On Saturday, November 4, "Nothin' But Free-Net: The Information Super Highway Comes to East Austin" introduced about 200 children and adults in the low-income communities of East Austin to the world of advanced electronic communications. This community event offered East Austin residents an opportunity to take part in the growing "virtual community" of the Internet.

The event took place at the Booker T. Washington Family Learning Center, from 10:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m.. Participants "surfed" the World Wide Web; communicated via e-mail with participants in a community computing initiative in East Lansing, Michigan; experimented with computerized games, digital photography, and computer art programs; and enjoyed a variety of music, food, and door prizes. The event marked a fun, exciting beginning for the public access computer station that is being developed at the Family Learning Center, which will continue to offer East Austin residents free access to the Internet and the World Wide Web.

Sponsors

"Nothin' But Free-Net" was sponsored by

• Southwestern Bell Telephone (SWB). SWB generously provided 15 telephone lines for this event to allow the attendees to "surf the Net" in real time.
  
• Austin CableVision. Austin CableVision generously donated money to pay expenses related to this event. They don't have a specific URL, but their parent company, Time Warner, does.
  
• Illuminati Online (IO). IO is an Internet service provider. This company contributed 10 Internet access accounts and also donated on-site technical assistance.
  
• OuterNet Connection Strategies. OuterNet provides Internet connections for businesses. For this event, it allowed Nothin' but FreeNet to use 10 Internet access accounts and provided on-site technical assistance.
  

Partners

"Nothin' But Free-Net" also had a great coalition of community organizations and corporate partners:

• Austin Free-Net (AFN) provides community computing resources for the benefit of Austin area citizens and is the heart of this event. Through public access sites, the AFN seeks to provide every Austinite with access to the Internet/National Information Infrastructure by the year 2000. The AFN is a nonprofit community organization with partners in Austin's educational, civic, and corporate communities. AFN is also affiliated with the National Public Telecomputing Network, an alliance of community computing networks in over 50 cities in the United States and the world.

• The Austin Learning Academy is a community consortium of individuals and organizations that are united in support of education, job training, and family support efforts in Austin's low-income neighborhoods. ALA's primary focus is the Family Learning Centers which operate in eight Austin public housing developments.

• The Family Learning Centers are a project of the Austin Learning Academy. Operating in eight public housing developments across the city, the FLC provides an array of education, community service, job training, and family support services. Because they are located close to public housing sites, FLCs provide a setting whereteachers and service providers can work side-by -side with parents.

• The LBJ School of Public Affairs offers for the 1995-96 school year a course titled "Bytes for Low-Income Communities". This Policy Research Project (PRP) has attracted a group of graduate students and faculty whose shared interest is elevating community awareness and usage of electronic information technologies. The PRP's role for the November 4th event was to coordinate the efforts of the various contributors.

A Model of Community Access

The primary concern of this coalition is to address the education, communication, and information needs of people in low-income communities. People can enhance their lives by connecting to critical educational, health, and social services being offered on the Internet.

The ALA, the AFN, the FLC, and the LBJ School of Public Affairs are jointly developing a model of community access to electronic information systems in public housing developments. We are committed to cultivating our youth and introducing them to ways they can use electronic communications in their daily lives.

We are seeking corporate sponsors, individual contributions, and volunteers to support this continuing effort . If you are interested in participating, or if you'd like more information, please click HERE.

The partners in this endeavor are very interested in making a model that works. We are constantly seeking to expand our awareness of resources for this purpose. Your participation and thoughts would be greatly appreciated.