With less than seven years left in this decade, the last of the second millennium, most of us living today will participate in and perhaps shape one of the greatest periods of change in the history of human communication. New information and digital communications technologies are rapidly laying the foundation for an array of new delivery systems and content options. Among the key trends that will have a major impact on journalism are:

* An explosion in the availability of news and information sources that can be accessed directly by the end-user, without the journalist as the intermediary.

* The proliferation of on-line multimedia information databases of all kinds. These are likely to incorporate new software that will perform automatic sorting and presentation of the content. Personalized newspapers and newscasts are almost certain to be available by the end of the decade, in effect bypassing the editor.

The providers of these personalized newscasts are not always going to be existing media entities, and users of these databases will be able to go around the customary journalistic processes. Both developments present significant potential for the abandonment of traditional standards.

* The introduction of interactive elements into all media, offering television viewers in particular greater control and selectivity in their news and information consumption habits, thereby redefining the medium itself.

* A continuing movement away from mass media to more targeted, direct media vehicles -- from niche channels (history, golf, classical music, etc.) to highly specialized information services. This will pose financial and editorial challenges to the publishing and television industries. Information and content providers will be stimulated by the creation of multiple pathways into the home: terrestrial broadcast, cable, fiber optic, direct broadcast satellite, and wireless. More television channels, covering every large and small niche you can imagine, will lead to further erosion in the viewer and advertiser base of the traditional broadcast networks and their affiliates.

From the consumer's standpoint, the information future is rich with choice and possibility. For the journalist, the view is more troubling. Unquestionably, the journalistic process, in which content is carefully gathered and edited, will be a defining difference between genuine news product and all else in the digital domain. Ultimately, it is the integrity of the newsgathering and editing processes that distinguishes the journalist from others who seek to serve similar information needs.

Journalism has professional standards, an editorial structure, and a hierarchy that can impose sanctions for failing to adhere to standards. Journalists select and organize content and thereby add value to it. We also have the skills required to make information accessible to the general public.

But we cannot rely on these strengths alone. Technology is tearing down barriers and creating new opportunities with great speed. On-line databases -- content reservoirs of entertainment, news, archival material, history, science, art, and education -- will profoundly alter the relationship betweenconsumers and the providers of content, especially such traditional providers as newspapers, magazines, and television. They will also change the nature of the relationship between journalists and the public we serve. In some way, thanks to a variety of interactive means, we will be more immediately and intimately in touch with people; in others, we will be bypassed.

To survive and thrive in the coming information age journalists need to take several steps:

* We must overcome our naivete about technology. Too many of us either hate it, ignore it, or love it so blindly that we miss its true direction. We need members of the profession who are capable of being among the technology leaders of the digital information world.

* We must become more knowledgeable about the economics of the new information age, and be conversant with new players who will compete with and perhaps beat out the media companies that have been our traditional employers.

* We must pay close attention to federal communications policy. We do not need to lobby in the same way that special interest groups do, nor should we. However, we do have to understand the critical role that regulatory policy has played and will continue to play in defining the communications winners and losers.

Last year's big battle was over the cable bill and the power struggle between the broadcast and cable industries. This year, Congress is ready to begin consideration of a sweeping overhaul of the nation's communications laws. Integral to this will be such issues as the role the powerful regional Bell telephone companies will be permitted to play in offering video and information services to their customers in competition with existing media companies.

Journalists' employers have generally lined up solidly in opposition to telco entry into content areas. But this solidarity may not last forever. Indeed, some prominent media companies are already embracing their "enemies," especially overseas. In Great Britain, U.S. West has partnered with Tele-Communications, Inc., America's largest cable operator, to offer cable television service, while Southwestern Bell and Cox Cable Communications have joined forces to provide both telephone and cable service there. NYNEX has similar arrangements with Time Warner in Hungary and Scandinavia. And even in this country joint ventures are starting to appear, like the one formed by Dow Jones and Bell South for electronic information services. Meanwhile, the Clinton administration has already committed itself to stimulating the development of so-called information superhighways, basically fiber optic networks, which will probably be constructed by telephone and cable companies.

* We need to be more vocal advocates within our own organizations for greater investment in the quality of the news product. We will not survive in the new information age if we experience further declines in the quality of the service we provide to consumers, for the simple reason that new alternatives will exist for obtaining much, if not all, of the same information.

* Finally, journalists and journalism organizations need to be in the vanguard of those who are adapting the new technologies for public service ends. We should be the standard-setters in this vital area and not leave to others the opportunity to forge new electronic bonds with the people we serve.

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