Personal Telco Monthly Meeting for May 25th 2005
When and Where
Urban Grind Coffee 2214 NE Oregon St. (take 22nd Ave. 2 blocks North of Sandy Blvd.)
Wednesday, May 25th 2005. 6:00pm - 9:00pm
Agenda
- 6:00PM - Introduction to Personal Telco for newcomers.
- 6:30PM - New Nodes and other announcements.
- 6:45PM - Business followed directly by informal meet and greet.
Audio & Video
http://stephouse.net/?nav=PTPMeeting (live video feed, experimental)
Agenda Items
- Roll Call
- Old Business
- Playdate Eight
- Get the word out to nodes and users
- Adopt A Node needs help
- where to get info for nodes and users
- how to get trained up
- Playdate Eight
- New Business
MississippiGrantProject Breakout Groups
- Antenna
- Infrastructure
- Outreach
Meeting Notes
Scribe: Sam Churchill
It's a sunny evening in Portland. About 60 people are gathered in the Urban Grind in Portland.
6:15: Michael Weiberg: Opens meeting, welcomes everyone.
6:20: Nigel Ballard: Introduces self. Goes around the room and asks first-time visitors to talk a bit about themselves and what they're interested in. About 6 people introduce themselves.
6:30: Michael Weinberg: First item elections for PTP officers. Eligebility requirements are that you are sponsored by someone on PTP and have a node operating. To vote in the next meeting (June), you must be a member today (May 25th).
6:40: Playday. Tom Higgins. Tom Higgins explains that Playday workshops introduce people to the technology. The next playday is June 4th, noon to 4pm. It will cover all the basic, how to find nodes, how to connect, and other basics.
- Tom Higgins annouces Adopt-A-Node. We need help, explains Higgins. Pick a node that you love or live next to. Go to PTP page and print out ten nodes will help alot. The idea is that you will be a contact person. We have a lot of cafes and other places that want a node but PTP doesn't have enough people. Adopt-A-Node is designed to run the infrastructure. Contact Tom for more info. The ptp wiki on adoptanode has more.
Dat says that the City of Portland has free PCs for the taking.
6:50: Bob Peterson starts a discussion on node installs. He asks how many people can program a node. About a dozens hands went up. Bob Peterson asks whether we should put more energy into node installs. With the Mississippi Project, people power would be streched thin. Weinberg says that one person who takes resonsibility of the node is the policy that PTP has used. Should it change? More discussion. Rick says that PTP should make playdays manditory for people who install a node. Right now coffee shops call up PTP and expect the organization to install and maintain it.
Charging for a node? Aaron Johnson brought up the issue that a flat fee, say $200, might be a viable solution. Then PTP could afford to install and maintain a node. Liability issues was brought up. Also, expectations. It would be a non trivial task.
But PTP doesn't have the manpower to continue that model, it was argued. Small coffee shops and others businesses should be educated, it is argued, so they can operate and maintain the hotspot themselves. As hundreds of hotspots proliferate, PTP can't install and maintain all of them.
How to make a place for people who are not engineers was mention. It would facilitate non engineers to build and manage a node. Aaron Baer says that it needs someone to run with it. That's the catch. Freelancers who operate on a "open source" model would allow anyone to participate (and earn some extra money). PTP wouldn't be the gatekeeper. It would 'outsource' the maintainence if inhouse people aren't available. Another thought, no new node built unless there is a resident administrator.
7:25: Break time