ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the current state of technological dependence experienced by less developed countries and offers some suggestions for increased self-reliance in acquiring the technological means to communicate. The freedom to communicate requires information technology, there can be no communication freedom. Communication means increasingly involve modern technology, one of the major moving forces of development. New information technology carries both the opportunity for innovating creatively and the risk of making the existing communication system more rigid, establishing more powerful, centralized networks. Point-to-point communication via satellites could be less expensive than traditional line-and-pole technology, thereby permitting increased person-to-person information exchange in the Third World. In the field of communication, appropriate technology aims at creating "community media:" small cassette recorders, low power radio stations, super 8 film equipment, half-inch video cameras for television, or mimeographed rural newspapers. "Big media" technology pushes the society toward centralization and the "trickle down" principle, producing one-way, vertical communication.
