Community Airwaves or Bust!
The Prometheus Pennsylvania Media Megatour is coming to your town!

Prometheus Radio Project is hitting the road all across Pennsylvania!  Did you know that there is a flurry of legislative activity this year in Harrisburg and DC that could impact your cable TV, your internet access, and much more? Prometheus Radio Project will be tramping around the great state of PA this summer, talking to community groups like yours -- letting you know what you can do today to determine your own communications future!  Our key focus of this campaign is to tell you about the possibilities of community wireless internet networking, the next big thing in the multi-issue Spectrum Reform movement.

Can we join you for a casual workshop that will inform, entertain, and help you defend your right to control your communications networks? Read below to learn more, check out our press release about the tour here or here and email PennTour <at> PrometheusRadio <dot> org to get connected with us!

And here's a new updated primer on why we're working this campaign: (choose either .doc or .pdf version.)

http://www.prometheusradio.org/media/act_183_flyer_june_9_2006.doc
http://www.prometheusradio.org/media/act_183_flyer_june_9_2006.pdf

The major component of this campaign is the hot, hot issue of community wireless internet networking (a.k.a. "wifi").  While this differs from what we usually do--build radio stations--community wifi falls squarely under the umbrella of Spectrum Reform; that is, the remapping of how we as citizens access our airwaves (which is everything from radio and community wifi to the radio signals that cordless phones, baby monitors, and garage doors operate on!).  We will be leading workshops to inform you and your community how citizen-owned and -operated wifi can benefit your area, as well as how what you can do to take action and set one in motion.

We will also be coming to your town give you the low-down on the national media scene.  By networking with folks across PA, we can influence politicians who in turn can help us protect our right to communicate. We'll come armed with lots of ideas and potential action steps for PA citizens, and we'll be eager to hear your ideas about what is important for media and democracy in your community.  We'll have up-to-the-second information on cable franchising, Municipal and Community Wireless, the looming deregulation of corporate Media Ownership, and the Future of the Internet, from allies across the state and the diverse national groups of the Media and Democracy Coalition.  We'll also have video, audio, and photographs showing how communities across PA, the country, and the world are building their own media solutions.  We can even bring the technical know-how.

We're hoping that the energy and expertise of Prometheus Radio Project will help your community become informed advocates for these important media reform fights. We seek to make your grassroots work broader and  stronger by bringing our national and international expertise on  grassroots media and media reform to bear on our home state of Pennsylvania.

We're happy to meet with any community group that wants to learn more about these important upcoming battles:

* Promoting Community and Municipal Wireless Internet Networks.  Because they provide very high quality, low cost, state-of the-art communication, wireless systems that are tailored to the exact needs of a community is one of the newest ways for citizens to reclaim their airwaves.  Our workshops can teach you how your community can start up its own wireless network and take internet access into your own hands.  Municipalities around the U.S. are using wireless for essential public safety communications.  But in your PA town, this is now illegal--so come and find out why, and what you can do about it.

* Fighting the Media Conglomerations' Perpetuation of the Corporate Agenda inside YOUR airwaves.  In most towns across Pennsylvania, companies like Clear Channel, Tribune CO. and General Electric own the newspapers, television stations, and radio stations your family relies on every day. Why don't we hear local news, music, or culture on our media anymore?  Because these companies don't find it profitable!  This year, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) plans to deregulate the broadcast media system so that the media mega-corporations who already own your local daily newspaper can also own TV and radio stations. Find out how to protect local content, and tell the FCC that deregulation is bad business for our communities.

* Maintaing Citizens' Rights for Collective Bargaining on Media Issues.  The Pennsylvania State Senate has introduced a bill that would take away your town's right to negotiate with your local cable company for better prices, better connections, and to protect the public access TV  channels your town needs. We as consumers are threated with this erosion of local choice.

Let's organize to pass a bill that respects our communities' needs, rather than just Big Media's!

We're looking to meet with groups in July and August to set the stage for a legislative push this fall.

Workshops will be led by Scranton native Dharma Dailey. Dharma has over a decade of experience reseraching and working with community media across the United States. She has led Prometheus' work on official comments to the Federal Communications Commission on how commercial media consolidation hurts our communities, which gave Prometheus the legal standing to become the plaintiff in Prometheus v. The FCC, the seminal lawsuit halting media consolidation. An expert on community and municipal wireless internet, she has shaped wireless policy with national and international leaders and researchers. Dharma is a member of the New America Foundation's Wireless Future Advisory Board.

If you're interested in meeting with us, please contact us at:
PennTour <at> PrometheusRadio <dot> org
Phone: 215.727.9620
P.O. Box 42158 Philadelphia, PA 19101