From: "Peter M. Weiss +1 814 863 1843" Subject: PA Internet Stories These 6 stories were retrieved via Gopher, and represent the Commonwealth's stories accepted for each state's "what has the Internet done for us" sponsored by FARNET and their 51 reasons to build the National Infomation Infrastructure (NII). ===== STORY Digest Wed, 22 Dec 1993 Today's Topics: 1. Appended file STORY012 PA 12/22/93 18:30:45 2. Appended file STORY034 PA 12/22/93 18:30:48 3. Appended file STORY038 PA 12/22/93 18:30:49 4. Appended file STORY093 PA 12/22/93 18:30:50 5. Appended file STORY122 PA 12/22/93 18:30:51 6. Appended file STORY123 PA 12/22/93 18:30:53 ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: 22 Dec 1993, 18:30:45 EST <12/22, 18:30:12> From: PMW1@PSUVM To: PMW1 AT PSUVM Subject: Appended file STORY012 PA 12/22/93 18:30:45 Document: 66 -- story012.PA Submitted by: Robert D. Hart, Executive Director Organization: INFORUM Address: 611 Siegfriedale Rd. Kutztown, PA 19530 USA Phone: (215) 683-6383 Fax: (215) 683-8548 E-mail: rhart@asrr.arsusda.gov Categories: Research, academic; Research, government; Economic development Criteria: Innovative or improved ways of doing things; More equitable access to technology or electronic information; Technology transfer Other Docs: (contact author for more information) Documentation The Story INFORUM: An International Forum for the Development of Sustainable Land Use Just as the construction of the global transportation system led to a revolution in the travel industry, the dramatic expansion of the telecommunication highways will lead to analogous changes in the communications industry. Like the early days of highway construction when small motels and "mom and pop" diners were built almost overnight to accommodate the traveling public, thousands of electronic bulletin boards have been set up for casual electronic travelers that want to meet people with similar interests on their electronic journeys. Perhaps people are less aware of the fact that expanded telecommunication highways have also made it possible to set up venues for business travelers, scientists, etc. INFORUM is such a venue. INFORUM is a global forum for information exchange in support of the development of sustainable land use systems. Commissioned at a Symposium sponsored by the US Department of Agriculture, the Rodale Institute, and the Indian Council of Agricultural Research in New Delhi, India in 1990, it was incorporated in as a non-profit organization in 1991. INFORUM's 6-member board of directors includes people from Brazil, Kenya, India, the Philippines, Russia, and the United States. INFORUM has been set up using the metaphor of an electronic campus. The "buildings" on the campus represent general services such as conferencing, a library, etc. The buildings have "rooms" that include a "bulletin board" for short messages, a "table" for discussion, and a "file cabinet" for longer documents. Rooms are rented for short term conferences in the Conference Building or they can be rented on a long term basis by organizations or networks that want to use INFORUM to share information or cooperate with others. Institutions can also lease their own building on the campus. INFORUM is accessible directly from both the INTERNET and from commercial telecommunication networks. Since many people around the world do not have direct on-line access to telecommunications networks but are able to periodically send and receive electronic mail, users also have the option of sending electronic mail to a topic or a conference moderator can periodically forward information to conferees by electronic mail. An electronic conference on the role of livestock in sustainable land use systems is currently underway in the Conference Building. The conference was organized by Winrock International in Arkansas, the Canadian International Development Research Center (IDRC), and INFORUM. This conference will be completed March 31, 1993, but to date more than 35 people form 25 countries have shared more than 1000 pages of information. Another INFORUM initiative is funded by the US Agency for International Development. Currently, 8 agricultural development institutions in China, Chile, Kenya, Philippines, Senegal, UK, US, and Zimbabwe are working together to set up a global information exchange process. The process includes a shared database, conferences on specific sustainable land topics, and a process to download this electronic information and disseminating it in newsletters published by the participating institutions. Like most types of travel, the first step in an electronic journey is usually the most difficult. INFORUM will actively work with local organization in different countries to help people learn how to connect their computers to global telecommunication networks, and to use these networks to reach electronic venues like INFORUM. The potential of an electronic initiative like INFORUM is almost without parallel. Today INFORUM may be unique in its effort to provide an independent electronic venue for people interested in sustainable land use, but in the future as electronic highways expand, many similar venues will likely be developed as people learn to think differently about electronic travel. #EOF ------------------------------ Date: 22 Dec 1993, 