One citizen's position on the future role of Tacoma's
community computer network
As the City of Tacoma implements an
optical fiber network connected to the Internet as municipal infrastructure,
allthe citizens of our community should be assured access. While
it is necessary for our city planners to facilitate commerce, it is vital
that a partnership now develops between our citizens and government in
order to harness the true potential of our technology. Public access will
provide a much-needed tool everyone can use to work toward self-determination.
Empowering the individual citizens
requires more than just cable TV or a few terminals at the public library.
A community that works to resolve its problems is not one in which the
basic social unit is the individual and his or her cathode ray tube. In
order to dissolve the barriers of the ghetto here, our people must
possess the ability and desire to interact with other people and information
in the wider world. Universal, subsidized access that brings people
into groups and public forums enabling public research and debate will
empower creative individual citizens to fracture the spiral of poverty.
The capabilities of the Click! network can also empower citizens who use
it with efficient, powerful technology in creating a new model of freedom
for society, that of the information democracy.
The present is not the time
for business as usual. Anyone who studies the history of our city can see
what we are all responsible for and must endeavor to continually address
in terms of environmental debacles and racial tension. As the "hellish
chasm" that separates the haves from the have-nots continues to widen here,
we the people should make a public space in cyberspace. The purpose of
this space will be to ensure every citizen a meaningful role in how we
affect and are affected by the society in which we live. For most, realizing
this role now is dubious at best.
It is the legacy of Martin Luther
King Jr. that shows us the only way anything has ever been done is for
everyone to get together and do something about it. His memory is not forgotten
by the people of Tacoma. We have named a street in his honor to remind
ourselves of it. Three-quarters of us are struggling with a feeling of
helplessness, a feeling that things are getting worse instead of better.
Political corruption and abuses of power that disservice working people
every day are considered problems normal folks can't change. Most people
sense society is unfair but aren't sure how to change it. How many of us
even vote? Low voter turnout reflects the general feeling that the political
system is not functioning.
No one can singlehandedly change our
social agenda. Not even Martin Luther King could have accomplished
what he did without the people on the front lines, in the streets and on
the busses, in businesses and at their homes and churches all pressing
toward the goal. People need a base from which they have the opportunity
to overcome. Now the City of Tacoma is in a position to empower its people
with an effective, collective tool that we can use to chain the monsters
of economic and social disadvantage.
Construction downtown has put
a sparkling smile on the face of our all-American city. But is the smile
a genuine one or is it a mask that covers what many would really not care
to see? Look at the inner-city youth. Are they a part of the American dream
or are they going to be forced to rent themselves in order to survive for
the rest of their working lives? Can they grow up free and strong in a
world where people help each other out or will they too perpetually witness
the unaccountable profiteering of the rich man dwelling in his habitation
while children go hungry and mothers without healthcare? Using our Click!
network to construct an information democracy is a positive effort we that
we can take in empowering each and every one of us to find the trick of
cooperation and reconcile the grave inequalities we struggle with as a
people.
Many resources for funding and
implementing this thread in the tapestry of civic life exist and are available
in the existing economy. It is of vital importance that alternative options
are constructed within the minds of our working people and communities.
Web TV and the public library system are just two possible elements that
could be used in providing citizens, free of charge, a means of working
together on their dreams, desires, and aspirations. The people of Tacoma
are smart and hard working. They will act in accord with their decent impulses
to make the world a better place if provided the opportunity. If people
become aware of constructive alternatives, along with even the beginnings
of a mechanism (such as this) to realize those alternatives,
positive change could have a lot of support. Let's give our citizens a
new way to try to make the system better and more democratic. Let's help
the working person earn a livable wage instead of minimum wage subsistence.
Fair and free access will help
our people work to uncover the truth about what is going on in the world.
Providing Tacomans a bridge from the media of yesterday, it will provide
everyone the ability to actually produce media. A new mechanism for communication
will be developed that does not result in the isolation of a person sitting
alone in front of a box absorbing predigested sound bites but, instead,
is based upon communication between human beings.
One option for optics technology
is a lively, quality cable TV station. A show written by people who live
here, such as teenagers, would provide information relevant to the community
about what's going on and where the problems are. Sixteen year olds could
write scripts and make films, acting in the films themselves. Broadcasting
at prime TV time (9 o'clock), serious issues can be raised like racism,
job discrimination, AIDS, etc. Then the sixteen or seventeen year olds
who acted could (virtually?) interview Tacomans in the audience about what
they'd seen and broadcast their comments and criticisms live, eliciting
more reactions. Our Click! network could carry the images of the faces
of everyday people and their projects, infusing the news with realism and
broadcasting it to everyone in the city, nation, and, literally, the world.
