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Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 7: Blair Newman (metaview) Fri, Feb 2, '90 (21:46) 10 lines
As mentioned over in the radio conf, I lunched today with (dsolar), the
head of KALW (91.7) NPR FM in San Fran, and he's really hot on the Well
by Radio idea that used to be topic 60 here in tele (started in 6/87).
Hoover will un-retire the topic if that's wanted, but meanwhile it can
be downloaded by typing at the OK: !zcat /uh/86/hchan/telecomm/tel060
<My ID in those days was (mcluhan) because I first discovered the Well
while doing some pro bono work for the Marshall Mcluhan Center for Global
Communications.>
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 8: Blair Newman (metaview) Fri, Feb 2, '90 (22:17) 48 lines
Here's the response 0 to that old topic:
THE WELL VIA RADIO?
We Well beings could collectively save a ton of money by reading
Well conferences received via radio, rather than via telephone.
(AKA "by-passing" PacBell)
Here's how it could work:
The Well would buy airtime from an FM broadcast station (say KQED
or KALW) in the middle of the night, when the station is
otherwise off the air. The marginal cost to the station, I'm told
by their engineers, would be less than $50 an hour.
The station would broadcast all the additions to all Well
conferences posted during the preceding 24 hours. The broadcast
would be 1200 baud FSK -- the same tone the Well uses to talk to
your modem over the phone-- which equals 432 Kbytes an hour, so
only 30 minutes or so would be needed.
You would connect a wire from your FM radio's earphone jack to
your modem's "modular" phone jack. This wire would include a
small circuit for impedance and amplitude matching-- estimated
cost under $10.
Then you'd leave your computer on (or connect it to a clock timer
power switch, with an appropriate "autoexec" file) and in the
middle of the night it would receive all the prior day's Well
postings and store them on disk. You could then read them the
next morning, at your leisure.
Advantages: no telephone charges, no connect time charges, no
sluggish VAX response.
Disadvantages:
(1) You'd still have to phone the Well to post.
(2) The Well couldn't survive without the connect time revenue.
Soooo...we'd need to create some new billing scheme to offset the
reduction in connect time-- which is 98% reading. One possibility
would be raising the monthly fee, but there would be no way to
prevent freeloading "eavesdroppers" who never posted anything
(i.e., weren't Well members). Any bright ideas on solving this
financial obstacle?
Blair Newman
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 10: Blair Newman (metaview) Fri, Feb 2, '90 (23:14) 2 lines
SCA's are unbelievely expensive these days-- $15k/mo was quoted to me
by a station not using theirs.
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 12: Blair Newman (metaview) Sat, Feb 3, '90 (09:36) 9 lines
You lost me Steve. Why would anybody spend $ when all it takes is a
$10 cable adapter running from a $10 mono FM recvr headphone jack to
your modem's rj11?
While (dsolar) gets substantial funding every year from NTIA, and thinks
they'd go for it, to get it up quickly he'd like to start with a liitle
bit (low 5 digits) of corporate underwriting (hint, hint). KALW, BTW,
is owned by the SF School Board, so a bunch of goodies are being rolled
into the proposal for them-- any ideas, Mr. Hughes?
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 13: Blair Newman (metaview) Sat, Feb 3, '90 (11:31) 67 lines
Here's the blurb that went to KQED, to which they said "OK, until we go
24 hours news/talk in a few months."
Blair Newman
1801 Hyde St. #6
San Francisco, CA 94109
(415) 984-1778
December 13, 1987
Mr. Gene Zastrow
KQED, Inc.
500 Eighth Street
San Francisco, CA 94103
Dear Mr. Zastrow,
This is the belated written recap you requested during our phone
conversation last August, concerning using KQED-FM from 1 to 5 AM
daily to broadcast standard 1200 baud text.
Any PC owner could receive this broadcast by buying a $20
"adapter cable," which connected to his modem at one end, and to
a normal FM radio earphone jack at the other. Software on the PC
would "filter" and store the 1 or 2 percent of the program
material that is most interesting to the listener, who would then
typically spend 5 or 10 minutes a day (at his convenience)
reading it.