18:30:48 EST <12/22, 18:30:12> From: PMW1@PSUVM To: PMW1 AT PSUVM Subject: Appended file STORY034 PA 12/22/93 18:30:48 Document: 43 -- story034.PA Submitted by: Sean McLinden, MD, /Chairman, Health Department: Information Sciences Organization: Duquesne University Address: 325 Rangos Hall Pittsburgh, PA 15282-0001 USA E-mail: sean@dsl.pitt.edu Categories: Health care/health services Criteria: Innovative or improved ways of doing things; More equitable access to technology or electronic information; Creation of new ideas, products, or services; Local commitment to network-based activities; Volunteer contributions of time and energy Other Docs: (contact author for more information) Video; Software; Documentation; Slides/photographs; Computer graphic images, such as GlF files Other (live presentations) The Story Internet Applications to Health Care Quality and Efficiency The FELIX Tool for Business Re-engineering Business process re-engineering, an approach widely regarded as the key to revitalizing businesses in the United States has yet to hit the health care industry. Key among the many reasons why this is true is the nature of hospitals, which (like many manufacturing conglomerates), were built from a collection of indepdendent (and sometimes competing) clinical specialists. Frequently, these independent (yet, necessarily interdependent) entities result in duplicity of process and collision of information which interferes with the quality and efficiency of the care of the patient. Why has this obvious problem not been addressed? Many reasons exist but primary among them is the nature of health care services and the medical marketplace. Community medical services are structured, not according to the needs of the community, but according to the availability of resources. If economy, geography, climate and culture make it desirable for cardiothoracic surgeons to move into the area, the services offered will be oriented toward cardiothoracic surgery. Health care in many communities is determined by specialty make up of the health care practitioners, not by the needs of the community. Health care "reform" has been an unfortunate way to characterize what is really a "re-invention of the health care process. This re-design involves the shift from practice-oriented clinical practice to community-oriented health care, which is a new model in many parts of the United States. The urgency of such a paradigm shift has been enhance by proposed health care legislation from both the President and the Congress. In spite of the need to embrace new models of health care delivery, many healthcare organizations continue to operate in an information infrastructure which is incapable of managing the necessary changes to produce a lean organization tuned to health care at the community level. Key to the management of patients, in any context, is the management of information flows and processes which characterize the patient care environment. FELIX was born out of this environment of chaos and change. Designed by a team of clinicians, administrators, information scientists, and industrial engineers, FELIX evolved from its roots as a patient management system into a tool to promote controlled organizational change. What is FELIX? FELIX is multimedia information authoring and management tool designed to facilitate the sharing of complex patient and process information across networks. Using the X windowing system, a high- level application scripting language, and standards for networked information interchange, FELIX provides an electronic bridge to sources of information distributed over many sites on a network. Unlike typical network browsers and wide area information systems, FELIX allows the user to integrate these sources into a single, coherent, framework for presentation and manipulation based on the concept of a virtual structured document. FELIX is not just a technology. Instead, it is the articulation of many real- world social constructs into an electronic representation that allows the user to visualize the relationships between information and information sources. Through FELIX, the user can discover not only information, but also the process by which this information was created. This facilitates organizational self-discovery, one of the first steps toward empowering users to contribute meaningful changes to the organization. Implementation of FELIX was begun following frustrated attempts to begin business process re-engineering using discussion groups and the Delphi method. It was found, by the FELIX developers, that while most members of the clinical community were open to change and learning, organizations provided little incentive for them to undertake this arduous process. FELIX is the carrot and the stick to just such organizations. By providing interactive graphical metaphors coupled to standard business applications such as calendar management and scheduling, electronic mail and messaging, and document creation and management, we were able to enlist the support of the organization in a process which was, otherwise, regarded as tedious and of a low priority. FELIX started as a multimedia clinical information system but much to our surprise we found that it was also a powerful agent of organizational change. FELIX was influenced