The Portland Linux/Unix Group (or PLUG for short) helped give birth to PersonalTelco back in November 2000. For that and their continued support we are eternally grateful. There also happen to be a number of very knowledgeable people who have helped with building the Portland community wireless network.
A detail of PLUG history is worth mentioning here. PLUG formed in the spring of 1994 as the Portland Linux User Group. In 1998, when PLUG "changed" its name from "Portland Linux User Group" to "Portland Linux/Unix Group", it was somewhat controversial. Not everyone liked the change, and so it was agreed that both names would continue to attach to the group. For instance, Dan Haskell has continued to use "Portland Linux Users Group" in announcements of the monthly PLUG clinic.
There is another group in Portland that calls itself PDXLUG, "a Portland Linux User Group". They forked off of PLUG in January 2003, annoyed at "off topic" discussions on the PLUG mailing list. They mistakenly thought that PLUG had abandoned its original name, and initially used it along with the PDXLUG.org domain name. This seemed ironically perverse, since they apparently forked because of their strong annoyance with PLUG, and yet chose a name that minimized the distinction in the extreme. PLUG generally wishes them well, however, their choice of name has caused some confusion amongst third parties about which group is which. Attempts have been made, mostly unsuccessfully, to encourage PDXLUG to pick a more distinctive name.