less of the type of information created, there is a cost of creation which can involve one's time and other resources necessary to formulate ideas all the way to the billions ($) spent by the government. There must be incentives to expend the resources necessary to create the information. Sometimes the mere existence of the Internet justifies or encourages such creation, although information is usually created to share ideas, to promote oneself or an organization, or for reimbursement (or profit).
Most use of the Internet is electronic mail, followed by moving data from one computer to another, and, lastly, logging into a computer that is running elsewhere (MacKie-Mason & Varian, 1997). Internet users are often discussed in terms of end-users, yet Internet users also include information creators and most information infrastructure participants who depend on the Internet to provide their services. For example, with electronic journals, authors communicate with peers and publishers, editors with referees, publishers with secondary database producers, libraries with libraries, database vendors with intermediary searchers, to name a few of the many types of communication that take place. The cost charged to users of the Internet is usually far less than the cost of acquiring Internet information in terms of their time and other resources. The cost of using the information is often even higher than the cost of acquiring the information.
The Internet communications infrastructure provides a means for individuals to create information and communicate it to others. Sometimes, as with E-mail and journal articles, the Internet merely provides a way of sending messages that can be stored and read when a need arises. It also provides a convenient mechanism for sending research data, software, and a host of other kinds of information from creators to users. The economic role of the communications infrastructure is to facilitate communication and add value to the information communicated through rapid transmissions, enhanced accessibility, greater availability, ease of access, low cost, and other such favorable attributes.
The Internet communications infrastructure consists of communication technologies such as the network of back-Some