by many practical demonstrations of social computing, including the Andrew system at Carnegie Mellon University, the World Wide Web, WAIS, and the University of Minnesota Gopher, USENET news and the Multipart Internet Mail Extensions (MIME), Cornell Cello and NCSA Mosaic. The FELIX user interface was based on work done at the Software Engineering Institute (CMU Serpent), the University of California at Berkeley (TCL), Brown University (FIELD and Intermedia), the University of New Mexico (KHOROS), and Stanford University (Interviews). The information browser combines visual programming metaphors (ala KHOROS and NeXTStep) with a semantic network which describes the organizations functional areas, processes, and the interconnectedness of these to the outside world. FELIX is designed to be affordable. A fully operating FELIX workstation can be purchased for approximately $5000. FELIX is based on industry standards for data representation including X, TCP/IP, SGML, SQL and SQL-II, and PostScript. No proprietary data formats are required or supported by the FELIX architecture. FELIX is based on widely available and off-the shelf industry platforms. FELIX has been tested on HP 9000/700s running HP-UX 9.0, Sun Sparc 2 running Solaris 2.0, Apple Macintosh Ilci and Quadras running A/UX 3.0 and System 7.0.1 with GatorX, and Univel UnixWare on 486s. FELIX is designed for network operation using the Internet as a model for global networking. FELIX is scalable, so that the same metaphors can be used in a system at home or in the private office as in the large hospital. Problem tracking and trouble shooting in FELIX is accomplished by advanced messaging services between the client user and a system architect connected via the Internet. The FELIX architecture has been designed to anticipate practical advances in global telecommunications including SMDS and broadband ISDN. Who developed FELIX? FELIX was developed in an academic urban referral hospital by a team of people described in the introductory paragraphs. Although it is a system still in development, FELIX is not an experimental architecture or a model. It was designed to manage real patient care processes and real clinical process information. Who owns FELIX? FELIX is owned by GFN Software Consortium, a partnership of clinicians, information managers, industrial engineers, and consumers of health care. GFN is a unique organization dedicated to the development of a single software product, FELIX, which will be made freely available to interested members of the health care community for institutional or personal use or non-commercial re distribution. As the mission statement for GFN states, categorically, that the purpose of the consortium is the development of non-commercial software, users need never worry that a subsequent version or upgrade will need to be purchased. How is FELIX development supported? FELIX development continues through the contributions of the user community, funding through consortium members, or contract work done by GFN to develop specific extensions to FELIX. In all cases, the development is incorporated into subsequent releases of FELIX for use by the entire user community. FELIX is also used as the basis for an innovative graduate and continuing education program for clinicians at the Department of Health Information Management, Duquesne University (Pittsburgh) where graduate students continue to work on its development. > GFN and Duquesne University also support FELIX development by providing consulting services to health care organizations attempting business process re-engineering or the development of computer-based medical records. Consulting services offered by this partnership are intended only for those institutions and clinical practices committed to reform of the health care system through cultural development which promotes a lean organization supporting the highest quality patient care processes at the best possible price. What is the status of FELIX, how do I find out more? There is a FELIX mail box: felix@dsl.pitt.edu. Interested parties should send their name, surface mail address, and phone number to that box. Surface mail should be sent to Sean McLinden, MD, Chairman, Health Information Sciences, Duquesne University, 325 Rangos Hall, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, 15282-0001. A description is also available via WWW or ftp. > FELIX is still in development mode. We expect to be able to announce something of a release schedule within the next few months. This will depend up the rate of progress on key parts of the FELIX architecture. FELIX, in its first release, will not be an end-user system, per se. This is because few if any current health care vendors actually support industry standard architectures for network data sharing and none support any concept of an industry standard data dictionary. The first release of FELIX will be intended to provide organizations with a target architecture around which they might build PFPs for future information systems and by which they might plan for a more robust information infrastructure in the future. As the health care marketplace becomes more sophisticated about their health care information systems purchases, we expect that FELIX will easily integrate into their information