Welcome to the 34th monthly round-up of developments impacting your local access networks.
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APC shares highlights of its work to promote affordable and sustainable connectivity between 2016 and 2019. Read more.
Events and conferences
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CoolabCamp is an event organised in Brazil to discuss community networks, autonomy and digital sustainability. In the context of the pandemic, the event will be online this year on 2, 3 and 4 April. The schedule is decided collectively between the participants on the first day. Read more.
Resources from past events
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As part of its Road to Addis Series, ITU promoted a webinar to address the specific needs for digital inclusion of women and girls, youth and the elderly, persons with disabilities, children, Indigenous people and people living in remote areas to achieve true and meaningful universal connectivity. Telecomunicaciones Indígenas Comunitarias A.C. in Mexico brought a community networks perspective. Read more.
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The session "The Future of Community Networks", held on 16 March at MozFest, is now available online. The panel discussed the future of community networks, combining perspectives from community research, next-generation peer-to-peer protocols, hardware and frontline implementation. Read more.
Community networks in news and blogs
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This article in Compost, a magazine about the digital commons, brings a group reflection on a project run in Bidar, India, to set up a community mesh network facilitated by Living Labs Network and Forum, and Janastu/Servelots. This local mesh network was to act as an intranet of local informal archives that would collectively function as a knowledge network. Read more.
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Local Networks initiative peer Common Room created a wiki to strengthen COVID-19 responses, making important information about vaccination available in Indonesia in the local language (available in Bahasa Indonesian). Read more.
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Locally-run, community-based networks are filling in where the government has failed to eliminate the digital divide. Faced with limited resources, Indigenous communities built their own connection in the US. This article shows how. Read more.
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Local Networks initiative and projects from Tosepan and IBEBrasil nominated for the WSIS Prizes 2021. The voting period is now open and will close on 31 March 2021. Find out how to vote and help us to support the global recognition of community networks initiatives. Read more.
Gendering Community Networks
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The Brazilian feminist organisation MariaLab launched two guides on feminist infrastructures - one focused on community networks and the other on servers. The publications reflect the content of courses promoted by MariaLab for women in Brazil and seek to share knowledge with more women (available in Portuguese). Read more.
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In this interactive piece in Compost magazine, young women look beyond the obvious and question: in a world driven by stereotypes and discrimination, can technology challenge the biases of our physical world instead of deepening them? The piece is an offshoot of the work Janastu has been doing with Garima Girls in Mirzapur. It calls for another look at accessible computing in the global South and questions the way forward to decolonise and contextualise democratic internet technology. Read more.
News on policy and regulation
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The UN will promote a High-level Thematic Debate on Digital Cooperation and Connectivity on 27 April. The provisional programme informs that inscription for the list of speakers in the plenary segment is now open. Read more.
Previous editions
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Previous editions of this newsletter are available here.
This newsletter is part of the Local Networks (LocNet) initiative, an initiative led by APC in partnership with Rhizomatica that aims to directly support the work of community networks and to contribute to an enabling ecosystem for the emergence and growth of community networks and other community-based connectivity activities in developing countries. You can read more about the initiative here, here, and here.
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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.