Thank You, We’ll Connect You Now

Joining a belated rush of telephone companies onto the Internet, Pacific Bell on Tuesday will begin offering Internet access to California consumers.

With free software and a monthly charge of about $20, residents in four regions of the state --Sacramento, San Francisco, Los Angeles and San Diego-- will be able to dial into the global computer network over PacBell’s lines. The service is ,expected to be made available to all Californians later this year.

Industry analysts have criticized PacBell and many of the other local and long-distance phone companies for being slow to expand into the consumer Internet access business. PacBell will face stiff competition from AT&T;, MCI and entrenched independent firms such as Netcom, PSI and Earthlink.

But Rick Hronicek, president of Pacific Bell Internet Services, says he’s confident the company will be No. 1 in the state by year’s end.

The Internet and Society: Experts from business, law, government and academia will gather Tuesday through Friday at Harvard for a conference on the impact of electronic communication on society. Conference participants-- including Microsoft’s Bill Gates and Sun Microsystems’ Scott McNealy-- will examine the implications for privacy, security, information ownership and communication.