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    By Nina McCain
    (c) 1980 Boston Globe (Field News Service)
    BOSTON-For the last 25 years or so, a staple of every futurist's
vision of the brave new world has been the little black box in the
living room that would, at the touch of a button, spew out news
reports, baseball scores, stock quotations and casserole recipes.
    The future has arrived in living rooms, nationwide.
    In Columbus, Ohio, John Gibney is reading The Columbus Dispatch on
his home computer terminal, scanning the day's offering of stories
quickly and selecting a few he wants to read in full. Later, the
31-year-old president of a fund-raising company may ''chat'' with new
friends around the country on the computer version of a citizens band
radio. And if ''the guys come over for a couple of beers,'' they may
play electronic football or golf or war games.
    Like thousands of other computer users, Gibney is participating in
one of three separate experiments designed to test the market for the
electronic delivery of information to U.S. homes.
    The Associated Press, the Knight-Ridder newspaper chain, Dow Jones
and Co. and more than a dozen individual newspapers are sending
electronically the kind of information that has been carried by ink
and newsprint for at least three centuries.
    Like Gibney, participants in these experiments will be able to pick
and choose from a smorgasbord of news, features and advertisments. If
the customer is interested only in the local school board meeting, he
or she can go directly to that story and skip inflation, politics and
the latest Latin American revolution.
    In some cases, the customer will be able to place orders with
advertisers via the computer, using a credit card number. As the
systems become more sophisticated, shoppers will be able to use them
to find the best buys on hamburger or house paint and to get the
classified listings for sailboats or sofas without wading through
houses, autos and pets.
    For readers who are used to browsing through the paper with their
morning cup of coffee or tucking it under their arm as they head for
the commuter train, the new method of reading the news on a computer
screen may seem strange at first.
    Those who are familiar with the new technology predict that it will
not take long to get used to. They point out that many adults now use
computers on the job and that kids who were weaned on television,
play electronic games and use computers at school, probably will
learn the new system easily.
    The print media have decided to test the waters in what is usually
called ''the home information revolution'' on the theory that if they
do not provide the kind of information that has traditionally been
their speciality, others will. The question that lurks in the
background is: Will the newspaper be replaced by the little black box
in the living room?
    Most newspaper people don't think it will, but they are hedging
their bets.
    In announcing the experiment involving the Associated Press and 11
local papers, AP general manager Keith Fuller acknowledged the
uncertainties of the new field.
    ''We have no idea where information retrieval will lead in the
future,'' Fuller said. ''Whether it will ever replace the
conventional media that we know today, no one knows. But I think it
is interesting enough, it has the potential, and that we all should
be aware of it. We want to do the experimentation on the ground
floor.''
    Benjamin Compaine, a staff member at Harvard's Center for
Information Policy Research and a specialist in the new technologies,
believes the newspaper will continue in its present form for the
foreseeable future while the new systems develop, much as television
developed with radio.
    ''I would not spend much time worrying about the extent to which
newer media are going to take over your turf,'' Compaine recently
told a meeting of suburban newspaper editors. ''In practical terms,
there are good economic, marketing, and socio-cultural reasons why
such services will find only limited penetration in the consumer
market in the current decade.''
    The real test of the new systems, Compaine says, is whether they can
offer more, better, and more conveniently packaged information at
prices people are willing to pay.
    ''Consumers are going to invest in the new hardware only to the
extent they perceive its ability to provide them with information
that is different or in some way better than what they now have,'' he
said.
    The experiments now under way around the country are designed to
find out if there is a market for the new systems. Do people really
want newspapers delivered via a computer instead of on their
doorstep, and how much are they willing to pay? What kinds of
information will they want? More consumer tips and fewer feature
stories? More local news and less national?
    Beyond the more immediate questions of cost and content are larger
issues with far-reaching implications for all of society. Will
traditional First Amendment freedom of the press apply to the signals
sent out over telephone wires or television cables? Who will regulate
the new information systems?
    Already there have been predictions that the Federal Communications
Commission, which regulates radio and television, could expand its
jurisdiction to include material from newspapers and magazines sent
into homes over cables or phone lines. Any move in this direction
would certainly be challenged by the print media, which jealously
guard their constitutionally guaranteed freedom from government
regulation.
    MORE
    
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    NINA MCCAIN X X X INFORMATION SYSTEMS?
