NCMR Community Wireless Workshop

This morning I was at a really great panel discussion on “The Growth of Wireless Internet : From Community to Municipal to Corporate,” which featured several leading experts and activists in the field of community wireless:

• Dharma Dailey, Ethos Group (moderator)
• Michael Calabrese, New America Foundation
• Harold Feld, Media Access Project
• Michael Lewis, Wireless Harlem Initiative (You can download his Powerpoint presentation here.)
  
• Sascha Meinrath, Champaign-Urbana Community Wireless Network (Powerpoint presentation)
  

My computer died mid-session, so I wasn’t able to take very detailed notes.  But after the jump you will find a list of resources and some of my notes.  Also, Sascha and Michael Lewis promised to get me links to their powerpoint presentations later.

Community Wireless Resources

Ethos Group    http://ethoswireless.com/
Center for Public Integrity    http://www.publicintegrity.org
Media Access Project    http://www.mediaaccess.org/
Wireless Harlem Initiative    http://www.wirelessharlem.org/ , Powerpoint presentation of initiative
New America Foundation    http://www.newamerica.net/
CAIDA     Caida.org/projects/commons
CUWIN     Cuwin.net, Powerpoint presentation about projects
Wireless Summit    Wirelesssummit.org
Net Neutrality     Savetheinternet.com
ARIN    www.arin.net

Other Wireless Resources:

• www.muniwireless.com
• www.wifinetnews.com
• www.Spectrumpolicy.org

Michael Calabrese, New America Foundation

Good news: There has been a boom in community wireless broadband – we’re winning.

Grown of community wifi:

• from wifi hotspots, to zones, cities, regions, and states.
• Zones – university campuses, parks
• Municipal – Champaign Urbana, Philly
• Multi-county – Long Island, Vermont, New Hampshire
• 250 municipal and county-wide that have been deployed
• 4,000-6,000 WISPs – wireless internet service providers

3 public interest issues from community wifi:

1. Digital inclusion: affordable access to broadband is going to determine business, cultural, educational future of communities
2. Can preserve net neutrality – puts pressure on wireline duopoly and cell internet services
3. Benefits of pervasive connectivity – ubiquitous access. 

Two main barriers:

1. Access to the airwaves
2. The guarantee that networks can be made public

Open Spectrum Policy

• wireless networks exist within unlicensed spectrum
• opening up the spectrum would make wireless networks cheaper and better quality
• municipal and community networks won’t scale if they are limited to the current “junk band”
• Meanwhile TV band is sitting mostly unused. Broadcasters have access to 48 channels.  Most markets use only 7 channels.
• We need people to sound off on this issue with the FCC, showing that they would use these TV "white space" bands. It's docket number 04-186 on FCC agenda. (Link to e-file your comment.)

Technorati Tag: NCMR2007

Comments

[Keith Kamisugi]

Rik - Thanks for offering to host the session's resources. Will check back for the links and PPTs.

[rikomatic]

No worries. Feel free to propose other resources and links.

[Michael Lewis]

Thanks Rik for attending the session and for posting the links. I also wanted to pass along two others if your readers want to keep abreast of the municipal wireless movement, including:

www.muniwireless.com
www.wifinetnews.com

Let me know if you need any additional info.

Michael Lewis
Wireless Harlem