The program content would be designed to appeal to the broadest
possible audience, within the universe of people having access to
PC's. Programming would consist mainly of news wire style
material, plus computer conferencing "discussion groups" similar
to Compuserve, Usenet, and other computer networks.
Many PC users, given the trivial incremental equipment
investment, might be attracted to the idea of a personally
customized electronic newspaper. It would protect them from
"information overload," while simultaneously assuring they didn't
miss developments in their particular interest areas. The
resulting audience could be attractive to potential underwriters
such as Microsoft, Apple, etc.
The Bay Area is the obvious place for an experimental trial of
this "Baudcasting" concept, and my informal inquiries at the FCC
indicated an experimental/developmental authorization probably
wouldn't be a problem for an NCE licensee.
Would KQED consider participating in such an experiment, assuming
full funding grants were available to completely cover your
costs?
Please call me if you'd like to discuss it, and forgive my delay
in getting back to you: I've been further researching this
concept, while being very busy in my consulting practice, and
starting up another media related project (confidential one page
summary attached).
Sincerely,
Blair Newman
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 15: Blair Newman (metaview) Sun, Feb 4, '90 (10:48) 4 lines
With the right software on your pc, you could read a post, impulsively
respond by hitting "r" like here, end your comment by hitting "s",
and your pc's software would dial into the Well or KALW's bbs (the only
local station with one!) and post it.
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 17: Blair Newman (metaview) Sun, Feb 4, '90 (13:45) 6 lines
Dave, why don't we team up and form a nationwide network of plain old AM
radio stations, broadcasting news/talk (ie, compconf) at 9600 baud plus
text compression, which appears to the "listener" exactly like a phone
based system (like cserv or prodigy), but which is cheap/free because his/
her PC's software only automatically creates a phone link (eg, for posting)
when it's really necessary. Give IBM/Sears a run for their billion.
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 19: Blair Newman (metaview) Sun, Feb 4, '90 (14:45) 11 lines
A free ad supported layer of newswires, syndicated stuff, all compconf,
and summaries of articles on, (2) an encrypted pay per reader layer
(priced ala carte at the copyright owners per reader fee, plus a standard
markup for carriage on the system).
2 kinds of receivers: one connects to any RS-232. The other snags every
item of interest to you into a standard RAM, then plays it thru a voice-
synth chip (your choice of Ed Murrow, Alistair Cooke, or whatever sound
alike newsreader) for when you can listen but not read (eg, driving).
AM radio station values are plummeting....the NAB should love this idea
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 21: Blair Newman (metaview) Sun, Feb 4, '90 (21:22) 3 lines
>dumb to port something that long
You mean the 67 line memo to KQED, or...?
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 25: Blair Newman (metaview) Mon, Feb 5, '90 (19:30) 24 lines
Thanks Tim. I'd been intending to call you for some tech consultation
concerning earphone jack to modem rj-11 matching cable design.
Given that this would be an experimental FCC authorization for a limited
time trial, it seems desirable to keep "listener" entry costs minimal--
meaning no special sca receiver, just an adapter cable to link any 1200
baud modem to any FM radio.
I spent several hours today with Mark Graham (mgraham) and his team. Mark
recently resigned from heading Peacenet/Econet to concentrate on his
Pandora Systems start-up which is an IP for several RBOC gateways, a VAR
for Caucus, etc. It's clear to me that Mark is probably the best qualified
person in the Bay Area to head up the KALW Baudcasting project, and hope
he can figure out a way to do that while maintaining his obligations to
his company's associates. Besides, I met KALW GM (dsolar) at (mgraham)'s
Peacenet retirement party, so it's only fair! :-)
Mark mentioned that there are some bucks available for educational tcomm
experiments from the PacTel settlement with the PUC last year. KALW being
owned by the San Francisco school board (ultimately under Mayor Agnos, who's
at war with KQED at the moment), and this Baudcasting idea originally being
conceived as a bypass Pactel scheme to reduce Well user costs (many pay more
for the phone connection than for Well connect charges), makes the
possibilities rich with irony.
