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First European Conference on Community Networking July 3-5, 1997, Milan, Italy By Steve Cisler Community or civic networking is taking root in Europe, boosted by a combination of European Commission policies and the energy of citizens at the local level who come from library, municipal government, business, computer science, and academic backgrounds. Their first conference took place in July in Milan, Italy, after a meeting in Brussels, where a small group decided to start a European association. About two months before the conference I was invited to speak to the group about the state of community networking in the United States. Until the invitation, I was quite ignorant of all the recent activity in the formation of community or civic networks in this part of Europe. Northern Italy has produced a pride of community networks (CNs), mostly based on SoftArc's FirstClass software. Because university nets were not able to give Internet access to the public, they settled for the easy-to-use BBS with an email gateway to the Net. This choice was wise, because many users had or still have slow modems that are unsuitable for SLIP/PPP access and the Web but work fine with the Mac or Windows interface to FirstClass. Also, the WWW did not have the wide choice of interactive conferencing software when the Italian systems were set up a couple of years ago. The Apple dealer in Milan has been a big supporter of the civic networks in Bologna, Desenzano, and of course Milan. The head of SoftArc had a demo of the new version of FirstClass that is now fully IP compatible (mail, news, and Web). Santa Maria delle Grazie Church Milan is Italy's second largest city and its industrial and financial center. The conference was hosted by Professor Fiorella de Cindio of the University of Milan. The meetings were held in the Hotel Stelline, just across from the church Santa Maria delle Grazie, where the Last Supper by Leonardo da Vinci is on exhibit. A few of the hundred-plus attendees knew little about CNs, but most were involved either in running a system or as a user. Some of the users were just as interested in the issues as were the principals. I met an aeronautical engineer (thanks for the translation services at the Last Supper tour, Cesare!) who used the Milan network and stayed for all three days. He wanted to be sure there would be a role for him as a member of the European association that was forming. There was very good support for the equipment needs of the speakers, and the translators did a great job of handling a lot of English accents from around Europe. It was eerie for me to attend a conference where English was so important, even though most of the people using it were not from the United States, United Kingdom or Canada. Just as certain Europeans resisted the adoption of TCP/IP protocols (because they were American), others are upset with the widespread use of English, which might be thought of as the communications protocol that has come to dominate the global society in spite of the traditions or beauty or usefulness of a national or regional language. No such hostility was voiced at this conference, but that does not mean it is not an issue. Continue Overview | Digital Photography Course | Science with eMates | Spotlight Essay | Book Review | Community Networking | INET '97 | News Page One | Find It | Apple Computer, Inc. | Contact Us | Help