    Among the groups that are interested in these questions is, not
surprisingly, the American Newspaper Publishers Assn. (ANPA). The
immediate focus of their concern is legislation now before Congress
which, the publishers contend, would open the door for the American
Telephone and Telegraph Co. (AT&T) to get into the business of
producing information as well as carrying it over telephone lines.
    The publishers have succeeded in getting the legislation amended in
the House Commerce Committee to provide stricter prohibitions against
possible AT&T forays into the news business.
    In a letter to members, the ANPA president, Washington Post
publisher Katharine Graham, warned of the dangers of giving a
monopoly like AT&T control over both the collection and distribution
of news and information.
    ''The possibility of one giant corporation becoming the information
supplier-an increasingly dominant information supplier-to four out of
five American households strikes many of us as profoundly
troubling,'' Graham wrote.
    Phone lines are vital to the new systems since most information will
be transmitted over them. Two of the three current experiments use
phone lines, while the project involving Dow Jones, the Dallas
Morning News and its parent corporation, A.H. Belo Corp., will use TV
cables.
    In the AP experiment, phone lines will link the wire service, 11
member papers, the CompuServe computer company in Columbus, Ohio, and
home terminals around the country. For an initial charge of $15 to
$29.95 and $5 for each hour of use, customers will have access to
selected material from the local papers and the wire service. They
will be able to get up-to-the-minute information at the same time
that it reaches newspaper offices and TV studios.
    The Columbus Dispatch already is tied into this system and the other
papers, including the Middlesex News in Framingham, Mass., will join
at one-month intervals during the year. Each paper will participate
for six months.
    According to Henry Heilbrunn of the AP, the system is designed to be
''user friendly,'' that is, users will not have to learn a
complicated computer language and will be able to find the stories
they want easily.
    Heilbrunn, who specializes in the new systems, says the customers
probably will be ''computer hobbyists ... they would have the type of
home that is gadget-oriented, that has a microwave oven and a big
screen TV, that looks to the new technology for ease of living.''
    John Gibney fits that picture perfectly.
    ''I'm a tinker toy man,'' he admits cheerfully.
    Gibney says he finds it much more convenient to scan the paper on
his computer than to read it in the usual fashion. He spends from one
to three hours a day using the computer and, since it is billed to
his company, he doesn't worry about the cost.
    ''When I can't go to sleep some nights, I get up and read the paper
on the computer. It comes in categories - sports, local news,
national news. If you want the whole story, you can call it up.''
    The Gibney household does not take a paper and does not miss it.
    ''My wife doesn't use the computer,'' he says. ''She'd rather watch
the news on TV.''
    There are an estimated 500,000 computers now in use in homes like
Gibney's and in small businesses, and simple terminals are now
available for $400 or less. So the potential market for the AP system
is substantial.
    William Perry, publisher of the Middlesex News, says his paper
already has received a number of calls from people who are interested
in participating. Although the News, which is a part of the
Harte-Hanks chain, does not expect to be ''on line'' to the
CompuServe computer until next spring, editors are beginning to plan
the kind of material that could be developed specifically for the
experiment.
    Perry thinks that most home users will be interested in specific
kinds of information, rather than in browsing through the paper as
Gibney does.
    ''Unless you're way up on a mountain or caught in a blizzard, I
don't think you'd read the whole paper on a computer. There's a cost
factor. The system can only transmit 300 words a minute. At eight
cents a minute, it would cost a lot to read a 48-page paper. Let's
face it, TV's cheaper.''
    In the Knight-Ridder project in Florida, the computer terminals are
provided free to 30 homes at a time by the Bell System, which also
supplies the phone lines. Knight-Ridder supplies the computer and the
content. Other news organizations, such as the AP and the New York
Times, also are providing some information. About l50 homes in the
Coral Gables area are expected to participate during the course of
the experiment.
    In addition to offering the usual news and feature stories and
consumer services, the Knight-Ridder project also will allow
customers to use the computer to place orders with Sears, Eastern
Airlines and the other advertisers who are participating in the
venture.
    Knight-Ridder is footing the $1.5 million bill for the project and
will monitor it carefully to determine what the usuers actually read.
    ''This is such an exploding, proliferating field, and everybody is
speculating about where it will go,'' says James Batten, the
Knight-Ridder vice president in charge of the project. ''We hope this
will enable us to make better-informed estimates.''
    ENDIT MCCAIN
    
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