Earlier I promised to post up my notes from the Community Networking get-together in the UK on 19 January. I’ve cleaned them up, so here they are. I’ll post some commentary another day.
Malcolm Corbett
Gave a summary of findings of the survey of community-based networks in the UK. [Details will be publicly released in March.]
Found projects active in over 500 locations, mainly wireless, mainly new. This is more than expected and CBN does not believe that all projects & activities have been located. Very much under the radar of industry and government. As new small enterprises they face many expected barriers - funding, backhaul costs, technical deployment etc. Many cited digital inclusion as an important driver for their projects.
Q: Digital inclusion - how do people achieve this? A: Not really known.
Q: Could we get more regulation from OFCOM by disclosing this?
Balance to be struck; make info public, will it stimulate funding or conflict/regulation? Can flood each other’s networks [with hot antennas], not traceable. So a big role for regulation. Manage noise levels.
A blizzard of OFCOM docs, but most on BT; some on spectrum regulation.
One argument is using unlicensed spectrum. Regulator not interested because ISM [industrial, scientific, and medical band. Argument is that CBNs are offering telecom services; huge layer of cost if so. You look like a telco, smell like a telco.
BT has more lawyers than OFCOM has staff. Many OFCOM staff are ex-BT. Just don’t see it or aren’t interested. BT regulations are terrifying; pleaded ignorance and ignore it so far.
Have user logs for last 5 years; what if police ask for it? Under the law you have to give them. Big ISPs asked to keep these logs. Communication Service Providers Act asks for a huge list of bits of data to be retained.
Q: So what to do with this data?
Don’t suggest we keep this secret, but need to be ready with lobbying and responses. In the political sphere there’s a warm fuzzy feeling about CBNs. Turning this into action and cash is harder work. Lots of it, but doesn’t seem big - only 12000 people!?! If seen as a telco, get regulated. Part of inclusion, regenertion debate, get funded. OFCOM not part of that latter debate.
Large players are being subsidised; we aren’t. Get a soft govt contract to build infrastructure, might not be corrupt, but isn’t “straight” economically. Subsidy may come through regeneration, cohesion etc. So there’s an offensive argument to play, don’t just need to be defensive. Government idea of action is to run conferences. There is some loan money, but not designed for these uses.
Most CBNs beyond range of current ISPs, so they don’t care. But after that we’re in direct competition. Many are urban, too. London, Bradford, etc. One of largest nets is in Manchester.
Some CBNs see re-sale of ADSL as being OK. ADSL useful for VoIP backhaul compared to satellite. May lose a few subs, CBNs allow ADSL to be shared out.
BT - can afford to give away modems. But CBNs have lack of access to capital. Can recoup over time. Forces to charge for installation. People are willing to pay to have someone come round to install DSL etc and clean up computer. People happy to pay for water plumber, but what about IT plumber? Should CBNs try to compete directly with BT (e.g. same sales and pricing policies)?
Some not interested in low cost per se, but interested in more bandwidth to do interesting things. So you might thing GBP5-10 a month for low-income households is the thing; but could be new apps like videocast withing the community. Need to set out to highlight differentiators other than price.
Lots of anti-BT feeling among the users. Prefer local support, small org support. More than half have waited for BT’s ADSL rather than go for CBN. Most of original motivation was because BT wasn’t getting ADSL rolled out. ADSL exchange, but lines often old and poor quality, may not be full coverage. Example of big rural UK estate, want to offer connectivity everywhere. CBNs much more flexible in terms of technology. Can do channel bonding quickly, stay ahead of BT.
Easynet want to launch 18Mbit service, can’t because of interference between pairs.
Low-income social inclusion — difficult, because they need more support, less IT literate. Opens network to more risks. Value BB less than people who use it all the time. May be fickle, enticed by big operators.
Head of govt DTI, 2008 universal BB decree from govt, unsure what it means. How can govt create connectivity in a situation with 3m poorest people on tax credits?
Aren’t many people in BB world that can meet Cybermoor’s [a UK CBN] penetration.
Not just an economic issue. Costs are comparable to other forms of entertainment they pay for. Just isn’t a priority for these people. Need to be relevant services that make digital inclusion a desirable objective. No point in having a connection if can’t afford direct charges for content & service. BBC’s project for archives online. CC license. Can re-shape it. People pay for Sky, can offer alternative to Sky of streamed sports broadcasts.
A difference between inclusion and enclosure. Might not want to be there. Have cynicism around reasons for digital inclusion. Social workers, teachers and polititians are laggards in tech use; end users are often ahead of them. But these are people who affect access to connectivity for those at the bottom end of the economic stack. Remote monitoring of elderly people — can stay in their homes. Huge community benefit. Don’t have to move to some old people’s home 50-60 miles away. Village has 100 homes, over 60 members. A wonderful community effort. Finished 15 bottles of wine between 22 people who came to last meeting! Parish council minutes go around by email. Lots of fun. Ran a course, co-op gave a grant.
