shapes the architecture & technilogical direction of the Internet. The Registrars are overseen by a board of directors made up of who? Who controls the high speed backbones that carry traffic across the world?

Yes anyone can put up a page or have a presence but most peole can also list their business in the yellow pages - that doesn't mean that everyone with the book will now you're in there. this idea that that (in & of itself) is grois silly.

>Change, adversity, technology are realities. >Change is not >supposed to be good or bad.

Change is inevitable but the results of those changes can be a bad or good. Im a Parable of the Sower fan, I know change is the only constant in this existence but even in that book, within the context of the changes there were universal unaltering truths & principles.

>Technology has always been around and it has always been at the >center of the "divide" issue.

Our people have always been at the forefront of technilogical, medical, advancement. Its the approach to technology & its uses that makes us different.

>I am empowered because I do not limit myself, I learn new >tools, push myself and keep climbing.

The gun is a tool too, as is nuclear energy. I'm not questioning whether we will have to use new tools. I'm saying that having them in & of itself does not equal empowerment. IE what you say below:

>There are people who are poor and will stay poor because
>they do not seek to learn new tools to do their jobs. They >will lose their jobs if they do not learn how to
>use technology.

Being empowered as a people is NOT us learning to use the net or a computer in order to hold on to jobs that dispensed out by people who are our enemies. That is us being in the same game but learning different rules. Power is controlling the games by DICTATING the rules.