Community Networks and Local Access Monthly Newsletter - Number 21

Welcome to the 21st monthly round-up of developments impacting your local access networks.

1. Events and conferences

• [En español] Este 6 y 7 de septiembre tendrá lugar Latinity sobre mujeres en tecnología, organizado por el miembro de APC Cooperativa Sula Batsu. Habrá un panel sobre redes comunitarias organizado por IBE Brasil y Colnodo.
• From 4 to 9 September, the Seventh African School on Internet Governance (AfriSIG) will be held in N’Djamena, Chad. There will be a session about community networks.
• Our Networks is a conference taking place in Toronto from 20 to 22 September, focused on all aspects of the decentralised web – from mesh networking to P2P applications to commons governance.
• [En español] Del 11 al 15 de septiembre, el Taller sobre Tecnologías de Redes Internet para América Latina sucederá en Guatemala.
• From 11 to 15 September, the Workshop on Internet Network Technologies for Latin America (WALC) will be hosted for the first time in Guatemala, to meet the training needs of networking professionals and technicians in this country and the neighbouring ones.
• [En español] La Cumbre Latinoamericana de Redes Comunitarias sucederá del 23 al 29 de septiembre en Fusagasuga, Colombia.
• The Indonesia IGF National Assembly will take place from 26 September to 3 October 2019. There will be a community network multistakeholder event to coincide with this event.
• Registration for participation in the 2019 Internet Governance Forum (IGF) in Berlin is open until 1 November.
• The Third Indigenous Connectivity Summit will take place from 12 to 15 November in Hilo, Hawaii. The summit will hold some preliminary training sessions online. 

2. Resources from past events

• En el Foro de Gobernanza de Internet para America Latina y el Caribe hubo una sesión sobre "El reto de conectar a los no conectados en el corto plazo".
• The Global Symposium for Regulators had Erick Huerta and Steve Song facilitating some sessions on community networks in coordination with ISOC:

- Connectivity for all: Do the basics still apply? 

- Information session: From the first mile to the last mile – thinking outside the box. 

- Last Mile Access: Solutions involving community. 

• [En español] Durante el 14° Taller Internacional de Regulación (#TallerCRC2019) tuvieron lugar interesantes ponencias:

- Presentación de Carlos Rey-Moreno sobre redes comunitarias. 

- Resumen de Philippe Defraigne de Cullen International mencionando la relevancia de las redes comunitarias. 

• Slides and videos of presentations at Battlemesh V12, a conference on wireless networks and open source software held this July in France, are being uploaded online.
• [En español] REDES A.C. participó del Congreso de Investigación sobre Comunicación y Media, presentando el trabajo de las redes comunitarias en Latinoamérica, resultado de la investigación realizada junto a APC y a ISOC.
• [En español] ISOC Colombia llevó a cabo un webinar sobre redes comunitarias.

3. Community networks in news and blogs

• Janastu's community mesh radio network was featured by TheBetterIndia.
• As part of the “Connecting the Unconnected: Supporting community networks and other community-based connectivity initiatives” project being implemented by APC in partnership with Rhizomatica, Sarbani Banerjee Belur of Gram Marg recently visited the Janastu Community Mesh Radio Network initiated by Servelots in the village of Halekote, Karnataka, with the support of a community networks travel exchange grant.
• [En español] APC republicó el artículo de AlterMundi sobre su participación en el Congreso Latinoamericano de Telecomunicaciones.
• [En español] Colnodo fue entrevistado por APC en relación a su acompañamiento de redes comunitarias en el Cauca, Colombia, y también publicaron un blog en su sitio web al respecto.
• In an interview with APCNews, Colnodo shared its experience with community networks in Cauca, Colombia.
• TakNet, a mesh community network in Thailand supported by the Asian Institute of Technology, was featured by APNIC.
• Pamoja Net, part of Ensemble Pour La Difference, has a website full of stories featuring their experience and their partners.
• The Regional Bureau Director for Asia-Pacific at the Internet Society, Rajnesh Singh, talks about how community networks can be the tool to bridge the digital divide in Asia.
• [Em português] O co-Nectar é um coletivo que incentiva a disseminação e integração entre os saberes tradicionais e novas tecnologias no Brasil. Estão fazendo uma rede comunitária!
• TunapandaNET from Kenya was featured in an article by KICTANet.
• The Internet Society's Asia Pacific Regional Bureau newsletter featured "The Case for Complementary Local Access Networks by the Community, for the Community".
• Questions raised by the Takeover of SNET, Havana’s community network.
• [En español] El gobierno de Chihuahua, Mexico, impulsa el desarrollo de redes comunitarias.
• [En español] NuestraRed.org fue premiado por el Programa Frida. 

