NETWORKS AND COMMUNITY Date: December 5, 1993 Compiler: Sam Sternberg samsam@vm1.yorku.ca This weekly report attempts to follow the changing nature of community based and oriented activities on the internet. Readers will get a summary of much of the week's activity on subjects like Free-Nets and other community nets; access technology, and legislation effecting public access to information and network services. Issues like electronic democracy, censorship and business activity on the net, will be touched upon when they impact community related issues. You will also learn about new community nets, and new gophers, listservs and e-journals which cover this material. No group and certainly no individual can really monitor even a fraction of the action on any aspect of the Internet. So your contributions are welcome. Please forward announcements to me if "you" are the originating source. Please do not forward material from other lists etc. - UNLESS these sources do not normally focus on issues effecting community computing and access issues. To start this news report, I am including a list of major resources on these topics. This list is not comprehensive. It is a good guide to historical repositories of information, ongoing debate and discussion, and useful tools for those attempting to open or run a community computing facility. To simplify the job of finding these resources I will point you to a collection of resources rather than a source whenever that's possible. I am grateful for the previous work in gathering a listserv resource list by Art "Rambo" McGee. I have made liberal use of his list. DISCUSSION AND ONGOING ASSISTANCE RESOURCES =========================================== each entry has the following information LIST NAME | SUBSCRIPTION Provider's net location | DESCRIPTION To subscribe, send a one line message that says: SUBSCRIBE LIST_NAME YOUR_FIRST_NAME YOUR_LAST_NAME to the appropriate subscription provider's net location. ---------------- ALA-WO | listserv@uicvm.uic.edu | regular reports on legislation - information access - other matters effecting library networks COMMUNET | listserv@uvmvm.uvm.edu | Community and Civic Networks - THE PRIMARY LIST COMMUNITY-ACCESS | community-access-request@parc.xerox.com | Community Access Issues CET-MG | almanac@esusda.gov | Communities in Economic Transition - for rural and small town groups COSNDISC | listserv@bitnic.educom.edu | Consortium for School Networking CPSR | listserv@gwuvm.gwu.edu | Computer Professions for Social Responsibility - censorship and network related social issues CYPHERWONKS | listserv@lists.cunet.fi | Electronic democracy - privacy - and new software development proposals for public debates etc. FREENET-ADMIN | listserv@nptn.org | Free-Net Administrators - current issues facing organizers - funding - managing - law - etc. FREENET-TECH | listprocessor@cunews.carleton.ca | Technical Net Operations - advice and assistance - excellent source of technical info PACS-L | listserv@uhupvm1.uh.edu | Library & Public Access Computer Systems - the most intellectual of the lists - excellent issue analysis Some of these lists are archived; and the archives are accessible through the gopher at Rice University in Houston. riceinfo.rice.edu TOOLS FOR DEVELOPING COMMUNITY FACILITIES ========================================= each entry has the following information TYPE OF RESOURCE | LOCATION OF RESOURCE | DESCRIPTION NETWORK DEVELOPMENT | gopher lan.vita.org 3rd WORLD path ->developnet news -> technology transfer -> | 3rd world community networks - tools NETWORK DEVELOPMENT | gopher riceinfo.rice.edu ON A BUDGET path ->psgnet/rainnet ... ->tools for low cost networks -> | software and advice for net builders NETWORK DEVELOPMENT | gopher riceinfo.rice.edu AND FUNDING path ->grants -> | fundraising resources ALSO | gopher cypher.esusda.gov path ->resources for non profits ->resource development -> | location of foundation center libraries and book listing funding info sources. NETWORK DEVELOPMENT | gopher riceinfo.rice.edu AND CULTURE path -> computer networks ....-> | lots of goodies including Center for Civic Networking civic nets, community nets freenets, NPTN, etc. ALSO path -> computing -> social issues -> | various journals on social impacts of computing CURRENT INFORMATION SOURCES ========================================== each entry has the following information TYPE OF RESOURCE | LOCATION OF RESOURCE | DESCRIPTION DAILY NEWS | gopher cns.cscns.com path ->main ->usnews -> | current business and telecommunication news + ISSUE ANALYSIS | gopher wired.com | articles about technology and society OPERATING FREENET SYSTEMS | gopher info.senecac.on.ca path ->interesting places ->city freenets | best access list for community nets .