The global digital communications network, colloquially known as the “internet”, has received much attention in recent years from business, media, cultural, and government interests. This paper looks behind the hype and sales-pitches, at the essential features of the medium which have made it (and will continue to make it) the central technology for the dissemination of information in the next century. It is a particularly important technology for remote communities, since all information resources (educational, commercial, and recreational) can be transmitted using a standard set of protocols (Hypertext Transfer Protocol, File Transfer Protocol, Network News Transfer Protocol), over any physical medium (packet radio, satellite, phone-line, and optic fibre), in any data format that can be digitised (radio, television, text, graphics, and sound). The implications of this non-coercive technology are explored in the context of the impact on development in the physically distant communities of the South Pacific.