COVER LETTER: A popular government without popular information, or the means of acquiring it, is but a prologue to a farce or a tragedy, or per- haps both. Knowledge will forever govern ignorance, and a people who mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives. - James Madison These words of James Madison, if anything, are of greater significance now then when they were first written. We, as a so- ciety, are at a point where whether we are going to live in an "Information Age" is no longer at issue. We are. The only ques- tion which remains is what we are going to do about it--whether we, as a society, will be able to use this new technology to more effectively "...arm ourselves with the power which knowledge gives." Free-Net (tm) community computer systems offer a significant and innovative answer to that question. They allow people un- paralleled access to some of the best services and resources our computerized Information Age has to offer; and they do it in a way which makes them free to the user--in much the same way that our public library system, for example, has been free to its patrons for over 100 years. This booklet is intended to provide you with an introduction to NPTN and our work. It is divided into six chapters. Chapter One outlines some of the background and general concepts which un- derly community computing; Chapter Two introduces Academy One--our K-12 educational program; Chapter Three provides more information on NPTN's Teledemocracy Program; Chapter Four discusses additional cybercasting and network information services; and Chapter Five tells how to begin the process of establishing a Free-Net system in your community. We hope this guide will answer many of your questions about our organization and will encourage you to take the next steps to- ward establishing a Free-Net of your own. For underlying it all--underlying all the time and effort that has gone into the development of the Free-Net concept--is one simple fact. We can not imagine a 21st Century which does NOT have free public-access community computer systems, just as our century had the free public library. If you agree with that belief; if you agree with us on the sheer inevitability of public access computing then, please, read on. This guide is for you. Thomas M. Grundner, Ed.D President