Power rating in rural areas? Less of an issue than people say, can use different bands (e.g. 5.8GHz), directional antennas, more dense meshes. Mobile phone coverage out-of-range in many CBN areas.
VoIP: many CBNs interested. Generate another form of revenue, an add-on service. Have spoken several times. Approach - make it work, then worry about the regulators. Unlikely to get closed down. Need to be mutual to avoid public service regulations. Need everyone to be a memeber. VoIP - who is actually providing the service — breakout can be in another country. VoIP PBX is just an app server, beyond regulation. Voice charges are very low, not a revenue source. BT international happy with VoIP - generates traffic; naional side doesn’t want it.
Q: Ts&Cs as a differentiator? A: Not understood by public. Community media services are differentiator. BB content only seen as exension of existing paradigm — centralised production and distribution. Networking transmitting more than it receives. (Not just viruses.) Non-asymmetiric a selling point. ADSL avoid ruining the hosting services. 256kbit up not suitable for multiple home workers. Not willing to go from GBP80 to 1000. Examples of small businesses making video ads, sales.
Village web site can regenerate socialisation. Can up load own pages. How to make village shop go live? Send them your shopping list? Local e-commerce applications. Have services for receiving orders to local village shop, organising deliveries. [CBN is embedded in wider community efforts.] Village shop would need access to library of photos of products? Most people know what village shop sells, know the goods. People’s orders very predictable.
Cybermoor - Daniel Heery
www.cybermoor.org
Lots of videos, forums (caused some controversy). Creative commons/Media Trust license - hybrid. Video which didn’t have permission to show a kid. Amazon associate, brings in some money. Income-based charges. Just not worth doing VoD for Britney - you only get 2% of the revenue. Better to originate your own stuff.
Work on a project basis; lookin at community radio. Local bands, produce their music. Difficult to get people to pay to subscribe to local TV. Will pay 20 quid/month for Sky Movies, but nothing for local stuff. Have local radio on IP. Some content not routed to public Internet.
Should CBNs be putting their effort into these non-connectivity issues?
Oxfordshire Rural Broadband
Circles can be quite incestous, hard to draw new people in. People who already have BT broadband; draw them in. Healthcheck process (chamber of commerce, council, housing agency, etc.) gives SWOT on local area. List of projects. Looking at how technology can be applied to make these easier and cheaper. Community BB is a backdoor benefit of some of these. One village trying to put together a museum. Too expensive to get a building. Farmer has a barn full of exhbits. Doing a study to use a mix of mesh and RFID, and exhibits distributed around the community. Tourists then wander around
CCTV: GBP250k for dark fiber alone to police station, 30k for community network.
Have abandoned commercial hosting, do own hosting. VoD, open source. Have 20 nodes in network. Small area, densely packed. Need adaptive power system.
Cameroon community in east London making content, which is then pirated by the commercial operators in Cameroon!
Access vs. service provision; Internet was a solution to an existing problem. VoD is unusual in that users create channels and compete to do the scheduling.
Canada - TiVo on steroids; commercial satellite recorded and turned into VoD. Legal, has a CATV license. Timeslip TV. Don’t worry about disk space, what to pull down. Cheap when done for everyone. In UK, can’t get Channel 5, Freeview in places. Could use this instead.
Can have local school acting as a mesh server (not Internet uplink). School digital content available to the community.
School where kids can go home and re-run all the lessons. Failing school (Kingswood) adopted multimedia and much improved. Whole teaching methods changed; teachers re-trained.
Brian Condon - End Game for the Telcos?
Dilemmas:
Regulation as telco vs. as a economic and social development agent
Offensive strategy to generate support vs reproduce telco modes of behavior
Choice and flexibility vs safety of big brand
Match local needs vs sub-and-spoke consumer/producer
Access provision vs. service provision
Publisher filter/gateway vs. highly distributed control
When does a LAN become a WAN and get regulated?
Community network roaming?
Single source of purchase for longhaul, do a deal with independent community fiber provider?
Get BBC etc involved for political support?
Roaming - Ts&Cs for roaming, traceability, wouldn’t open network until can protect node owners.
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It was a great meeting of minds , very informative and a good "mishmash "of ideas from like minded people.
Posted by: at February 10, 2005 09:02 AMI think I made the point at the cando, but it might not have been noted amongst all the important stuff, that the whole point of a CBN a Community Broadband Network it that it is a network of people, not of computers, and that is what the Telcos can't provide. A personal network geared to the needs of the community it services. Growing as the community grows. Not possible with ADSL in rural areas.
Posted by: at February 10, 2005 10:54 PM