For the past two years, IFWEA’s affiliate TSL in Finland has provided technological support for IFWEA’s International Study Circle Project. TSL is also responsible for the design and running of the IFWEA web site. Jouko Muuri, webmaster of the IFWEA web site and leader of the computers and information network team in TSL, describes their telematics work.

Today our "computers and information network team" is working nationally teaching a range of subjects including: basic knowledge about your computer; computer driving license; internet skills; information society and design your own homepage. We run fifteen computer classes all around Finland. TSL serves its member organisations by offering telematics services and education concerning telematics and computer issues. The request for these services has grown very quickly.

Our team consists of six members - two computer analysts, two computer teachers, a graphic designer and a web designer. We have an internet server called "pomo" (the boss) located in our main office in Helsinki. It is connected to the internet with a leased line (cabel) with the speed of two megabytes per second. The server itself was renewed in December 1998 and is now equipped with all the newest solutions. As an operating system we used Unix (FreeBSD) initially and after the updating we chose Linux (for more information, look at http://www.linux.com). It is a great operating system, much more stable and speedier than many of the alternatives. Also, since it is open source, you can rest assured that it will not remain stagnant. The internet server is the computer where all the websites are located.

We can also offer IFWEA and its projects e-mailing services. It is possible to create mailing lists manually (typing names to a list which can be used over the internet globally) or create a majordomo mailing list, where one can join (subscribe) or leave (unsubscribe) automatically.

Linked to the main server we use a database server called Lotus Domino (for more information, look at http://www.lotus.com/home.nsf/welcome/r5trial). This gives us a great assortment of methods of handling and reorganizing data which is collected via websites. It is also much easier to create fill-in-forms or discussion forums on the web site with the help of Lotus Domino than processing these services manually (writing cgi-script-programmes etc). This is a very new technology which we would like to use more when working with projects of IFWEA.

Building IFWEA’s capacity

We strongly believe in TSL that IFWEA needs to take advantage of internet technology. Using the internet, it can strengthen and refresh its actions by collecting, analysing and sharing information with its affiliates. This needs financial resources and new thinking. The internet is no more a toy or a hobby for computer freaks. The globalised world with global problems means there is a need for tools which assist in gathering information and experiences globally. The internet is surely the first one which IFWEA can use as a toolbox, speedy, cost-effective and rational. It is not surprising that IFWEA's less-resourced affiliates have taken the internet so seriously and have used it as a method in their daily work. Are there any possibilities among well-resourced affiliates to help those organisations which have no money to afford this technology?

The International Study Circles programme and its three different projects has been succesful. It has developed a new kind of solidarity and co-operation between affiliates. It has also strengthened the regional work of IFWEA. Questions and discussion themes published by those groups participating in the international study circles show us clearly that, for example, actions against globalisation need to be informed by local thinking and creativity. If one can at the same time communicate and change ideas with other groups experiencing the same problems, it indeed opens up new points of view and produces new methods on how to act in the future.

More discussion and contact between study circles is needed. Of course, the difficulity of language is understandable. Facilitators face a very hard task when they have to translate material and reports. In future projects we should offer more possibilities to individuals in the study circles to take part in communication and study processes via the internet. Let us give the bird the wings to get up to the open skies. We should also educate facilitators that the internet itself is a huge database of information which can be related to study themes of the study circles. Using search engines and structured web services around the internet will enrich the study process.