Why Consider Rebranding

For some time, approximately forever, the Personal Telco Project has had a problem with its name. The principal problem is that, for lay people, telco means telephone. When such people hear our name, they immediately think we specialize in voice communications. We don't.

Another smaller problem is that the word "personal" de-emphasized the community-aspect, where people work in some kind of common purpose to achieve mutually benefit. It is great that individuals can and do take action all by themselves, creating a resource that they share with their community. It would be better if it were clearer to those benefitting from that sharing, that they could participate, that they are invited to participate, and even further cooperate, and that doing so created a virtuous feedback loop of ever increasing community benefit.

As I have encountered groups similar to ours, from Europe and elsewhere at international conferences, one of the striking differences I've seen is the relative lack of community in our community wireless networking in Portland.

As Personal Telco completes its 15th year and goes forward, we are considering whether a new name might help close the virtuous feedback loop, make it clearer, immediately, what we do, and make it clearer, immediately, to those encountering our service, that they can and maybe really ought to participate by building sharing networks themselves.

With that introduction, I'd like to ask those of you who care about the Personal Telco Project (even just a little) to think about what a new name would look like and to share your ideas for what a better name might be. Please feel free to share your ideas, either here on the mailing list, at a regular wednesday meeting, publicly or privately, or on a wiki page we have created for the purpose:

We have a tentative schedule for deciding on a new name. At the monthly meeting on March 30, the Personal Telco Project Board of Directors will pick a name, maybe it's the current one, but we hope it might be a better one. We hope we will have your ideas and your input to help us make the right decision. --RussellSenior

Ideas

(feel free to add your own, with or without explanation)

Personal Telco Project Community Communications Cooperative Community Communications Cooperative of Portland Community Wireless Networking of Portland