Sánchez González, AdrianaCamacho Jiménez, Kemly2013-03-132013-03-132008-08-15Sanchez González, A., and Camacho Jiménez, K. (2008). Public access to information & ICTs: Costa Rica. Public Access Landscape Study final report, presented by Sulá Batsú to University of Washington Center for Information & Society (CIS), Seattle.http://hdl.handle.net/1773/22340This research focuses on the public access to information and communication landscapes in 24 countries, with specific focus on public libraries, to understand the information needs of underserved communities, public access to information and communication venues, and the role of ICT. Through field research in 24 countries conducted by local research partners, and cross-country comparative analyses based on common research design elements (see list of countries and research design overview in Appendix), the project aims to contribute to the knowledge in the field of information and ICT for development. Of particular interest and value are: the comparative look at key venues (libraries and other), and the mix of depth of in-country knowledge with breadth of global comparison to elicit success factors and scenarios to understand how diverse populations can and do access and use ICT to improve their lives. All outputs of this research will be broadly disseminated to interested stakeholders and placed in the public domain.A study focused in "public access to information" represents a big challenge. For the Costa Rican team, this challenge offers the opportunity to find out what are the information processes in our country, were the culture of information has no deep roots among population and public libraries and telecentres are seen as a possibility to improve the education offer for children and young people, but not as public venues that can help the hole population to change their conditions and improve the quality of life. Our study, based on three different venues (Public Libraries, CECIs and Cyber cafes), tries to picture the diverse strategies of communication that Costa Ricans use to inform themselves according to culture, gender, age, and other variables that will complete an overview which does not pretend to cover the hole population but to illustrate the general conditions of the country in terms of information processes and the use of libraries and telecentres for this purposes, as well as the possibilities given by the high presence of Cyber Cafes around the country. This study does not cover "public information" but "public access to information". The research is focused in daily information practices that fulfills particular immediate needs of people. This information is of general interest and is not referred to particular nor specific issues and is not technical, specialized or political related. And it is important to point that this study understands "public access to information" as an access not limited by gender, age or citizenship. Access in venues open to the public and limited by specific organizational conditions, schedules and resources. What is understood as a "venue" is an open place were anybody can look for information, and since they do look for particular information to fulfill their needs, the venue adapts to the information needs of its users. It is very importan to make clear that any generalization found in this report generalizes from the sample selected for the field work, and does not pretend to picture the reality of the totality of venues existent in the country. The research team is awared that the sample selected for the study is not representative of the hole country reality and do not pretend to establish absolute conclusions.enLibraries, telecenters, telecentres, cybercafés, ICT4D, ICTD, Landscape Study, Costa RicaTechnical Report