A growing number of people are turning to the internet for news and using it as a virtual shopping mall, which in turn is driving consumers to broadband internet service. They’re also increasingly eschewing traditional wireline telephones in favor of cheaper cellular service. That makes the communications sector a long-term play for growth investors.

T. Rowe Price Media & Telecommunications (PRMTX) is a one-stop fund that offers exposure to all of these trends, both in the US and abroad. The fund’s top-five holdings reflect this goal. Its largest position is in Amazon.com (NSDQ: AMZN), whose profits have surged in recent quarters thanks to both the breadth of its product offerings and the depth of its customer service. Sales held up well, even amid a deepening recession, suggesting that this is one growth industry that boasts solid, defensive characteristics.

American Tower Corp (NYSE: AMT) and Crown Castle International (NYSE: CCI) are both infrastructure plays in the wireless industry; American Tower owns a portfolio of wireless and broadcast communications towers here in the US, while Crown Castle operates cell phone towers across the US, Canada and the UK. Revenues for both companies have been relatively stable throughout the crisis because of long-term contracts.

Finally, on the service side, are AT&T (NYSE: T) and Vodafone (NYSE: VOD). Both have faced headwinds over the past few quarters and revenue growth has stuttered, but that’s to be expected given the economic climate.

Overall, T. Rowe Price Media & Communications is a well-managed fund, providing inexpensive exposure to key growth markets–the fund’s expense ratio is just 0.9 percent.

More-traditional technology plays, such as the makers of the hardware and software that drive business and communications applications, have also fared well in the current recession. Earnings have dipped in some areas, but revenues generally have proved much more stable than many anticipated going into the crisis.

And, in fact, recessions are often good for the technology sector, weeding out weaker players, freeing up developers and allowing the industry’s resources to be devoted to the most productive pursuits. It also encourages innovation on the cheap, a trend that was already afoot before the recession got into full swing and should pick up now that consumers are more value-conscious than ever.

An easy way to gain access to the rapidly evolving information technology sector is through an index fund, one of the best of which is Vanguard Information Technology (NYSE: VGT).

Tracking the MSCI US Investable Market Information Technology Index, Vanguard Information Technology is an extremely low cost exchange-traded fund (ETF) with a total annual expense ratio of just 0.25 percent. In fact, it’s one of the lowest-cost, IT-focused ETFs available.

Tracking a market-capitalization weighted index, the ETF is heavy on industry-leading large caps, which limits volatility in the fund’s net asset value. At the same time, it also provides exposure to some of the smaller-capitalization names that are more speculative, but without taking on too much risk.

Because of this balance, the fund’s market price tends to cleave fairly closely to net asset value, limiting wide swings to either premiums or discounts.

By holding both funds, you can leverage the growth prospects of essentially all aspects of the technology space without dramatically increasing your risk exposure. But don’t expect an immediate pop in the overall value of your portfolio; rather, expect to hold these funds for the long-term to benefit from the innovation going on in technology.