The right of the people to use
and maintain this vital element of the public sphere must be supported
(and not infringed) by private business interests and our government. Large
businesses can't be given carte blanche access at the expense of small
businesses, and the principles of the commonwealth shouldn't be held subservient
to private interests. A community clearly focused on its potentials should
husband the talents of its individual citizens regardless of their amounts
of personal capital.
There will be opposition to
this position from certain people. This effort to create a more humane
society is going to inhibit somebody's freedom in how they or a group under
their control wields power. That type of freedom is an illusion. Effort
based on self-interest and selfish desire sends people in a direction with
no focus. Our prosperity depends upon the growth of our emerging industries,
but we need to remember that our means are our ends. Conscientious business
is good business. The voice of a singer of our generation, Tracy Chapman,
reminds us that "...poor people gonna rise up...take what's theirs..."
A tool such as this can help us adopt
a proper mental attitude and thrive amidst the chaos our everyday world
has become. It's time for empowering our citizens beyond traditional barriers
and examining and holding accountable the corporations we deal with on
both local and international scales. I hope that the progressive decision
to implement information infrastructure our city planners wisely made indicates
their desire for efforts of this nature. The mandate of the majority is
still valid. We are still able to vote for what we believe will make the
place we call home better if everyone becomes involved and makes it happen.
Clearly, a fibernet created
under sustainable priorities will provide everyone access to cultural resources
for personal development. It is possible that this medium may inspire our
people to actually desire literary or artistic resources in their personal
lives as the working class of this country desired access to libraries
50-60 years ago. It is a sad fact that only a privileged person now has
the means and desire to enrich his or her life with art or information
that we should all be able to share. The recent exhibit of the ceramics
of Picasso or the visual art of the foremost Russian artist of our time,
Illya Kabakov, which our own art museum featured several years ago, are
both good examples of how the video capabilities of a fiber optic system
could have been used to make valuable cultural resources available to virtuallyeveryone.
It is also clear that communication
and information technology of this kind is uniquely suitable to the imaginative
abilities of any child, senior, or person without liberty. Several things
have to happen, however: Normal folks (not just the techno-elite
or the commerce-driven)
must have accessto this tool. Yesterday's
system makes many feel hard-pressed just to take care of themselves and
their families. These "on line" projects also have to be constructed through
joint effort, not isolation. Here are some other examples that show how
technology like this can help. They (me,you) must use imagination when
using these technologies, doing what people are not doing yet.
One example might be children creating
marketing targeted for the neighborhoods in which they live in order to
raise funds via car washes, bake sales, or yardwork. Handicapped
people can be directly helped. Retired people will be able to make
a living from avocations they have developed skill in over the years. Possible
projects: Scrap metal haulers heading to General Metals on the tideflats
could know where to stop pick up recyclables, in the process cleaning up
debris and rusted hulks from neighborhoods and making them nicer places
to live.
Gardeners could implement a city or
county wide seed exchange and publicly discuss garden tips germane to the
local area like what grows well or where abandoned fruit trees are that
could be cultivated to produce. Grandmothers might sell homemade pies when
neighbors find out where these master bakers are.
Artists,
customers, curators, and galleries could meet in a cyberspace which
has the technical capacity for detailed graphic presentations. Local homeless
could search for help from organizations or odd jobs. Local musicians will
find that the capabilities of fiber-optic enhanced internet access will
let them sing their songs to the world. Alternate means of making
a living will become possible for economically trapped people.
Other creative uses of our technologies:
In Seattle a homeless person can have free E-mail courtesy of the Seattle
Community Network. Perhaps Tacomans could also help these people. Schools
of all levels will continue to have a role and be improved. Enthusiast-created
micro/internet radio could broadcast the free speech and creative powers
of individual people. Local radio stations will also find a resource in
the community network for providing services such as public service announcements
or community billboards. The creative use of the imagination in devising
possible uses knows no limits except:access to free technology for
all.
Just four walls do not make
a house a home. Just laying fiber optic cable will not cure all the ills
of the people. Given the potential for improving ourselves this infrastructure
will bring, it seems clear that being responsive to and motivating for
the people in the caretaking of this resource is necessary. Traditionally,
the roles of government and corporations have become complementary. Now
government and citizens have a chance to partner in implementing management
for this new infrastructure.
Fundamental to the Tacoman work
ethic is the feeling that our government is not the despot of the people,
but that it is the people who should define the government's priorities.
Public financing of technology of the future shouldn't be funneled through
private hands, and the public should decide where to invest. Therefore,
while implementation of the hardware has been admirably accomplished by
the efforts of our city planners, maintaining "control" of this resource
from above is inappropriate. It's time to help people from our streets
and schools to bring it to life.
Respectfully,
Preston Stanke (bm199@scn.org)