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Association Suisse des Médias, Fédération Internationale des Associations de Multimédias (FIAM), Forum Européen des Multimédias.
Specialists working in the field of new technologies.
The digital divide expresses the social, economic and geographical inequalities witnessed across the world in the area of access and use of digital technologies and software applications. These inequalities are even more acute if we consider the ever greater importance played by Internet and multimedia, as more and more individuals in both rich and poor countries integrate this medium in their social and professional lives.
To bridge the divide, infrastructures capable of offering basic telecommunications services have to be created. We have thus witnessed, worldwide, over the past decade, the built-up of fixed and wireless networks offering a large selection of communication services. But that is not enough to respond to the challenges of the Divide. We also have to ensure that the costs of acquiring these technologies and the tools that accompany them be affordable to the largest number of users.
Furthermore, persistent efforts are required to offer Internet and multimedia users digital content that is of quality and respectful of different expressions of cultural diversity and interests. This is the context in which FIAM (International Federation of Multimedia Associations) was holding its third Summit which brought together in Montreux major world Internet and multimedia actors. The purpose of this encounter was:
The Summit addressed these objectives by looking at several areas of industry activity:
. The summaries were written by volunteer reporters of ICVolunteers who were assigned to each of the sessions to document the presentations.
http://www.internetworldsummit.orgOfficial Web Site of the 3rd World Summit on Internet and Multimedia