"For reasons which may become apparent over time, I have become a scout or a runner in this Internet.

"I drop songs as my offerings as I seek along this new migration path, this Cyber-Bearing Crossing, a new route for singing, a new trail for the dust of our clinging to the tribal contract with this sacred creation."

Speaking from the middle of the parched Mojave Desert in Johannesburg, Calif., 45-year-old artist Turtle Heart uses the computer and modem to breathe new life into an ancient message of an oft-forgotten people.

The Ojibway Native American's paintings are carried across the earth as ones and zeros and displayed only in the glowing phosphor of glass computer screens. They have never existed on canvas. Through his Native American Computer Art Project, he plans to bring the message of tribal elders to the masses.

"There's been so much written about native people, but none of it by native people. The Internet is the best tool in 500 years to give native peoples a voice," he said.

"They want to see your face and they want to see your heart. If those elders like what they see, then they will open their hearts and the process of sharing will begin" -Turtle Heart

Like many across the country, Turtle Heart sees the information superhighway evolving into a tool for Native Americans to strengthen their communities and convey their culture to the world.

Organizations devoted to the plight of native peoples - and a few tribes themselves - are creating electronic community networks, World Wide Web home pages and on-line discussion groups in surprising numbers.

Even the federal government doesn't know how many reservations have an on-line presence, says Connie Buffalo, a Chippewa and an executive with Englewood-based Jones Interactive Inc., a subsidiary of Glenn Jones' telecommunications empire. But the movement is significant enough for the federal Office of Technology Assessment to launch a study.

As president of the Electronic Pathways project, Buffalo and executive director Karen Buller (a Comanche) visit Native American homelands throughout North America to advise them on technology.

"Some tribes know more than we do. In some areas, they've repurchased computers from their casinos and put them in their schools," Buffalo said.

For example, in Barrow, Alaska, the Inuit (also known as Eskimos) have built a $48 million system that allows two-way interactive video, said Buller, who recently saw the set-up firsthand. When the temperature is 40 below zero, high school teachers in Barrow can continue teaching the kids at their homes.

On the same trip, Buller heard a tribal elder showing another how to surf the Internet, "and then in the same breath they talked about how excited they were because they were sewing up their nets for the beginning of the whaling season. It was just surreal," she said.

But many native nations are still deciding whether they want to take part in new technology. Turtle Heart said elders often are the hardest to reach.

"They want to see your face and they want to see your heart. If those elders like what they see, then they will open their hearts and the process of sharing will begin ... but because of the problems of the past between the modern world and old Indian world, the elders are cautious, shy and reserved."

Another Denver-area organization, the Alpha Institute, is taking steps to make sure native people aren't left behind in the information age.

Since 1991, Alpha has helped hook up some influential groups, including the Hopi and Lakota nations. Last autumn, the organization gave a free Internet system to the Denver Indian Center, which holds GED classes for the underprivileged. Alpha directors Andrea and Michelle Lord followed up with free Internet training for students.

The Internet may have been prophesied by tribal elders, Andrea Lord said. "They considered this nonvisual communication, where people would talk in circles of light," she said.

The nonprofit's philosophy is simple: Give people free access to the Internet and they will have an incentive to invest more. Give them no access and they won't have any incentive at all, Andrea Lord said.

"We just provide the tools, we don't provide the philosophy. We try to get people who don't normally have an opportunity to speak out," she said.

Turtle Heart said on-line access to Native Americans will be out of reach as long as telephone companies avoid investing heavily in areas that don't show a high profit.

But if tribal people begin showing an interest in this technology, phone companies will move in, Turtle Heart said. "They go where the brightest light is, so it's up to Indian people to turn on their lights," he said.

"It's like presenting them with a thousand mirrors so that they can look at themselves in a new way," Buffalo said. "When they look in that mirror and begin to connect with other Indians ... they can see a positive destiny unfolding for themselves, and it's a destiny that they, with their strength and focus, are creating together.""