Throughout society the explosion of information technologies is changing how we work and live. This volume focuses on emerging technologies and their impact on people and organizations in the early years of the new century. This book contains a collection of 36 papers selected from more than 110 high quality presentations at the 2000 International Conference on the Information Society in the 21st Ceptury (IS2000). The conference was held November 5-8, 2000, in Aizu Wakamatsu, Japan. IS2000 featured lively exchanges of ideas and opinions on the im pact of emerging technologies on our society among international participants from academic and industrial organizations. The chapters in this book are grouped under the following six headings: Information and Knowledge Management Towards an Intelligent Society; Collaborative Internet, Multimedia, and Electronic Commerce; Intelligent Robots and Auditory Interfaces; New Models and Approaches for a Knowledge Economic Society; IT-Based Innovative Edu cation Systems and Strategies; and Emerging Technologies for the Information Society in the New Century. The papers offer excellent perspectives on advances in the various fields and provide a framework for the development of improvements in technologies that hold promise for enhancing our lives in the new century. Special thanks are due to the University of Aizu and the Telecommunications Ad vancement Foundation for providing grants to support IS2000 and the publication of this volume. We also would like to thank all the authors for their excellent work in assuring the high quality of the contents.
