Kobe's lesson: Dial 711 for ‘open’ emergency communications

This Comment discusses the telecommunications aftermath of the Kobe earthquake and discusses the creation of a new disaster communications system. The basic lesson for telecommunications from the Kobe earthquake is that the usual approach of disaster information systems, traditionally based on a military-style topdown approach, is inadequate. It congests easily and cannot adjust to shocks. A better alternative is an open-access emergency system - open to inputs from a wide variety of public and private participants and with open access to that information. In Kobe the emergence of ‘information volunteers’ was a spontaneous step in the direction recommended, towards a ‘711’ system.