Page 35 - Communications Satellites Global Change Agents

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FIG. 1.2. The building of global human information (20 miles and 10,000 stories
high).

terns. These problems will be heightened if the G-8 and other economically
advanced countries continue to be thoroughly integrated into this global web of
information while other nations and societies, for technical, economic, or cultural
reasons, are excluded.
In only a few decades, the most developed countries of the Organization of
Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) can extend their knowledge
base and economic wealth well beyond limits that we can now only imagine. Yet
what does this portend for our increasingly small planet if the process leaves the