“With the internet, where is it that you want to take us?”

Contemporary life is inseparable from the Internet. No matter whether it’s at work, home, or among friends, interacting via the Internet has created entirely new ways of communicating. In Taiwan, even in aboriginal communities they are using the Internet to achieve potentials that were previously unimaginable.

Chunghwa Telecom Foundation is behind the “Digital Aboriginal Communities” program and has cooperated with Fu-Jen Catholic University in its “Distance Tutoring Classroom” (as in the picture at the right, with thanks to the Chunghwa Telecom Foundation for providing the photo). A computer screen can bring together cities and villages, and is a road between mountain areas and lowlands; the Internet brings with it other expectations, that children in aboriginal areas can open up a window onto the whole world, with homework that university students bring them, letting people situated in these places to understand the one another’s very different lives. The Internet allows them to listen and be heard.

The TELDAP e-newsletter were honored to have the opportunity to invite Chief Executive Lin San-yuan to share his experiences and point of view concerning the value and significance in this concept of digital archives and digital learning as a trend in the development of the Internet.

Creating Value?

“With a national technological development plan with regard to digital learning and digital archives so long in the making, why is it that the most people know very little about it or know what you are doing?”

Once was seated, Chief Executive Lin pointedly asked the first question, and while I blushed he added, “It is because nobody has seen the ‘value’ of it.”

There are three aspects to implementing a national technology plan for digital learning and digital archiving: culture, education and industry. These are also the most important foundation and roots of national development, but the sad thing is that values have not been built up around them.

 “Come listen to this.”

The Chief Executive had me go over to his computer and listen to a recording.

In a hubbub of voices there was a clear and distinct human voice, just then in the process of selling something. His speech and expression glided up and down, in the local accent, and from the moment he made his call he cut right into everyone’s everyday needs, logically and incisively amid the noise; one needed only be attentive to fall under his influence.

The Chief Executive explained that for culture to spread and be marketable, it needed to learn from ordinary people on the street about how to make these topics relatable to men and women of all ages. It needed to tell vibrant stories, using another means to attract peoples’ interest, and make people realize the value and importance of developing digital culture.

The value of “Click Taiwan” has increased somewhat

Just as the Chunghwa Telecom Foundation has, for some time now, made continual efforts to eliminate the digital disparity between people in cities and in the countryside in the areas of education and outreach, it hopes that technology will be made a part of peoples’ lives, linking industry and culture, allowing digital technology to create more multivalent values and benefits.

“Click Taiwan”, the website it established, uses text, images and sound to record the stories of Taiwan’s regions, so that in a flash one can feel as though one has been transported to a locale and see how a community has developed, and see how people relate to their home communities. It isn’t just a cold set of digital data, but uses these documentary means to show us, via the Internet, the true face of this bit of land, the emotions and memories of those who live there.

In telling and sharing these stories, people are not only deeply impressed, but they are also motivated to go there and get involved.

I am moved each time I see these films

At the start, Chunghwa Telecom Foundation invited well-known directors to go on location in various places to film the stories of the various communities, and through their professional gathering of material and camerawork, the special beauties of these places in Taiwan can be shared with everyone.

For the past several years, a creative competition has been held that enables university students to visit isolated communities and tribes, invite local people, amateurs, and film professionals, and produce film and recorded media, a platform that allows us to have a penetrating look into the communities’ stories.

Some of these activities not only generate site traffic, but also have the power to train and educate. An audial and visual record of Taiwan can be seen in the fourth “Er San Shi Community Film Competition”. People from all walks of life, from the tribal areas to the towns and villages, get together and talk about their lives, the environment, their communities, history, culture and art. “Like in one film, where a college student goes to a tribal area and tells a story about growing up in a tribe. The camerawork may not be at a professional level, but every scene contains a real local feeling, and every time I see it I am moved.” Lin spoke with feeling. These films that are affecting and that everyone can enjoy not only communicate emotions connected with the place, but also the value and significance of all the people who are a part of the story.

The local voices gradually become respected by society as more people participate in activities like these. Some people who see these films see something they have never noticed before, the scenery of a hometown, that is actually still there. Some people, on the other hand, after seeing them decide to get involved in their own community, and start making their own films with a V8 camera. Or they start thinking about whether they can fulfill their potential in their community or society.

Integrating everyone’s needs and transforming them into social consensus

With knowledge and value, people attain a feeling of solidarity. The “Click Taiwan” website combines and packages a multitude of elements that give people an incentive to be continuously involved with the work of documenting their community. These films are a kind of provocation, and also have a promotional power, letting everyone know that there are all kinds of opportunities and possibilities in life, and that the shape of Taiwanese culture comes into being one click at a time.

This concern a process of “National Transformation”, but with respect to a national technological plan for digital archiving and digital education, we can draw from it the realization that this kind of documenting should not just be the work of a national body, but is the responsibility, need and task of everyone.

All of us want to leave behind a significant memory of our lives. Whether it is a special skill belonging in the family, or the stories of one’s parents and the growth of children, everyone wants to leave a record of the beauty to be found in life. When all of these needs are integrated in a popular consensus, it is not necessary to tell people the content or goals of the plan, as people will spontaneously recognize the importance of the digital preservation of culture and memory.

Establishing and internalizing diverse values

Does digital technology bring people closer, or make them more distant?

Taiwan’s culture, history, arts and natural environment have been granted a new value and significance by means of digital archiving. But the implementers of the plan need to find their own position relative to them.

Understanding, from the user’s point of view, the habits and needs of Internet users is to go from an abstract idea to people’s normal everyday needs. It may be difficult to initially come to grips with the idea, but to unite the concepts of experience and an archive, from the small book that memorializes a family to a national archival database, the two concepts are really the same thing. In other words, to give the people the feeling of uniqueness, interest and social solidarity, once these feelings have been internalized, their participation, investment, and continued support will be fostered, enabling the digital archive and digital education to garner broad support. Its value will be conspicuous and there will not be the need to promote it; the concept will already have taken root.

Creating a blueprint for connecting technology and emotions

On the way back from the interview, it was raining in the Taipei and as the day ended I took with me what Chief Executive Lin Sanyuan had woven for me during the interview: a small bird woven out of straw (see note), feeling a warm sense of gratitude towards him.

Through the Internet, the Chunghwa Telecom Foundation has knit together peoples and places, and has allowed people to listen and understand one another through their computer screens, though they are worlds apart. Lin says, “Technology is not creating a digital divide, but it wants to improve conditions, shorten the distances between people.” Little by little, the potential is realized and new, multivalent values are created.

In the conversation with Chief Executive Lin’s, as well as on the “Click Taiwan” homepage and in the Digital Good Neighbours project, it is stressed that on the way to being good digital neighbors, technology will never again appear as something cold and distant. Through digital technology, many stories will be recorded and disseminated, becoming a cultural repository that enables us to believe that one day there will be limitless potential and opportunity to develop new values.

Note: Lin’s mother first taught him the art of weaving things out of straw. He says, “When my father passed away, I really felt the importance of preserving and transmitting family memories”. As a way of ensuring that this art is not lost to later generations, he used video equipment to record his technique and his process, and shared it on the web for others to enjoy and study (web address:

http://www.youtube.com/user/big3dollars).