The history of information technology has shown that new generations of software and hardware are short-lived and dramatically different from one another. Applications of digital formats that were at the very limits of our capacities a few years ago, tend to become amusing as we compare them with current equipment and programs. At the same time, any tendency to sit back and wait for the future before entering into and contributing to technology advances cannot be characterized as the exercise of prudence.  The reluctance of many scholars in the humanities to step forward and take risks in an age where printing has been encapsulated by the digital, has placed our fields at a disadvantage.  Caution, with regard to the new, often only implies fear of failure.  These are not offenses that apply to those in this conference.  In the field of Buddhist studies, the hard work of creating data and strategies of research have come from this small community who are meeting here. I believe that you all deserve an enthusiastic expression of approval. You have been the pioneers who had the ability and the capacity for endurance and resolution.  From your energy that has been directed toward the actual work of digitization, we have seen the rise of the productive power of scholars.  The appearance of Buddhist canons in electronic medium has transformed what was once merely theoretical and speculative into a practical and fundamental part of scholarly research.  The digital texts, dictionaries, and tools for users are the support from which future insights and research additions will be derived. The codex will not be soon replaced but it is less important as an element in study than was the case a decade ago.
           
            We cannot yet be complacent about these developments. The rapidly evolving process of the digital world has not been completed.  There are a whole range of events which mark the changes that still transform and provide the shifting identity of  electronic complexity and progress.  The challenges we face today are no less daunting than those of the past. Our goal must be to identify the next stage of the digital era and to consider all of the possibilities of applications and variations.  One of the themes of this conference will be to discuss ways in which we can join forces for the sake of mutual support as well as action for interoperability of data sets.  The information that has been produced by such hard labors must not be dropped into the forgotten corners of the internet or cached in such a fashion that it is either concealed or suppressed by our policies and practices. We must present our material in a manner that allows it to be studied or viewed in relationship to other sets of data as an intelligible part of a distinctive whole.