Typical EPC beneficiaries might be Indians trying to set up a more efficient grain-storage network, millions of Third World people are starving because the food goes to the wrong places. Sometimes, incidentally, the “wrong places” include the warehouses of thieves, and computerized records could reduce the opportunities for corruption. Many problems are political or economic, of course. The EPC would limit itself to technical issues and try to be as apolitical as possible, just as the international Red Cross focuses on relief rather than ideology.
Another EPC beneficiary might be a communications specialist hoping to install a satellite link; for obvious reasons, better communications might be one of the EPC’s first priorities. The EPC might help domestic and foreign groups working toward this goal. Even countries with poor phone lines, of course, can receive some computer messages in the large cities.
Yet other beneficiaries could include:
● Colombian doctors who wanted to fight an epidemic with the latest information sped over the computer lines.
● A civil engineer in Peru working on a road or bridge for isolated villagers who hoped to sell food to cities.
● A rural-assistance administrator in Kenya. Micros could help his staffers keep abreast of the newest, best way to dig a well or treat a dysentery-stricken baby.
The EPC wouldn’t just promote the flow of information from countries like the United States to the so-called lesser-developed countries. Among them, too, it would speed up the spread of practical solutions to common problems.
Learning of an efficacious home remedy, for example, a rural-assistance group in Ecuador might pass the information on for possible global dissemination. It just might save the life of a child in Peru. By keeping track of the better home remedies in the Third World, in fact, an American drug researcher might discover something that checked out scientifically—as has happened in the past.
Some Third World countries or groups of them might want to start their own EPCs. Rather than preempting these efforts, an American or international EPC could aid them, thereby multiplying the benefits of the original organization and forestalling fears of electronic imperialism.
The EPC could have a domestic version, too. Because of lower communications cost, the Home Corps (a friend’s phrase) might take more chances helping nonexperts without credentials. A gifted high school writer on Chicago’s South Side might tap out short stories on a school computer, for example, and a famous author across town might zip the files back, with comments easily inserted electronically. The two might meet a few times in person, then carry on via computer without the hassles and menace of urban travel. Likewise, an Evanston business executive might volunteer help to a businesswoman in a small town many miles away.