Toward a public lane on the information superhighway: A media performance analysis of the Community-Wide Education and Information Service Initiative

This dissertation is an examination of the Community-Wide Education and Information Service (CWEIS), an initiative of the Corporation for Public Broadcasting that provided grants to 12 public broadcasting organizations for the purpose of developing community networks. Often called "free-nets," community networks are community-oriented on-line information and communication services, typically providing electronic mail and Internet access to the general public using standard telephone lines and computer modems. The CWEIS initiative can be viewed as an effort by public broadcasting to extend its public service mission to the developing system of computer communication networks popularly known as the "information superhighway."; The purpose of this study was to provide an independent examination of the performance of the CWEIS initiative in extending the mission of public broadcasting to community networks. Multiple research methods were employed to document the work of the CWEIS projects, with results presented in a case study format. Five public interest principles of the initiative were identified in the analysis: (1) enhancing diversity, (2) expanding access, (3) promoting community, (4) advancing education and (5) fostering the public sphere. Results indicated that while there were some notable successes, most CWEIS projects fell short of the original goals of the initiative. It is argued that the uneven performance of the CWEIS initiative in extending the mission of public broadcasting to community networks reflects the ongoing debate over how to define the mission of public broadcasting.