More than wires, pipes and ducts: some lessons from grassroots networked communities and master-planned neighbourhoods

Authors:
Mark Gaved;Marcus Foth
Affiliations:
Knowledge Media Institute, The Open University, Milton Keynes, United Kingdom;Institute for Creative Industries and Innovation, Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Australia
Venue:
OTM'06 Proceedings of the 2006 international conference on On the Move to Meaningful Internet Systems: AWeSOMe, CAMS, COMINF, IS, KSinBIT, MIOS-CIAO, MONET - Volume Part I
Year:
2006

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Abstract

Community informatics research has found that the provision of technical connectivity in local neighbourhoods alone does not ensure community interaction Externally initiated projects applied to communities by government or commercial bodies have encountered difficulties where the project's goals do not correspond to the host community's Differing expectations can lead to disillusionment or rejection Self-organised initiatives developed from within communities appear to be more aligned with residents' goals and purposes and may not face these issues However, such initiatives have also encountered difficulties in maintaining volunteer input and achieving technological sustainability Valuable insights can be drawn from both cases In this paper we review examples of each type of initiative and consider lessons that can be taken forward into new networked neighbourhood initiatives currently being developed We consider one specific example, an inner-city master-planned residential development in Australia seeking to establish a community association to support socio-economic sustainability and governance of the local ICT infrastructure We offer recommendations drawn from existing projects that may be applied to this site and to a wider context, and consider some implications for the future selection, deployment and maintenance of community information systems.