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 29: Daniel del Solar (dsolar) Mon, Feb 5, '90 (21:47) 3 lines
KALW unfortunately has only had one $30K NTIA grant to acquire production
room equipment. The WELLAIR connection will be up as soon as we
ok
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 30: Blair Newman (metaview) Mon, Feb 5, '90 (21:49) 2 lines
KALW's regular channel, not the SCA, is the way to start a experiment.
Their sca is already leased anyway.
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 33: Blair Newman (metaview) Mon, Feb 5, '90 (23:19) 12 lines
Current thinking is to send a best of the Well nightly (kind of a free
sample) but to h`ve the transmission's main compconf sys be free--
perhaps KALW's bbs (415-641-4373) or an available multiline system. That
eliminates the Well lost revenue problem that stopped this project two and
a half years ago. Lots of the current strategizing is built around the
educational tie-in due to KALW be SF schools owned.
Just got off a conference call with Pozar and Dave (KALW's chief engnr.)
reviewing tech issues (no show stoppers) and the union contract (will there
need to be a very bored board op on duty at $20/hour). Anybody have
online TM search capability? We'd appreciate a quick and dirty prelim
check of "Baudcasting."
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 39: Blair Newman (metaview) Tue, Feb 6, '90 (17:46) 3 lines
I'd say think of it as advertising for the Well (free samples of addictive
things are a tried and true marketing strategy), but get posters' OK
before passing it on for Baudcast. How's that sound?
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 42: Blair Newman (metaview) Tue, Feb 6, '90 (18:17) 7 lines
There are a *LOT* of modems in KALW's footprint, so as free advertising goes
Which brings to mind the obvious possibility of a tie-in with one of the
free PC tabloids, or maybe sending new product announcements off PRwire and
Bizwire, or maybe one of those trade press abstracting services...
Wheeee!
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 47: Blair Newman (metaview) Tue, Feb 6, '90 (19:01) 9 lines
Only a tiny "best of" tease sampler of the Well would be Baudcast (and that
only if the Well desires), comprising 1 or 2 percent of the daily feed.
How's that "treating it like a news wire?"
But the optimum news/talk ratio-- how much of it is open to "listeners"
jumping into to fray-- is an interesting question.
I don't have any biases about the content. Part of the experiment is
finding out who the audience is, and what they want.
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
The software involved would not be a simple proposition, either on the Well
or the receiving end. You would have to have someone scrounge the Well for
the "best of" material, get the approvals from the writers involved, censor
the dirty words, questionable stuff, etc (so KALW can keep its license). Then
you would have to format it into some sort of text stream with flags in it,
and set up timed transmission to KALW. On the receiving end, the user would
have to hook up their modem to their computer, after first aquiring a hookup
device (from wherever), have some sort of sorting software that could sort
the incoming stream out, and remember to leave their radio on the right
station at the right time.
If there was (and I am NOT saying that there is) a reason to give out "tastes
of the Well" to encourage users to sign up to the Well, I can think of less
complex ways to do it (such as a seperate phone line with an audio/ascii
"item of the day", a mass mailing with some of the better stuff on line,
in writing, including some short bios on some of the more interesting people
on line). This "technofix" idea as an ideal advertising mechanism seems to
be suggesting that users would more willing to blow time, money and effort
to get a one time "free" sample rather than jumping in and blowing the same
amount of money in real ONLINE time to get a picture of the system. I think
that you would agree that this that is not very likely.
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 53: Blair Newman (metaview) Wed, Feb 7, '90 (01:30) 8 lines
Again, I said that any posts that were Baudcast would have to have
to have explicit permission from the author, probably including a signed
blanket release form as used in the broadcast industry.
But anyone who still labors inder the impression that the Well isn't
a public place should sign up for jef's new user notification service.
Don't be fooled by the extraordinarily steep Pareto curve here (posters
to lurkers ratio).
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 56: Blair Newman (metaview) Wed, Feb 7, '90 (02:00) 6 lines
It's 415-641-4373, but I confess I haven't called it yet. An irrelevant
leading indicator of baudcasting compconf traffic.
Frankly I'm inclined to share (stacy)'s and (lcarlson)'s view that creating
an online culture may require intially limiting access to a pre-selected
seed culture group.
