Davis Community Network (DCN): A Regional Community Networking Initiative in North-Central California

Abstract

Davis Community Network (DCN) is one of several hundred community networking initiatives now being spawned in the U. S. and throughout the world. Community networks are local responses to the needs of urban, rural and ever growing edge communities in a globally evolving information society. They are taking a variety of forms and fulfilling various functions in response to their social, economic and technical context. DCN is a notable example of the community networks that were jump-started with government or corporate funds in the early to mid-1990s. Broad based community partnerships, a sound economic foundation, an educated and participatory public, and clearly understood goals and benefits, are the still rare combination of factors that result in successful community networking ventures. Non-local factors, such as government policies and private sector telecommunication infrastructure deployment timeframes, also weigh heavily into the equation. The information society is in the early stages of an evolutionary development. Community networks must frequently reassess and reinvent themselves in response to greater local-global changes. Davis Community Network hopes to continue to learn lessons and to demonstrate possibilities, as all communities, homes and people eventually become nodes in a ubiquitously networked society.