Just finished an interesting community meeting (conducted in our hammock shop so people can make hammocks while we gab about community process). We recently laid fiberoptic cable throughout the community for our new phone system, and now we’re faced with the question of whether we want to have our computer network and the internet accessible in our residences. Right now, we only have network and internet access in our main office building, in an area of the community called the courtyard. People can have personal computers in their rooms, but we don’t have individual phone lines or access to our network of communnally accessible files.
The biggest implication and concern for me is looking at what kind of cultural shifts this would encourage. Right now, if anyone wants to check their email or work on the internet, they come to a public building and work in a space where they’re likely to engage with other people. Making the internet accessible to people in their private rooms, and even in their individual residences (we live in buildings of 10-20 people each), it means that we’re creating a situation where people are less likely to communicate and interact with the people we live with. Not that all social interaction is inherently good and all solitude is bad, but that we’re already working against the gravity of the individualized and compartmentalized mainstream culture, and this would make the slope even slipperier.
I enjoy community meetings because it’s a reminder that we’re in this together, as a group of individuals looking at our responsibilities to the greater whole. At least, that’s how I experience them. I see other people using it as a forum to express their hard-line opinions that they aren’t open to changing (though that really didn’t happen at this meeting). We had a presentation by one of the techies who’s worked a lot on the phone and computer system, then a go-round where people talked about their concerns and suggestions, and then a brainstorm about “next steps”, how to move forward. We agreed that there will be an informant posted by the computer services team, then a salon-type meeting to have an in-depth discussion about cultural implications, then a written survey to all of us in the community about what we want. I like that we’re having group discussions first, before the survey, because I want to understand what other people think and feel before I submit my opinion of what the community should do.
and now it’s dinnertime, and I get to sit down and eat socially with the people that I’ve been discussing these political issues with. Have I mentioned lately how much I love my life?
Speaking from personal experience, I get more work done in an office with a computer shared by three complete with co-workers from nearby offices popping in for a chat than I do at home in my private office with personal laptop. Accountability, networking, and just plain fun…shared workspace is better.
Hi Kate,
David alerted me to your dilemma, and here’s my 2 cents. It is indeed a slippery slope you’re on. Internet access in your room can be like like a telephone + cable TV with infinite programming. It is an incredibly powerful tool for communication, entertainment, and reference, but one that is unquestionably directed at some soulless ghostly ether. Any group concerned with the building of Community in the real, physical now shouldn’t allow their members ‘ attention to drift away so easily.
That being said. I’m sure you don’t want to live in the stone age and I’m sure there are people there with modern computers who want to use them like one. A compromise may be to install additional network ports or wireless access in the public areas, so that those whose private computers are laptops can access the internet on their own machine, but not in a place where it is likely to suck their attention away from the community.
Good luck with it,
Rafe
wow, just noticed the date on that bugger. Hope you folks made a good decision, and tell your brother to check your blog more often.
Rafe