Raising the Floor Op Ed in Sacramento Bee

Just published my first op ed on the raising the floor concept yesterday in the Sacramento Bee, Everyone deserves access to technology, online world, co-authored with Prof. Gregg Vanderheiden. This op ed was derived from remarks I made to the California Emerging Technology Fund's Roundtable recently.

I want to sound the call for the technology community to get behind raising the floor for everybody around the planet. It's something within our power, and it will bring out the best in our community.

The opening paragraphs are excerpted below:

As technology races ahead at an ever-increasing pace, more and more of society's activities are moving into an online digital world that requires unfettered access. Although many of us may feel like we're falling behind technologically, large groups of Californians face barriers that block their access to the online world. People with disabilities, seniors, the poor and those without strong reading skills are facing ever-increasing obstacles to technology use. Since technology is becoming essential to education, business, personal finance, politics, entertainment and shopping, if we don't do something, we may find someone we love, or even ourselves, left behind.

We need to commit ourselves to delivering a base set of technological capabilities to all people, starting with Californians. At an affordable price, everybody should have access to communications technology and content to meet their personal, social, educational and employment needs. We need to raise the technology floor so that all of our citizens have at least the basic tools they need to participate in our modern society.

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