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Guest Editor's Column

by Brennon Martin

CPSR News Volume 15, Number 3: Summer 1997

This issue of the CPSR Newsletter is dedicated to the same theme, offering those of you who could not join us in Seattle a glimpse into the discussions of the weekend and hopefully providing thought-provoking ideas for those of you who were there as well. Four of the six authors in this issue made presentations at the conference: Barry Forbes, Executive Director of the Alliance for Community Media; Amy Borgstrom, Executive Director of ACEnet; Jamie McClelland, Technology and Policy Specialist of Libraries for the Future; and Mick Souder of the Minnesota E-Democracy Project.

Their articles examine various connections between physical community space and cyberspace. Mr. Forbse's piece concerns the need to guarantee the existence of public spaces in the new commercial media channels; Mr. Souder looks at the use of these public cyberspaces to debate solutions to physical community-space problems. Mr. McClelland and Ms. Borgstrom discuss two different projects regarding the use of computer networks to address community problems, the former focusing on the problem of giving children a voice in community affairs, the latter on developing a financially self-sustaining community network that builds the economic strength of its members.

We include an important article by Coralee Whitcomb, who was not at DIAC-97. She writes about Virtually Wired, a community networking project whose story offers lessons in sustainability that must be addressed if the community networking movement is to succeed. Ms. Whitcomb is the author of the Telecom Post and a well-known CPSR activist-her return to CPSR's Board is noted elsewhere in this issue.

Brennon Martin slaved as workshop coordinator at DIAC 97. There was much less blood spill on this newsletter, but he hopes it is just as much fun for those who come across it. Hi is currently working at the Philips Multimedia Center in Palo Alto as Business Development Project Manager of a multi-lab effort to develop networked, multi-user, digital environments and working toward a doctorate in Communications at the University of Washington in Seattle.

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