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 58: Blair Newman (metaview) Wed, Feb 7, '90 (02:20) 7 lines
Exactly the point of main channel vs SCA. Listener entry cost should
be under $20-- impulse purchase level.
Ideally, for office PC's, the software should be able to filter for
several differnt people, then dump their customized "newsletters" to
the printer, awaiting their pick-up when they arrive at the office in
the morning, and subsequent persusal over coffee.
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 61: Blair Newman (metaview) Thu, Feb 8, '90 (00:43) 29 lines
Agree completely, Glenn, for the short term test (a year?).
As for doing it for real....
If there's an eventual mass market I'd expect it to be a 9600 baud or
faster feed with both ad supported free and pay per item layers. The
free layer could include basic newswires, all public computer conferencing,
some syndicated material, summaries of the info available on the pay layer,
and ads-- but your filtering software would only show those you were
potentially interested in. The pay per layer would be encrypted, with
de-crypt handled by the baudcasting software on listeners' PC's, and
priced per item at whatever the copyright owner wanted per reader, plus
some markup for carriage on the system. The baudcasting PC software
would upload billing info during phone links, which would automatically
be established when need in background (eg, sending email, or posting).
As an intial swag I'd guess that perhaps 80% of users consumption would
be info, and 20% would be conferencing-- but that's based on current
reading behavior, and perhaps Cserv's 1/3rd Minitel style CB, 1/3rd
Forum, and 1/3rd infoservs mix is closer to the mark.
While I'm told it's possible to pump 9.6Kb thru an SCA, the receiver/modem
(actually, just /dem) would be far cheaper if a wider carrier was used--
say, an AM station, or a bit of a TV VBI.
In a telcon today I was given a pointer to a guy who has been in the SCA
data biz for a decade, and knows all the prior analyses of consumer
possibilities. I'll call him tomorrow and report back.
The SCA bandwidth is *wider* than a standard phone line, and I believe
that the S/N is at least comparable, so a standard 9600 baud modem (such
as a TrailBlazer) should work just fine: the only difficulty is that
such modems depend on getting feedback from the other end for automatic
self-adjustment........ but I just thought of a way to handle that little
detail, so forget it.........
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 63: Blair Newman (metaview) Thu, Feb 8, '90 (03:09) 3 lines
True, but a receiver listening to an AM station and a 9.6Kb demod could
be much cheaper-- $50? The X*Press 9.6Kb box that listens to an FM station
slot on the TV cable, and plugs into the RS232, sells for $125 currently.
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 66: Daniel del Solar (dsolar) Thu, Feb 8, '90 (15:33) 1 line
927uklfwpiulk
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 67: Daniel del Solar (dsolar) Thu, Feb 8, '90 (15:38) 8 lines
In order to carry baudcasting on KALW we would have to have a live
operator, and do station IDs in English on the hour (5 minutes on
either side). Experiment should last 6 months to get all that
would participa to try it at least once. I agree with the comment
that a news aspect would be good in the material, from usenet,
and possibly other BBS's would like to provide "summary feeds"
as part of the xperiment. Clearance of the text from the WELL
and other sources would be the responsibility of the xD~rT<
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 77: Blair Newman (metaview) Fri, Feb 9, '90 (11:05) 6 lines
What baud rate is "First Call?" What percentage of its data capacity is
used for error correction? Any text compression?
For a quick, dirty(!), and cheap Baudcasting experiment, users who found
some garbled text the next morning could simply call the KALW bbs and
download the %d}~~`/fx'd article. Much appreciated post, Mr. Rutt.
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 80: Daniel del Solar (dsolar) Sat, Feb 10, '90 (12:57) 7 lines
Need full time on-air control, including station ID's hourly. Perhaps
$50 per hour for the first six months of 4 hour nightly, 12:40 am to
4:45 am. Plus the need to administer it, including mail, phone, and
email, from co-experimenters, which may number between 5 and ten thousand.
Perhaps 400,000 potential listeners to Baudcasting. $50 K for six months.
Possibly covering the development and distribution of promo/info regarding
the $10 connecter between the radio and the modem jack.
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 81: Blair Newman (metaview) Sat, Feb 10, '90 (15:05) 11 lines
Dave (KALW's engineer) told me the union board operator is $20.50/hour?
