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Community Network Development: A Dialectical View

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Digital Cities II: Computational and Sociological Approaches (Digital Cities 2001)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNCS,volume 2362))

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Abstract

Drawing on an ongoing longitudinal research study, we discuss problems in the development of Urban-net, a next generation community network in a city in central New York. The project was funded under a state program to diffuse broadband technologies in economically depressed areas of the state. The network is technologically complex and entails high costs for subscribers. The political economy of the development process has biased the subscriber base toward the resource rich and away from the resource poor, and toward uses like intra-organizational connectivity and Internet access and away from community-oriented uses as originally envisaged. These trends raise troubling questions about network ontology and function, and about the relation between the network and its physical host community.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Information Studies Community & Information Technology Institute (CITI) 4-279 Center for Science & Technology, Syracuse University, Syracuse, New York, 13244-4100

    Murali Venkatesh Ph.D. (Associate Professor & Director)

  2. School of Information Studies 4-227 Center for Science & Technology, Syracuse University, Syracuse, New York, 13244-4100

    Donghee Shin (Doctoral Student)

Authors
  1. Murali Venkatesh Ph.D.
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  2. Donghee Shin
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Ube National College of Technology, Tokiwadai, Ube City, Yamaguchi Pref., 755-8555, Japan

    Makoto Tanabe

  2. Department of Social Sciences Netherlands Institute of Scientific Information NIWI, Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, Joan Muyskenweg 25, PO Box 95110, 1090 HC, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

    Peter van den Besselaar

  3. Social Informatics Program, Faculty of Social and Behavioral Sciences, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

    Peter van den Besselaar

  4. Department of Social Informatics Laboratory for Global Information Network, Kyoto University, Yoshida-honmachi, Sakyo-ku, 606-8501, Kyoto, Japan

    Toru Ishida

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© 2002 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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Venkatesh, M., Shin, D. (2002). Community Network Development: A Dialectical View. In: Tanabe, M., van den Besselaar, P., Ishida, T. (eds) Digital Cities II: Computational and Sociological Approaches. Digital Cities 2001. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 2362. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-45636-8_14

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-45636-8_14

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-540-43963-9

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-540-45636-0

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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