A Multimedia Arcade LO7256

J.Mullen@agora.stm.it
Mon, 6 May 96 14:34:8 GMT

Here's a tidbit from Italy....

The Italian region of Emilia-Romagna has come up before on the
list as the place where innovative practices of collaboration between
networks of organizations and between government/groups of organizations
has led to a surge in small to mid-sized business development and quite a
remarkable economic comeback in the last two decades. A rich tradition of
collective action goes back to the middle ages.

A new project is planned to open to the public at the beginning of
1997.

The project is called the Multimedia Arcade. Ideated by Umberto
Eco, professor of semiotics and writer, financed by the City of Bologna,
and managed by a software/training company formed by some of Eco's former
pupils, the Multimedia Arcade will provide a large public space for
learning about, training on and accessing new technologies and services,
an exhibition area, and conference rooms for holding assemblies on "the
history, the culture, and the major themes in the world of new media."

The Multimedia Arcade will be divided as follows:

+ Terminals Area - 50 terminals for accessing internet and a library
of multimedia products

+ Exhibition and Conference Area - provides the equipment for
presentations

+ Commercial Area - dedicated to industry information regarding
multimedia products, software, hardware, internet providers, etc.

+ "Cabled Bar" - grab a coffee while accessing internet from your
table


As well as the accessibility to resources this could provide to
would-be entrepreneurs, and perhaps some creative, spontaneous combustion
along this vein amongst the younger population, it is worth stating that
in Italy university education is public, for the most part, costing well
under a thousand dollars a year (excluding, books, room and board, that
is). At these prices, one can well imagine that computers don't exactly
proliferate in the classrooms. Bologna is definitely a "university town."
So it is interesting to see how problems in different sectors can prompt a
collaboration between civic, private, and educational institutions that
can work towards a common goal of providing general access to the tools
for learning and creating, while abating the fears of a gloomy future of
solitary individuals locked away in their homes glued to their computer
screens.

--

Jackie Mullen J.Mullen@agora.stm.it

Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>