Notes from Initial Meeting of "Santa Barbara Networking" June 6, 1994 7 pm Antioch University, Santa Barbara First there was some discussion of the purpose of the meeting. Each person in the room introduced him/herself and spoke briefly about his/her interest and reason for coming: Sharon Clausen talked some about our initial meeting, and the fact that we were working on creating an "event" which would draw the community and would make it aware of the many benefits of electronic networking. Nancy Oster talked a little about MultiAccess Computing Corporation and her desire to see the some of the local communications expertise turned toward the filling the needs of our local community . Catherine Babine talked briefly about telecommuting. Jerry Sturmer is interested in sustainability; all aspects of it. He's on the Board of Directors at the Community Environmental Council, among other things. Dale Taylor spoke briefly about some benefits of networking and electronic collaboration. Greg Hart from the Circulation Element Task Force (CETF), "Traffic Solutions," and the Planning Commission etc. mentioned that both those groups were interested in these subjects; next month has been dubbed "Telecommuting Month!" Jennifer Tang, also from CETF or Traffic Solutions, mentioned that a Newsletter is forthcoming, focussed on telecommuting. John Wiley said he's interested in working together on the goal of creating information infrastructure: "Metanetworking the SB Community." Frank Dziuba is interested in networking the community. Spoke about Silicon Beach Communications. Their goal, first, is to build an online community, to meet the needs found locally. Caleb Clausen who spends time on computers at MCC has been thinking about networking; he thinks there should be some easy ways to create a community network. Dave Oster from MCC does wide area networking for PC's and Mac's. There is a group of networking companies locally which we should be able to leverage. Anne Cameron works with kids with communication problems. After the introductions, there was general discussion about the "event," and the fact that there should be a name for this group. Some favor was expressed for "South Coast Telecommunications Council." We decided to vote later on names in order not to get hung up on the subject. Sharon held forth briefly about her community networking concepts, and also about the NIA grants. There was some discussion about these grants. Collaboration seems to be very important in seeking and obtaining them. Sharon thinks they are designed to be teamed up, ie multiple related grants stand a better chance of funding than solo ones. There was then some discussion of an "event," including possible sponsors, format, sites, possible speakers, timeframe, and other things. The following points were made: - "Telecommunications for Sustainable Economic Development," it was agreed by all, was a good catch phrase for our purpose. - Silicon Beach Communications' idea is to get community enterprises communicating among themselves. - Dale mentioned Smart Valley; Nancy said there's a group in Santa Monica called PEN that might be willing to help. Also, San Carlos? is networked and might be able to provide a speaker. - There was some discussion about having tables there where localcompanies could display their wares. - The three major areas of focus should be economic development, community networking, and telecommuting. - Lee Moldaver has volunteered his sister to speak about telecommuting. - The Telecommunications Advisory Council in LA has a speaker who is expensive: David Fleming at UC Davis. - Greg Hart will be our first sponsor (Traffic Solutions) - Chambers, City, County are all potential sponsors. It was generally agreed that we would shoot for a morning event, with breakfast and a speaker. After breakfast there will be a panel discussion about where to go next and about who would be involved, and there will be tables for local communications vendors. This will be "in the Fall" sometime. We are all to go think up possible speakers, contact them or give their names to Dale, and think about possible sponsors and sites. There will be another meeting on Monday, June 20, at 7PM at Antioch for further discussions. The meeting was adjourned.