Remember Daniel, one of the conditions of an FCC experimental authorization
is that the licensee make no profit on it.
I've been thinking about a letter to Art Agnos and the supes along the lines
of "Silicon Valley is the world's high-tech capital, and San Francisco
(rather than San Jose) should be the capital of Silicon Valley. Having
Baudcasting pioneered by San Franciso's public radio station and library
will contribute to the city's leadership role in the information age,
without any expenditure of municipal funds."
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 83: Blair Newman (metaview) Sat, Feb 10, '90 (16:09) 5 lines
If free computer conferencing is included, so any "listener/reader" can
see the comments of any other, and vice versa, couldn't a case be made that
this takes the concept of community radio to a higher level? (BTW, my fave
radio is BBC World News, which isn't usually considered community radio,
but perhaps should be.)
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 84: Blair Newman (metaview) Sat, Feb 10, '90 (16:40) 23 lines
Got some email today which included the phrase "Wellcast."
It's true that I originally started on this idea back in '67 in reponse
to learning that PacTel got more connect time revenue from the Well than
the Well did (I'm close to Sleazalito, so it's always been a free call for
me). But there are many problems in "Wellcasting" -- lost connect time
rev's, the posters permissions (you own your own words here), profiting
from an experimental FCC license, etc.
While I believe the channel capacity capacity should be used for whatever
the community/audience wishes, it would be a big surprise to find the
desired news/conferencing mix equalling the Well's 0%/100%. So, all
things considered, the Baudcasting experiment should be an extension of
KALW's bbs, beefed up as needed.
However, because all the words on the Well are owned by the folks who wrote
them, posters shouldn't be surprised if they receive email from time to
time, requesting permission to port over specific posts. Thus the only
commercial relationship between KALW and the Well would be KALW paying
the standard connect time rate to download material it had permission
to baudcast.
Does that sound equitable all around?
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 85: Daniel del Solar (dsolar) Sat, Feb 10, '90 (19:08) 15 lines
<censored & scribbled>
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 86: Blair Newman (metaview) Sat, Feb 10, '90 (19:09) 15 lines
A little correction for the historical record:
My interest in this area dates back to 1980, when I came up with an
idea I called "PocketQuote," and described it to some friends at Brentwood
(a major VC firm). Some time later a company called Telemet pitched
Brentwood on the same idea, and Brentwood told them they'd already
heard it under the name PocketQuote, and wouldn't consider the Telemet
deal unless I wasn't pursuing the concept. Brentwood never heard from
them again-- Telmet found funding elsewhere and stole the name.
I never pursued it because I believe if one wants to be in the casino
business (a form of low level drug addiction involving monetary masturbation
triggered release of endogenus brain chemicals), ethics and truth in
advertising require large neon signs and mini-skirted keno girls--
both in short supply on Wall Street.
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 87: Daniel del Solar (dsolar) Sat, Feb 10, '90 (19:18) 3 lines
Which speech texts should the baudcast news carry? How about the
Congressional RECORD's "best of floor speeches and data insertions...
" And maybe NIGHTLINE's and all of the TV news shows transcrips.
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 88: Blair Newman (metaview) Sat, Feb 10, '90 (19:49) 5 lines
For starters, I'd suggest stuff we can get free for a trial period, in ascii
by telecomm, that's of interest to the initial rather technoid audience.
Usenet news alone would more than fill the 4 hour/night capacity, so
maybe voting on what's bcast on the bbs?
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 89: Daniel del Solar (dsolar) Sat, Feb 10, '90 (20:25) 2 lines
Draft list over breaking bread and drink, next week?
After Wednesday eve, breakfast at Herbs Fine Foods at 8 am
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 90: Blair Newman (metaview) Sat, Feb 10, '90 (20:53) 6 lines
Personally, I'd prefer this project be launched as a grass roots hacker
effort at the opposite price/performance extreme from Prodigy-- minimizing
the amount we have to raise/spend to get it on the air for the first 30
days could be an interesting political statement. Could somebody volunteer
to set up an email list to synch a meeting? The usual old cast of characters:
crunch, lee, rab, glenn, mgraham, fen, etc.