architectures. What is GFNs mission statement? The mission of GFN is to make it possible for the health care community to address the most pressing needs of our population in a manner which promotes the highest quality at the best possible price. To make this possible, we are developing a software tool, FELIX, to promote continuous quality improvement by facilitating the processes of patient management and health care admininstration. FELIX, our sole product, will always be freely available to any institution or individual whose goal it is to provide health care according to the terms of our mission. We do not believe that health care reform will come from the government though external economic measures but from within the organizations and communities that are directly responsible to the patients. This reform, true reform, should be motivated, not by the desire to escape economic doom, but by an professional culture which recognizes the special privilege which we enjoy as the caretakers of the nation's health. This "reform from within" should come about whether or not extrinsic factors exist to provoke. The crisis we are facing is not an economic crisis although it has economic implications. It is a crisis in process management that has come about through a crisis in information management resulting from the failure of our past paradigms to address the health care needs of our population. GFN is committed to one goal, alone. Improving the quality of patient care by improving the behaviors which lead to inefficient or misdirected patient care processes. #EOF ------------------------------ Date: 22 Dec 1993, 18:30:49 EST <12/22, 18:30:12> From: PMW1@PSUVM To: PMW1 AT PSUVM Subject: Appended file STORY038 PA 12/22/93 18:30:49 Document: 42 -- story038.PA Submitted by: Gene Klotz, Professor Department: Mathematics Organization: Swarthmore College Swarthmore, PA 19081 USA Phone: (215) 328-8243 Fax: (215) 328-7824 E-mail: klotz@forum.swarthmore.edu Categories: Other: (Education: K12, teacher education, college education, educational software) Criteria: Innovative or improved ways of doing things; More equitable access to technology or electronic information; Technology transfer; Volunteer contributions of time and energy; Partnerships between public and private sector Other Docs: (contact author for more information) Other: (Complete electronic transcripts of the discussions are available) The Story GEOMETRY SOFTWARE STORY We have an NSF-sponsored electronic bulletin board, The Geometry Forum. Our goal is to build an electronic community composed of high school and college teachers and students, research geometers, researchers in geometry education, developers of software and other educational materials, appliers of geometry, and everyone else interested in the subject. Various aspects of the world of geometry make this a real possibility and a goal with important educational consequences. There is a revolution in school geometry caused by some new computer software. Here are brief excerpts from a discussion which took place on the Forum last week. *** Are you using any geometry drawing program in your work? I have heard of (1) Cabri-geometre, (2) The Geometer's sketchpad, and (3) XYZ Geometry. Are there any others? Experience reports would be appreciated. *** I am using Cabri-geometre in some independent research. I became interested in it as a way to create examples for a book I am working through on finite geometry and I have found it fun and useful. The best thing to do is to get a hold of a demo version and try it out. I have contacted the publishers of The Geometer's sketchpad and will be getting a copy to review later this week. I'll be glad to compare them when I get a chance and post my results back to this forum. *** I got a Demo copy of Cabri from an archive site in France by anonymous ftp, and am thrilled by its capabilities. I now feel comfortable with it. A teacher who lives not far from me sent me a demo version of Geometer's SketchPad with a few demonstration panels. There is a fundamental difference in the syntax of the two systems. *** Cabri is very similar to Sketchpad in its functionality, but (as many people have pointed out) very different in its interface. *** Nick Jackiw of Key Curriculum Press then writes: I'll comment, but first let me disclaim: I wrote Geometer's Sketchpad I'm reasonably friendly with Jean-Marie Laborde and Yves Baulac (the designers of Cabri), so while my bias is toward Sketchpad, I'll pretend to present my comments from a neutral perspective. I'm glad to answer other questions about Sketchpad here, but if I begin to seem too self-promotional, I trust other netters will burn me down. *** The points presented by Nick Jakiw are interesting. Language matters, I know. I guess I had not considered the implications in this context. I am not going to burn you down. I like the Geometer's Sketchpad. I think it has a "steeper learning curve", but higher pay off for the user. *** Thus, it was possible to ask a question about some major educational software, and within a day there was discussion of what some users thought of the various programs, and how to get demo versions. Moreover, the writer of one of the programs chimed in and explained why his program works the way it does. This was a