Communications, Information Technologies, New Media
  1. EcoPlan as User
  2. Earlier and Current Work
  3. Computerization/Communications Profile: 1972-2000

Communications. Information technologies. Computers. Telecoms. Networks. New media. e-Commerce. Portals. Content. Interactivity. The Information Society... These are sectors, technologies, firms, markets, products, services, tools -- and ways of living and working -- that we at EcoPlan face and deal with from a number of perspectives every day, as we have indeed since the closing years of the sixties. We use them. We study them. We probe them. And we think a lot about them and where they are leading to. Exciting stuff. It helps to be in the middle of it all, and still have time to think.

EcoPlan as User

The international consultancy business, as we practice it anyway, is basically run on a platform of state of the art information and communications. There are three main pillars of this part of our business:

  • In the first place there is the matter of our long standing work structure - which since our founding has hinged on a widely spread out network of associates and cooperating groups who stay in close touch, communicate and define ideas iteratively, come together, and, when the occasion is right, form working teams of various sizes and sorts to execute projects and programs. (Our goal has always been "to have them in the same (virtual) work space".)

  • Beyond this, and as opposed to more traditional research assignments that may lend themselves to completion in relative isolation from the client and others, the kinds of jobs that we take on invariably require more or less continuous feedback and the possibility of close steering as well as use of interim results (as best they might be) as we go along.

  • And finally, at the outset a result of our transportation/access work and the (to us) obvious synergies between the transport sector and information and communications technologies, we very early (starting in 1974) began to monitor new technology developments in these fields, both with reference to their eventual transport applications (as complements and as eventual substitutes) and as an emerging sector which was well worth tracking and knowing in its on right.

Not surprisingly as a result of all this, we became early practitioners of applied state of the art of information processing and communications, and now have literal decades of experience and a growing array of techniques and tools that we use, each day, to mold ourselves into highly competent working teams. Here briefly are the main tools that we rely on to run our business today:

  • Full SOA computerization and high speed communications lines between all partners, and as possible with our clients
  • ISDN, cable modem and ADSL links
  • Videoconferencing
  • Use of Web sites (both private and public) for specific project and program support (and not just advertising our services)

Earlier and Current Work

This is clearly an important part of our qualifications, but on the other hand we also feel that it is not to be taken too seriously. Each project is after all a new start, and what is more important than a long list of earlier work and paper qualifications is the clarity of vision, the organization, the energy level and the lucidity, often under pressure, that the team brings to a new assignment. That said, what is perhaps interesting about the several lists of past work that you will find spotted throughout this site is the extent to which they suggest that we have, in our specialty areas at least, managed to accumulate over the years a certain amount of information, contacts, eventually even knowledge, and a certain level of perception about underlying issues and sectoral dynamics, which can in some cases provide a good base for new work.

For now (Dec. 99) we will just list here the titles of an array of related projects and initiatives that we have carried out in this broad area, recent and older. In due course, a more complete and fully annotated and linked section will replace this. (Some of these entries are directly linked a Web site or report that provides more complete information on the project.)

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EcoPlan's Computerization/Communications Profile: 1972-2004

Here for those who might be interested in this sort of thing (and it does tell a story) are some of the highlights of the evolutionary process as we lived it here, prior to which we simply outsourced all tasks requiring computer calculation and handling.

  • 1972 - Purchased and started to use first "large" programmable calculators (ca. $1,000, 8k. We kept trying to make them work as "PC's".)
  • 1973/74 - First dedicated word processors (ca. $5-10,000 each. We used them, but we what we really wanted was "PC's".)
  • 1976 - First Apple II for word processing, simple database management and calculations. For us, the great breakthrough.
  • 1978-1984 - Six year use and good progression of CPM microcomputers + LANs (a lot better than those first IBM PCs)
  • 1978 - Gave away last IBM Selectric typewriters.
  • 1979 - First portable computer (Osborne I, 15 kg.s, 64k RAM, 2x92k floppies, 5" monitor. Wow!)
  • 1979 - First written master plan for EcoPlan conversion to 'paperless office' (which only recently has really begun to take shape)
  • 1980 - Retired (gave away) last dedicated word processor (a Xerox machine the size of a small refrigerator that set us back ca. $25k in 1976)
  • 1982-- First email (MCI Mail, with 300 bps modem with acoustical couplers. Great stuff. Our clients laughed at us when we proposed it for our work with them.)
  • 1984 -- Conversion to networked IBM-compatible PCs
  • 1985 - First regular use of computerized databases via modem (Dialog, Datastar, et al)
  • 1987 -- Group 3 fax (which we shifted over to only because we had failed to covert our clients and colleagues to email after four years of trying)
  • 1992/3 - The Commons put on the Net for the first time. First step was a news group on Internet; preparation of first two 'electronic libraries and discussion spaces, on Access and Information and Rethinking Work (on ECTF/CompuServe)
  • 1993 - Point to point videoconferencing installation, together with first ISDN lines
  • 1994 - Videoconferencing/group work extended (with whiteboarding, high speed data exchange, etc.)
  • 1995 - First videoconference lecture to university graduate faculty (University of Toronto media class)
  • 995 - Developed first special project WWW site in support of an international conference: (OECD World Converence on Sustainable Transportation, Vancouver, Canada)
  • 1997 - Move up to multi-point videoconferencing and full function international group work system
  • 1997 - First international virtual scientific conference (Zero Emissions)
  • 1998 - Cable modem takes us to communications speeds approx. 10,000 times those with which we were very satisfied two decades ago.
  • 1999 - ADSL lines installed - Faster yet
  • 2000 - Shift of videoconferencing to ADSL, Polycom and the Net
  • 2001 - ADSL upgrade to 512k
  • 2002 - Shift to IP videoconferencing + open software for web (PHP) +wireless networking
  • 2003: Upgrade of videoconferncing hardware and software + ADSL and cable now up to 1024 ko. and progressing

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Updated 3 December 2004