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  • From: Tom Poe <tompoe AT studioforrecording.org>
  • To: community_studios AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: [Community_studios] community wireless networks and Open Studios
  • Date: Thu, 10 Nov 2005 00:01:46 -0600

MULTIMEDIA CENTERS IN YOUR NEIGHBORHOOD
By Tom Poe
November 9, 2005

The nice thing about cable tv, is their marketing department. For those who have cable, they can choose from literally hundreds of channels, offering everything from woodcrafting to gardening, from cooking to personal hygiene, from tips to new parents to kitchen and house design. Having tested the market, they have concluded such shows are watched by lots of people. Well, that said, the bad thing about cable tv, is their shows! Ask anyone who has watched them, and they'll most likely volunteer they could do as well, or better than the folks on the shows.

In some communities, the cable franchise agreement requires the company to provide multimedia centers for the residents. These centers offer residents the opportunity to make such shows, and air them on the local cable tv channels. But, what about our community? We don't have such a facility. Do we need one? Do we need several? Would we use them, if we had them? This article gives some information that just might provide the answers to those questions and more. Go ahead, read on.

WHAT IS A MULTIMEDIA CENTER?

It's a computer. Well, not too many months ago, it was an expensive setup, and an impossible dream. Today, suddenly, technology has exploded, and everything that was required just a matter of months ago, now sits on a computer. In other words, in order to create CDs, or DVDs, or tv or radio shows, or even full-featured films, one simply needs a computer sitting on your kitchen table. Can you believe it?

I have a donated computer sitting on my kitchen table. It's a low-end PIII desktop computer. I got some CDs with an Open Source operating system, installed freely available software from Stanford University's Center for Computer Research in Music and Acoustics, and this donated, cheap computer now enables me to make high quality CDs. The cost is something less than $4.00, so far. If the cost is that low, you can bet it will be just a matter of time, before every neighborhood in every community will have one or more for local residents to use, free of charge.

BROADBAND ACCESS

I think it's important to make some comments about what the tv companies are doing:

“In just the past few months some of the biggest TV names have announced new broadband channels, from MTV Networks to Comedy Central () to ABC News. If you thought the 400 cable channels focusing on everything from golf to anime were already cutting niches thin, broadband TV is going a step further.” - From Business Week, November 8, 2005.

They're simply making video clips (tv shows) which people can download and watch. That's it! Something you and I can do on a computer sitting on the kitchen table. Now, you have to realize that the telcos, the cable industry, the broadcasters do not want you to know that. It's a secret. Imagine the havoc created when the entire country realizes they don't need large corporations to control what they watch, or listen to.

Let's compromise, though. Let's let them continue to provide whatever they provide, and let's imagine a community where broadband is provided in an affordable way. With the computer, we can put up video clips that are the equal of what they put up, and even better, our video clips let us see what's happening locally. We let (we're generous folks) the Charles City Press use one of the computers to produce video clips of the news for us to view, as well as a copy of the paper to hold and read. We let HyVee get into the game, and produce video clips we can watch on what specials are offered, how the deli works, tours of the store, interviews with the flower department, customer service department, whatever. We're able to watch church services throughout the week. All we do, is use the broadband connection to access the sites, and download the shows. Are you looking for a pet? Paws will make it possible for you to view the pets, call them, and have them delivered to your door, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. There's no limit to the possibilities.

One especially nice thing about broadband, is the ability of our city government to provide services that are now being made available in a somewhat clunky fashion. For example, city meetings will be “live”, as well as recorded. A broadband network provides a reassuring sense of security for the community, regardless of what natural disaster might occur. The New Orleans hurricane tragedy might have come out differently, because, with a broadband community network, communications for fire and police and hospital personnel would have been back up and running within a couple of hours.

VALUE-ADDED TECHNOLOGY:

When combined, the multimedia centers in every neighborhood, along with a broadband wireless community network, offers us the best available technology for our community, and, in an affordable fashion. Is this a replacement for our present telecommunications and cable industry alternative? Doesn't have to be. Coexisting alternatives are simply another way of saying, creativity and innovation. Our country was founded on the principle that creativity and innovation will drive progress. Competition is increased, when you and I have the ability to do the same thing that broadcasters, film makers, record labels, and newspapers do. Did I mention that with some additional investment, our local theatre can offer our “home-grown” productions right in the theatre, from outdoor events to documentaries to children's recitals? Imagine the possibilities for additional revenues, if our local arts organizations begin to make their performances and events available for the theatre. Not to mention, all of the works created by us, are potentially of interest to people all over the world. How many copies of a tour of Mooney's art exhibit might be sold to schools around the world, if our local library had one of these computers?

COMMUNITY-BASED WIRELESS NETWORKS:

The telcos, cable industry and content producers are consolidating to the point we now have what, maybe five radio station owners in this country? Regardless of where one lives, their request to air their radio show must get permission from one of those five owners. Now, stay with me on this, we have only a handful of cable operators to choose from in this country. In my community, I have one telco providing phone service, and one cable company providing service. If I don't like the service, I can . . .

Technology enables a community to create a wireless network, one that will provide access to the Internet at a fraction of what the phone or cable company offers. The cost of putting a community wireless network in place is peanuts. But, that's not the point, actually. Wireless networks offer something else. They offer a community a communications infrastructure that utilizes the airwaves that are owned by you and I. The phone companies and cable companies have a duopoly playing out, one that relies on continued control of the airwaves that belong to you and I. The government gives control of those airwaves to the duopoly in return for discharging responsibility to act in the interest of the public (that's you and I). Today, the interest of the public is best served, if the technology advances are made available to you and I.

We are rapidly approaching the day, when we can speak to our computers, and throw away the keyboard. We'll use microphones. Our voices will control the computer. We'll be making high quality recordings and broadcast quality videos whenever we use our computers, whether for composing an intimate conversation with our relatives and friends over the Internet, or a tv show, or a radio show, or a dictated letter we print out and place in the post office to mail to someone. Using the airwaves that we own, we can send voice, text, images, music, art, literature, science, data across the Internet to anywhere in the world. Without access to the Internet, there will be many who will be left behind. Those of us on limited incomes will be discriminated against, our children whose families can't afford access to the Internet, will become the “uneducated ones” of the future.

When asked, the telcos and cable industry answers that they are providing for rural and low-income folks. They say it costs too much, and that it's a long-term project to make access to the Internet available to everyone. This begs the question, then, as to why they don't use the technology available, along with our airwaves they're using, and build community wireless networks. The cost is negligible. You won't get an answer from them. I'll leave you with a question: Why don't we build a community wireless network, today?
--
Open Studios, Charles City, Iowa, USA
www.ibiblio.org/studioforrecording/
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  • [Community_studios] community wireless networks and Open Studios, Tom Poe, 11/10/2005

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