An Irish Forum for the Information Society has been formed in response to the report. While it welcomes the publication, it says "the report sees progress coming purely from the market or from government initiatives. It ignores the important and necessary contribution of communities and voluntary organisations in creating their own communication networks. Although it stresses the need for lifelong learning, the report understands education mainly as the acquisition of technical skills. Yet people who are employable in the future information society will need to be adaptable, to work in groups and teams, and above all, to combine technological competence and creativity."
The forum hopes to raise a series of debates and initiatives incoming months. The acting chairperson is Liam Breslin, or contact Dr James Wickham in TCD (01 608 1875) or Chris O'Malley in DCL (tel 01 608 1875)
. Arthouse in Dublin is also organising a public meeting and panel discussion on the report on May 7th at 7 p.m. An HTML version of the report can be downloaded as a 220K file from its Web site at http://www.arthouse.ie
The report is also available in a printed edition (price £10) or as a 1.4 megabyte PDF file from Forfas at http://www.forfas.ie/infosoc