Press Advisory

Steven Clift to headline policy forum on the digital divide Sept. 28

Markle Foundation adviser and online strategies consultant Steven Clift will headline the Sept. 28 Brown Policy Forum on Closing the Digital Divide. He will replace the original panel leaders, one-time U.S. Attorney General nominee Zoë Baird and former MCI WorldCom executive Jonathan Sallet, who will be unable to attend.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Markle Foundation adviser and online strategies consultant Steven Clift will headline the Sept. 28 Brown Policy Forum, Closing the Digital Divide. Clift will speak in place of the original panel leaders, one-time U.S. attorney general nominee Zoë Baird and former MCI WorldCom executive Jonathan Sallet, who are unable to participate.

The forum will be held as scheduled at 7:30 p.m. Thursday in the Salomon Center for Teaching, located on The College Green. Darrell West, director of the Taubman Center for Public Policy and American Institutions, will serve as moderator for the event.

Clift is an adviser to the Markle Foundation, an organization that specializes in information technology, particularly in efforts to provide access to technology for under-served populations. He is also an online strategies consultant who focuses on the use of the Internet in democracy, governance and community, seeking to improve democracy and citizen participation through the use of the Internet.

In addition, Clift is chairman of the Board of Directors for Minnesota E-Democracy, a non-profit organization which created the world’s first election-oriented web site in 1994, and hosts ongoing citizen discussions on state and community affairs. He is a frequent media commentator and shares information, news and advice via his Democracies Online Newswire service and through public presentations around the globe. Additional information on Clift is available at http://www.publicus.net.

Editors: The Brown Policy Forum on “The Digital Divide” was announced in our news release No. 00-028, distributed Friday, Sept. 22. Please update your files.