discussion which took place within a period of three days between teachers, teachers-of- teachers, and developers of cutting-edge educational technology. Nothing like this could have occurred before the Internet. One of the participants, Michelle Manes, is working on the Connected Geometry Project, a major curriculum development project. She has described their project on the Forum, and asked for comments and advice. It is now possible for them to discuss ideas and to have their materials tested by a much broader audience than possible in the pre- Internet days, and to interact with incredible speed and convenience. The entire educational community has so much to gain that we are entering a new era in education. This is actually a never-ending story, since I've just contacted a student I know in Grenoble (by email, of course), home of the Cabri-geometre group, and asked her to facilitate getting them in on the discussion. #EOF ------------------------------ Date: 22 Dec 1993, 18:30:50 EST <12/22, 18:30:13> From: PMW1@PSUVM To: PMW1 AT PSUVM Subject: Appended file STORY093 PA 12/22/93 18:30:50 Document: 65 -- story093.PA Submitted by: Ann A. Dixon, Assistant Director Department: Academic Computing Organization: Bryn Mawr College Address: 101 North Merion Avenue Bryn Mawr, PA 19010 USA Phone: (215) 526-5002 Fax: (215) 526-7450 E-mail: ann@brynmawr.edu Categories: Education, higher; Health care/health services Criteria: Innovative or improved ways of doing things; Creation of new ideas, products, or services Other Docs: (contact author for more information) Slides/photographs Story Site: (if other than location listed above) New Orleans, LA The Story It was an ordinary Saturday morning in March, 1990, and I had tickets to see Kathleen Turner in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof that night in Philadelphia. It was no ordinary morning, though: Mom called to tell me that her doctor thought she had lung cancer. Stunned, I booked a flight to New Orleans for the next morning, wound up a few projects at the office, and packed, not knowing how long I was going to be there or what I would be doing while I was there. As it turned out, I stayed for 17 months, and the Internet allowed me to keep my job in Pennsylvania while caring for my mother in New Orleans. I am the Assistant Director of Academic Computing at Bryn Mawr College, a Seven Sisters college of about two thousand undergraduate and graduate students located on the Main Line in suburban Philadelphia. I have supported the curricular and research computing needs of our faculty and students since 1985. Since we have a small staff of only four full-timers, I have worked on a variety of projects, including managing the timesharing computers, designing and implementing the campus network, and affiliating the College with the National Center for Supercomputer Applications (NCSA) for chemistry and physics faculty. In the winter of 1989-90, Bryn Mawr joined PREPnet, the Pennsylvania regional network, as part of a library automation project which included Haverford and Swarthmore Colleges. The three colleges were to become connected by T-1 lines, and to combine their card catalogs into one database physically located at the Bryn Mawr library. I was in the midst of winding up the installation of the bridge to Haverford and Swarthmore when our family's health crisis struck. After I had been in New Orleans for a week, one of my co-workers mailed me a computer and a modem so that I could set up an office on the kitchen table. I sought the assistance of a colleague at the University of New Orleans, who gave me access to a local phone number and account on a UNO computer. I then regularly dialed up a UNO computer which was connected to SURAnet, and from there, connected directly to the Bryn Mawr College computer. The administration and personnel department of the College were skeptical that I could perform my job in these circumstances. One reads about telecommuting as a trend, one of the ways that the workplace is changing, but it had never been tried at Bryn Mawr. The College did not have a formal family leave policy at the time either. I used all of my vacation time, and then negotiated a part-time arrangement where I would work 20 hours per week. The balance of my salary would be used to employ additional student labor on site. The reduced time would allow me to spend time talking with Mom, running errands, cooking, taking her places, visiting her when she was hospitalized. Retaining the job helped me "get away" in my mind from the caregiving role and its responsibilities, and the income helped pay my six month old mortgage. Everyone was surprised by how much I could do long distance. From my kitchen "office" in New Orleans, I diagnosed hardware failures on the mainframe using troubleshooting software. I performed everyday maintenance tasks such as adding accounts, changing passwords, evaluating system performance, and programming. I consulted with the library staff by electronic mail about the local area network which was being installed to access their new database. I wrote training materials for the Computing Center's student staff and articles for the newsletter. I advised the biology department in the selection of equipment and software for a new computer lab. I