As news comes through of more job losses in the technology industry - this time, 330 are to go at Nortel in the North, - you hear the worried voices start asking yet again whether we are too dependent on the high-tech multinationals, whether we should invest in techoriented projects, whether we are heading for a mammoth crash.

Sometimes I wonder what people are thinking of as an alternative. Or if they have grown so blase they forget the enormous changes the electronics and technology sectors have brought over the past decade, as their high-value, highly skilled jobs helped deliver a measure of national prosperity never before seen in the Republic?

I'll agree that the Government has failed to bring much of that prosperity to bear on the social services the State so desperately needs. Therefore, many people feel the changes have been uplifting to others but not them.

We've seen little more than token improvements in education and health, for example. Despite massive budget surpluses, a good quarter of the population has not experienced much of this new prosperity filtering down to them in any tangible way.

And those barricaded outside this new Ireland of four-wheel drives, lifestyle bars and wine lists have yet to see increases in social welfare payments that go beyond token gestures. I mean, what would you do with an extra few pounds per month?

Those are issues that cry out to be addressed, as do quality-of-life problems such as housing costs, the appalling state of the roads, not to mention the lack of them. It's a new millennium, and we are still unable to drive 90 miles to Galway in under two-and-a-half hours and usually a good deal more.

I recently had lunch with one of the State's tech entrepreneurs who says he could not care less about broadband or unbundling issues, which he believes will sort themselves out. The problem for those who need to hire at the moment is persuading anyone to move to the Republic once they have a look at rents, car insurance prices, traffic jams and nasty attitudes to the non-Irish (nothing like being refused entry to a pub because your skin is darker than the average person's to make you check the IT job listings anywhere but here).

And again, concerns were raised last week because computer science and engineering programmes have the highest drop-out rates in Irish universities. Rather than dither over whether schools need more career counsellors, why not make it Government policy to supply every primary and secondary school with an adequate supply of computers and computing classes? Then, students would be well equipped, even inspired, to pursue these subjects.

Why don't we lead in this area internationally and make sure that all students arrive at university with a broad knowledge of computing - on both a functional and creative level - and a familiarity with the tool that will, with very few exceptions, be ubiquitous in their working lives?

Surely we should not be forcing schools to obtain badly needed computers by asking parents and children to collect vouchers and crisps packets for company and supermarket computer promotions? Public-private partnerships have their place but this is definitely not what I would define as a productive relationship.

Actually, I often wonder why the Republic doesn't, in its current prosperity, seek exciting ways in which to lead in the areas where technology, society and culture overlap. With its small population and area, the Republic is a prime creative testing ground for ideas and projects that could shape how the rest of the world eventually thinks. We could be a model for innovative Government initiatives, or public-private partnerships that benefit both the public sector and the private sector.

The Government has done some of this in telecommunications infrastructure and, last week, announced a multimillion pound disbursement towards information-age community projects. But while they show a possible way forward, these just begin to scratch the surface of possibility.

Additionally, timelines for such projects can be long when they have to wend their way through Government evaluation committees. The private sector tends to move faster and we're in an era that needs to move fast.

The kind of collaboration I'd like to see would be between, say, a very large software company that has said it wishes to dotnet the world, a mammoth database company, a telecommunications or cable carrier of the size to cover most of the State, the Government agencies that are working to develop interactive services and innovative creators of content that could think up exciting ways of presenting such services.

Create a model for how citizens can interact online with their governments and the kudos will extend to the State as an innovative place to do digital business and to the companies that can make such a project happen.

Or maybe we could have a link-up between all the State's schools, a major Internet service provider, a computer manufacturer and children with disabilities who are either at home or in alternative schools and institutions. Why not create a virtual world of learning and friendships that stops isolating schools that have money from those that don't, schools that are run by the State and those that are not; and children of different capabilities, nationalities, ages and backgrounds?

We now have the industries, the money, the expertise and most certainly, the creativity to make such things happen. What we need is the possibility and the will. And we have long since had a deep obligation to take the prosperity that has come from the technology industry and make it transformative in the lives of those who so far have gained little from it.

Karlin@indigo.com