4. Gendering community networks

• This is the first in a series of interviews we will be publishing that highlight the work, struggles and achievements of women in community networks. We will document their experiences to provide them with a platform and to inspire more women to get involved in this field. This month we are featuring Memory Jere, from CYD Malawi.
• Kondoa Community Network: Breaking gender digital divides. 

5. News on policy and regulation

• The director of ITU-R, Mario Maniewicz, gives a glimpse of what will be discussed at the upcoming World Radiocommunication Conference in Egypt in November 2019. 

6. Research

• Report from the Alan Turing Institute on the “Data Science for Bridging the Digital Divide and Beyond” workshop. A highlight: it mentions Steve Song's work on open telecom data. Read also:

- Josiah Chavula's presentation at the “Data Science for Bridging the Digital Divide and Beyond” workshop includes the Inethi community network. 

- Steve Song's presentation on open telecom data at the “Data Science for Bridging the Digital Divide and Beyond” workshop. 

• “Towards Scalable Community Networks Topologies”, a paper from Leonardo Maccari and others, presents a novel methodology and its implementation through an automated tool that enables the exercise of [light] centralised control of the dynamic and otherwise spontaneous growth processes of community networks. Maccari also gave a presentation about this tool in the last BattleMesh. . The journal where this article was published might also be interesting for community networks enthusiasts. 

7. Reports and publications

• The Redecentralize movement has created a monthly newsletter about the “redecentralisation” of the internet, the technologies, the discussions and the events related to this. 

8. Articles on technologies related to local access networks

• TV white space commercial deployment has started in South Africa. The use of this technology is key for increasing the coverage in rural areas, where the territory is broad and the terrain is uneven. Mozambique is also exploring this field, approving a TV white space standard covering the 470 MHz-694 MHz band.
• [En español] Argentina está preparando su regulación sobre espacios blancos de TV para noviembre.
• The Google Summer of Code has finished and Freifunk has published reports on the different projects that were developed regarding community networks.
• African telecoms at a crossroads: What needs to happen next. An opinion piece by Russell Southwood and Steve Song on the future of telecommunications regulation in the region. 

9. Tools and toolkits

• The Cybermoor Cooperative has produced a guide on how to create a broadband initiative based on their experience in rural United Kingdom. 

10. Funding opportunities

• All throughout 2019, Google has an open call for policy fellowships in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the US and Latin America. Fellows will have the opportunity to work at public interest organisations at the forefront of debates on broadband and access policy, content regulation, copyright and creativity, consumer privacy, open government, government surveillance, data security, data innovation, free expression and more.
• Her Abilities is the first global award that honours women with disabilities who have achieved greatness in their life and field of work.
• The Mozilla Open Source Software Fund funds open source projects used by or related to Mozilla’s mission. Applications are accepted on a rolling basis and are reviewed monthly by an expert selection panel.
• The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation supports early-stage research for which private or government funding is hard to obtain and early-career (tenure-track) researchers.
• RIPE NCC will provide EUR 250,000 per year to support projects of value to the operation and resilience of the internet. The call for applications is open until 1 September 2019.
• The United Nations Democracy Fund invites civil society organisations to apply for funding for projects to advance and support democracy. The next call for applications is expected to be open from mid-November 2019.
• Until 1 October 2019, IDRC is accepting proposals for "Strengthening education systems with proven innovations in developing contexts", in which community networks could be involved. 

11. Previous editions

• Previous editions of this newsletter are available here.

This newsletter is part of the project titled, “Local Access Networks: Can the unconnected connect themselves?” carried out by APC in partnership with Internet Society and Rhizomática, with support from Canada's International Development Research Centre (IDRC) in 2017/2018 and funded by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida) in 2019. 

Invite others to subscribe to this monthly newsletter!

One more thing! If you have comments about the newsletter or information relevant to the topic that you would like us to include in the next edition, please share it with us at localaccess.newsletter@apc.org.

August 2019