evaluated new software for faculty. I answered questions by electronic mail every afternoon while Mom was napping, and in effect, had "office hours" when people could find me on-line for an interactive chat. And finally, I gave students specific instructions for a variety of tasks which needed to be done on site, making them my eyes and hands when necessary. The loyalty of the student staff and the close relationships which I had developed with faculty over the years, first as a student, and later as a staff member, were important to the success of this telecommuting arrangement. Before I left Pennsylvania, I had been conducting business regularly by electronic mail, so people were already comfortable communicating with me in this medium. Although news usually travels fast around this small campus, a few people didn't know for months that I was away. The personnel department's willingness to try a flexible, unorthodox arrangement was important too, as was the support of my supervisor. The Internet provided a reliable, cost effective means for cross country communication. I was able to retain my job while caring for my mother, and my employer was able to retain my experience while I was 1500 miles away. The bottom line is that the technology makes it all possible. #EOF ------------------------------ Date: 22 Dec 1993, 18:30:51 EST <12/22, 18:30:13> From: PMW1@PSUVM To: PMW1 AT PSUVM Subject: Appended file STORY122 PA 12/22/93 18:30:51 Document: 64 -- story122.PA Submitted by: Robert D. Carlitz, Professor Department: Physics and Astronomy Organization: University of Pittsburgh Address: 39410 Hara Street Pittsburgh, PA 15260 USA Phone: (412) 624-9027 Fax: (412) 624-9163 E-mail: RDC@vms.cis.pitt.edu Categories: Education, K12 Criteria: Innovative or improved ways of doing things; More equitable access to technology or electronic information; Creation of new ideas, products, or services; Local commitment to network-based activities; Leverage of public funding; Volunteer contributions of time and energy; Partnerships between public and private sector Other Docs: (contact author for more information) Documentation The Story KIDSNET Mailing List Early in 19891 circulated a few messages to such Internet newsgroups as misc.kids and comp.edu to ask about the possibility of connecting schools to the Internet and letting students and teachers make use of a medium with which I was familiar in my work as a research physicist. Several people expressed an interest in this topic, and on May 8,1989, Patt Haring sent out a message which inaugurated the -SNET mailing list. The message headers were as follows: Date: Mon, 8 May 8920:05:27 EDT From: patth@CCNYSCI.BITNET From: Patt Haring The original "private" list contained eight names. After announcements were posted to misc.kids and comp.edu and other Internet newsgroups, readership grew rapidly, and the enlarged public list was moved to the University of Pittsburgh in September of 1989. The readership include 5 students, teachers and administrators from the schools - educators, scientists and sociologists from the universities - programmers, hardware designers and network architects from industry - people from foundations and funding agencies - children and parents. The challenge which animated the group's discussions on the outset was the idea of creating an international network for children and their teachers. Many of the readers have become involved in projects contributing to this overall aim. Some of these projects - such as the international projects - are far larger than the group itself. Discussions on the list have influenced funding trends, federal and state legislation and the professional outlook on K-12 networking. The Consortium for School Networking had its roots in discussions on KIDSNET, and the Consortium now provides on-line services nearly as extensive as those of KIDSNET. Throughout its history the focus of the KIDSNET list has been on teachers, classroom activities and the school curriculum. This has made the list an ideal place for teachers new to the network to find projects in which to participate. Several hundred such projects have been initiated and organized through this mechanism, with the participation of thousands of teachers from schools around the world. Here in Pittsburgh, KIDSNET was used to introduce local teachers to the Internet and its resources. This process began a grass-roots movement which spread through the Pittsburgh Public Schools and several other school districts in the region. A formal project known as Common Knowledge: Pittsburgh has been developed with a goal of providing access to the network for all students and teachers in the city schools and for integrating use of network resources in the school curriculum. The experience of KIDSNET shows the ability of the network - and the virtual community built around the network - to respond to n opportunities and develop important new resources for our schools. There appear to be no major technical obstacles to the realization of the original goal KIDSNET to develop an international children's network, and even the political obstacles to such a goal do not appear to be insurmountable. Insofar as the ideal addresses educational needs, technological development and interactional communication and