Bristol Wireless News

Bristolwireless have 10 tickets available for this event, contact the Lab for more details

Richard Stallman: Copyright vs Community in the Age of Computer Networks

Sat 22 May 1400hrs Waterside 3, Watershed

Richard Stallman has been cited as one of the most important people in computing today. As founder of the Free Software Foundation, his ideas have transcended the computing arena to be influential in most areas of technology and culture. He believes that knowledge is not a commodity that should be privatised, but something that should be freely available to all. Copyright was originally designed to fit with the system of centralized copying imposed by the printing press. Stallman will be discussing how the copyright system does not fit well with computer networks, with global corporations that profit from copyright lobbying for harsh punishments to increase their copyright powers, whilst suppressing free public access to technology. There will also be the opportunity to ask Stallman questions about his work and ideas.

This event is organised by plugincinema – Stallman provided comment and inspiration for their forthcoming book ‘Plug In & Turn On: A Guide to Internet Filmmaking’
Fee: £3.00 full/ £2.00 concessions (fee to cover room hire costs)

Bristolwireless have 10 tickets available for this event contact the Lab if your interested

After some initial problems (possibly static) affecting the Access Point, the installation at Greenhaven elderly residents supported accommodation is now(20/4/4) up and running. Greenhaven has two Red Hat Linux machines in a communal area wirelessly connected to Easton Community Centre. The warden, Ron Corbett is an enthusiastic supporter of the project and is looking forward to encouraging the residents in making full use of the facility. This is the first residents installation and we are looking forward to completing the other nine in the forthcoming weeks. We intend to generate some suitable publicity at an opening bash. Watch this space!

Hi,

My name is Sam Kinsley and I am a student at the University of Plymouth. I have developed an application to be used on wi-fi enabled computers that promotes social networking.

I would really like to test this application with a group of willing volunteers. I am being assessed in three weeks time and really need to do this some time this week or next week. Please help!

Some background:

"The ‘killer-apps’ of tomorrows mobile infocom industry won’t be hardware devices or software programs but social practices."
(H. Rheingold, Smart Mobs)

TalkingPoint is a small application that runs in the background on laptops that searches for other users running the application. Once found the application gauges whether or not the owner of the other device is of interest to the owner of its own device, using keywords and arbitrary profiles. Participation would be entirely voluntary and require the user to deliberately set such software ‘active’.

I hope TalkingPoint will allow me to explore the new ’social practices’ that Howard Rheingold talks about it Smart Mobs.

I have a website at: http://www.samkinsley.com/

The application website is here: http://www.talking.org.uk/

I would greatly appreciate any help you can give me, ideally I would like a group of users to experiment with the application on evening this week, or early next week.

Many thanks

Sam Kinsley

http://www.samkinsley.com/

Hi,

I’m located in Oxford. I’m not aware of any local plans to create a wireless community, as such, but Oxford Indymedia are looking at using wireless for at least two different point-to-point applications.

So here’s a question: is it possible to get a one-hop wireless link working over a distance of about 1Km, on the flat, in a built-up area?

I’ve read a fair bit about antenna gain, and a fair bit about theoretical range (e.g. in the boondocks in USA), but very little about what you can expect to achieve when there are houses in the way – and all of that was negative.

–
Jack.

Further to a sit down with Rich on Friday 16/04, here are some structural suggestions for the BW website. I am aware that this was discussed a while back, and have tried to take on some of those issues; this is intended as a minimal friction re-vamp rather than a mighty site build from the bottom up… and nothing is set in stone obviously.

It aims to sit within Hamish’s mission picture (http://forums.bristolwireless.net/viewtopic.php?t=31) while practically meeting the possible requirements of all sorts of site visitors…

Sorry that other Ed could not make it, and hope you all like it enough to consider it as a practical braindump perhaps leading to a happy www rejig.

The point of it is to rationalise the site Information Architecture without disturbing the standing www pages (altho’ I don’t know about the second level nav), in order to make it clear to visitors what sort of stuff they will get where in the site… Here goes.

****************************************
BristolWireless.net website suggestions 19/04/04
****************************************

Aims:
—–
Maintain current accessibility standards as seen at bristolwireless.net
Structure website content clearly and relevantly for all visitors
Simplify the layout:
1. Remove ‘Gallery’ and other Right Hand side bits (integrated elsewhere)
2. Tidy up Left hand side, leaving navigation, search and links
Create a strong ‘call to action’ and sense of inclusion for visitors, and good links from BBS

Proposed user groups:
———————
These are non-specific groups based on people’s potential interest in the site rather than their ethnicity, age etc. (ie this is not a heavyweight usability analysis. I gather that the BW site has reached a satisfactory medium of desirable usability and actual do-ability).

Establishing these will give a basic outline
of *who* may use the site, which we can then further break down into *how*. This is not suggesting a site designed around specific user types – that might lead to a heavy re-build (?).

1. Totally technical types looking for totally technical information and discussion
2. Keen punters and interested parties, (potential) volunteers for all angles of BW
3. Totally non-technical punters wondering what it is all about and what for
4. Journalists
5. Sponsors
6. Easton Locals

Proposed content areas:
———————–
These are based on the information categories which BW offers online, and users’ likely activity requirements. This is not splitting the site into ‘who are you’ fragments at the top level, but placing the different information for different users within specific content categories. This is based on the theory that whoever they are, the visitors will have one of
the following information needs, which they will be looking for in clear categories.

