INDUSTRY

The Netherlands has made long-term investments to provide new levels of national connectivity and collaboration, according to a new publication from The COOK Report on Internet Protocol.

The Netherlands' initiative provides blazingly fast optical networks and multi-disciplinary software for improving education and research. In addition, the country's systems also generate new public/private partnerships, as well as resources for “e-Science” communities that need to share massive amounts of data across borders.

“It's apparent that the Netherlands is building the digital network and knowledge infrastructure on which the economy of the 21^st Century will be based,” said Gordon Cook, author of The Cook Report. "The quality of a country’s information and communications technology (ICT) increasingly defines its future economic opportunity."

The new book, “BUILDING A NATIONAL KNOWLEDGE INFRASTRUCTURE: How Dutch Pragmatism Nurtures a 21^st Century Economy”, explores why the Netherlands got digital infrastructure right when so many larger countries failed. Gordon Cook suggests that centuries of working together to keep the North Sea from flooding Holland have taught the Dutch the value of working together to create “a technology commons for public good.”

Interviews with key participants tell how the Dutch government used revenues from disappearing natural gas deposits to finance a future-focused digital infrastructure. Dutch tech enthusiasts, half geek and half academic, had already spent fifteen years building educational and research networks. In 1997 they were asked to create a digital infrastructure to assure the small country of seventeen million could stay competitive in an Internet-driven world.

Kees Neggers, Director of SURFnet, says the Dutch success is based on the inclusiveness of the governance process. Policy is defined mainly by user input. Neggers cites the recognition that users need “advanced hassle-free end-to-end connectivity.” Collaborating with advanced users flushes out problems that could create obstacles to wider adoption. New public/private models help transfer innovative technologies to the private sector for commercialization.

Dutch teams are now focusing on making better tools for “e-Science.” Data-intensive software and processes are being made generic for easier adaptability to multiple areas of science. Open source software is used to improve collaboration.

The big question for North America is can the Dutch model work across the Atlantic? Internet providers in the United States are focused on competing to increase profitability. They show little interest in collaborating to build a 21^st Century Infrastructure. The COOK Report says The Netherlands provides a badly needed reference model for rethinking infrastructure in the U.S.

“BUILDING A NATIONAL KNOWLEDGE INFRASTRUCTURE: How Dutch Pragmatism Nurtures a 21^st Century Economy” is available for download from The COOK Report on Internet Protocol at http://cookreport.com/knowledge.pdf and also from SURFnet at http://bit.ly/d2sRWL. A limited number of printed copies of the book are also available for purchase at http://bit.ly/9yYudu.