understanding, it is both an attractive and timely activity to pursue. A final footnote to this story should give the electronic, e-mail address for subscriptions to KIDSNET. It is currently kidsnet-request-@vms.cis.pitt.edu. Thi s will change shortly, since a clearinghouse for children's television claims a copyright on the name. The clearinghouse is backed by the major television networks. It could be that the conflict over use of the name may be symptomatic of a deeper conflict and a deeper change that is taking place as computer networks challenge the dominance of traditional broad cast media in education and other spheres of activity. #EOF ------------------------------ Date: 22 Dec 1993, 18:30:53 EST <12/22, 18:30:13> From: PMW1@PSUVM To: PMW1 AT PSUVM Subject: Appended file STORY123 PA 12/22/93 18:30:53 Document: 63 -- story123.PA Submitted by: Ronald C. Blum, Account Executive Department: Sales Organization: Soma Technologies of Philadelphia Address: 1650 Arch Street Philadelphia, PA 19103 USA Phone: (215) 496-0303 Fax: (215) 496-0130 E-mail: blumr@nisc.upenn.edu Categories: Other Criteria: Innovative or improved ways of doing things; More equitable access to technology or electronic information; Creation of new ideas, products, or services; Technology transfer; Local commitment to network-based activities; Partnerships between public and private sector Other Docs: (contact author for more information) Documentation The Story As a third party maintenance organization, being on the Internet has meant that we have been able to resolve our customer's service needs directly. Many of our government customers place their service calls using a predetermined format which corresponds to government mandated protocols. In many cases educational institutions as well as large corporate accounts accessing The Internet are able to set up their internal help desk software to forward calls directly to us through the Internet. Messages received at our end are converted to a format which flows directly into our service management package. This eliminates the need for customers to wait for a telephone response to service calls. Customers are able to enter information describing system problems and failures with make and model of the machine. With this level of detail our help desk personnel are often able to respond immediately in chat mode, over the Internet. If appropriate, a voice response may be given, or, in the case of a hardware failure. Having access to numerous newsgroups makes us aware of commonly occurring problems experienced by a wide range of user types. We can be prepared to resolve these problems, in many cases, before a failure occurs amongst our customer base. Frequently there are cases where a users group member has experienced the problem and frequently the "fix" is developed through dialogue of users that have worked on it together, over the Internet. Sometimes an amalgam of amateurs can come up with a better fixer than the manufacturer's, by the book, solution. The Internet provides a huge resource of data concerning new products, their anticipated pre-release impact on the user community, and after release de-bugging ideas. In many cases complete technical manuals as well as bulletins are available for those who know how to access them. Users become self repairers and professional service organizations, such as ours, are able to stay on the cutting edge and up to date with the plethora of new products whose users have not yet developed self repair techniques. University and scientific organizations on the Internet often have very sophisticated tools at their disposal. Digitized images of products with which there is a problem can be transmitted, file emulation scenarios created and received for download to users. Audio techniques, while not prevalent are appearing on occasion. Finally, a friendly word to a frustrated user who is soliciting help from a newsgroup can lead to a "profitable" business relationship. When the word gets out that your company has the resources, knows its product, and queries its customer base, addressing its problems prior to the customer knowing that you are a resource available to them, business is bound to expand. I believe that as other businesses explore the possibilities that the Internet provides for staying abreast of their customer's needs and responding to them seamlessly the Internet and equivalent electronic information resources will make American businesses more competitive. The ability to monitor their customer's needs in a non-interventional way, address customer issues with immediacy but transparency, view the customer base as synergistic, and develop strategy for address and redress of recurring as well as unusual needs will thrust American business into a 90's and beyond mentality. This mentality, based on true awareness of customer need and competitiveness to satisfy that need rather than merely a response to a shrinking bottom line. For us, The Internet puts the customer in the driver's seat, makes us, the third party maintenance organization, a vehicle providing the services the client needs, as they are needed, in an expeditious manner. #EOF ------------------------------ End of STORY Digest Wed, 22 Dec 1993 ************************************************************