The section headings might be links to those sections. The article titles might be links only. Can it be possible to create indented section menus when the visitors are in that section, or does it have to remain in the blogging structure? If it remains in the blogging structure, would it be good to have a set of anchor links at the top to lead the less-experienced
visitors to articles some way down the page? Obviously, the titles are suggestions rather than definitives!

1. ::Read up section::
History of BW, The CLAN
History of wireless networking and computer recycling
Overview of wireless applications
Heavyweight technical documentation
Training and give-away days
FAQs
An lightweight article about what happens when you put up a node
etc… etc… etc..

2. ::News section:: (or this might be simply the home page, blog-style?)
Regularly updated RSS feed from BBS

3. ::Get involved section::
Join mailing list
Come t
o meetings
Register your interest for training/give-aways
Sign up to IRC
Add BW RSS feed
Send an email to the list
Submit a link
Wikis

4. ::Press Releases section::
Press Releases
Business Cards

5. ::Interactive Easton secton::
Links to local stuff
Submit a link
Gallery

6. ::Links list::
This is to appear on every page below the content lists and navigation above

Other bits of navigation:
————————-
As well as navigating to the content and discussion stuff, visitors will also want some more

functional navigation as per normal website stuff. Could this fit in the banner?

1. ::Contact page::
Map
Directions
Phone numbers
Email addresses
Chelsea directions

2. ::Site Map::
Erm, site map, really.

3. ::Sponsor list:: (As a footer to every page?)
IOP, Greater Bristol Foundation, PCT Health Service, Christian Haystack etc..

***********************************
So there you have it. All constructive debate is encouraged and all that. I’m off to France now, so will look forward to catching up on this posting in a few days… In the meantime, I will leave it up to Rich and Sean to moderate

Slightly edited by Beeb but not too much

http://www.bbc.co.uk/bristol/content/madeinbristol/2004/04/wireless/wireless.shtml

Meeting 6.30 pm Chelsea

Agenda: ACTION PLAN FOR EVENT

Printing etc:
Logo
Event Flyer/Poster/T-shirt/Stencil
Info Factsheets/Questionnaire

PR

Testing:
Content/Network/Servers

(meeting 10/11th May)
Technical Set-up/Print Proofing

Print Runs

Aquisition/Siting

(meeting 24th/25th May)
Event Co-ordination
* Installations
* ECA layout
* Other Venues
* Catering
* Decor
* Documenting
* Roles
* Helpers

Well after that riveting debate -
http://forums.bristolwireless.net/viewtopic.php?t=118

Lets have a bit of fun with the voting bit of this board – poll is open for 48 hours!

I’ve done a whole list of as yet unanswered FAQs at http://docs.psand.net/twiki/bin/view/CLAN/ClanFAQs
feel free to start filling in the blanks

* NOTCON ‘04 Call for Participation – Please Redistribute Freely *

NotCon ‘04, Sunday 6th June 2004, Imperial College Union, London
http://www.notcon04.com/

Proposals due by: Friday 14th May 2004

Have you coded, created, or discovered an interesting application of technology?
Then why not come and talk about it at NOTCON ‘04?

NOTCON ‘04 is an informal, low-cost, one-day conference looking at things that technologies were perhaps not intended to do.

It takes place on Sunday 6th June 2004 from 11am to 6pm at Imperial College Union, London (in South Kensington, next to the Science Museum and the Royal Albert Hall). And yes, there will be wi-fi. And a bar. And the kind of people who actually ask for them in that order.

* What We’re Looking For *

We’re looking for a mix of talks, demonstrations and panel discussions covering all the usual areas – but with a bit more of an edge than you’d get from just reading about them online.
In short, we’d like proposals for any of these sorts of sessions – especially if they fit into the following categories:
Geolocation services
Social software
Hardware hacking
Actual impacts of blogging
Alternative media
Politics on the net
Politics *of* the net

– and also especially if they don’t.

There’ll be the usual 45-minute (and questions) slots for longer talks, plus plenty of shorter 5-minute "lightning presentations", so you don’t need to write a complete lecture or anything.

Proposals should be submitted via the web form at: http://www.xcom2002.com/nc04/submit.php

And if you try to get them to us before midnight UK time on Friday 14th May 2004, then we can work out – and let you know – the line-up before the end of May.

* Staying In Touch *

Even if you don’t want to suggest a talk, you can stay informed about the event by subscribing to our low-traffic announcement-only mailing list – send a blank email to: notcon-subscribe@socialswirl.com
(your address will only be used to contact you about the event and will not be passed onto third parties).

* Further Info *

NOTCON ‘04 is organised by some of the people behind UK tech newsletter NTK, socially-minded net charity mysociety.org, unofficial "Emerging Technology" recap ConCon UK, and 2002’s "Extreme Computing" show – but please feel free to help out!

We’ll be attempting to answer any other questions that arise on the event Wiki: http://www.symbianwiki.com/ConConUK/Questions – or you can email info@notcon04.com

if it’s not covered already. NotCon ‘04, Sunday 6th June 2004, Imperial College Union, London http://www.notcon04.com/ See you there!