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 91: Blair Newman (metaview) Sat, Feb 10, '90 (22:04) 9 lines
Lest anyone confuse me with somebody who knows what he's taking about
re Wall St, let me hasten to add that Investment Banking was one of the
two courses I "low passed" at Harvard Business $chool, probably for
undisguised disgust. The other was "Self Assessment and Career Development,"
which I obviously still haven't figured out.
But I aced several times more than I "looped," while managing to run up
a bill on their DEC-10 more than 2 orders of magnitude above the prior
student record -- a safe and sane place to churn and burn.
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 95: Daniel del Solar (dsolar) Sun, Feb 11, '90 (12:58) 6 lines
The Baudcstng Tee shirt, KALW, design? Mandala, recently
released, on the back due to simple synchronicity, or other
good reasons. The back, or is it the front, of the Baudcasting
flyer -print run 10 or 20K, ads in the local hacker mags papers,
and bbs's...who's to do that all? The budget I think should be
for around 20K to accomplish all theprinting andposting.
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
# 96: Blair Newman (metaview) Sun, Feb 11, '90 (18:23) 108 lines
The following is a first cut discussion draft of a mission statement.
If enough other people are interested to make the project appear viable,
I'll volunteer 100 pro bono hours to it over the coming 6 to 8 weeks,
including looking for someone to actually run it. Otherwise, it'll
return to the back brain incubator labeled still half baked...
Baudcasting
Baudcasting is a term coined to describe the concept, first
proposed by Jim Warren in the late 1970's, of using standard
radio stations to transmit a "news/talk" format via the same
"modem tones" computers use to communicate over telephone lines,
rather than by voice. The speed of such a station's transmission,
the "Baud rate" in computer terminology, could range from 1,200
to 9,600 words per minute (1200 to 9600 Baud), compared to the
normal speaking speed of about 150 words per minute. Thus a
Baudcasting station could transmit approximately 1.7 to 41.4
million words per day, depending on technical factors such as Baud
rate, text compression, error correction, etc. -- up to 192 times more
information than a normal talk radio station.
The receiver used in conjunction with Baudcast stations would
monitor the transmission 24 hours per day and, by using
"information filtering" software, store the news/talk items of
interest to its owner. The receiver's owner could then, at his or
her convenience, read the resulting "personalized electronic
newspaper" either on a personal computer display screen, or on
paper from the PC's printer.
A variation of the Baudcast receiver, designed for times when one
can listen but not read (e.g., while driving), would use "voice
synthesis" technology to speak the news/talk items, and perhaps
could mimic the listener's favorite news announcer. Either type
of Baudcasting receiver would be retail priced from under $100,
assuming use of current technology and mass production scale
economies.
The Baudcasting concept has a number of possible public interest
benefits. For example, its combination of very low cost per word
transmission capacity and filtering software could provide
Baudcast consumers with a kind of "information overload safety
net," assuring they do not miss any developments of potential
interest due to the increasing media "noise level."
Another potential public benefit of Baudcasting involves the
second half of the "news/talk" format, and is related to a
technology called "computer conferencing." Computer conferencing
systems contain a variety of ongoing "discussions" being
conducted in text rather than voice. A typical participant will
link his or her PC to the conferencing system once a day via a
normal telephone line, read the additions to the discussions of
interest since last checking in, add their comments if desired,
and then repeat the process the next day.
Development of computer conferencing was initially funded by the
federal government in the 1960's, to facilitate improved
communications (and thus increased productivity) among research
scientists, via a Department of Defense system called Arpanet.
The resulting benefits have triggered creation of other computer
networks (e.g., Internet, Usenet, etc.) which are now rapidly
linking academic institutions and high technology organizations
worldwide.
This technology's potential benefits to the general public is
part of the justification for massive investments in consumer
oriented computer networks, such as France's Minitel and the
IBM/Sears joint venture called Prodigy. Baudcasting could provide
exactly the same benefits as these earlier telephone line linked
consumer computer networks, but at more than an order of
magnitude lower cost to the consumer, because of the typical
user's ratio of reading to writing -- which is roughly comparable
to one's percentage of the "air time" in a cocktail party
discussion.
The software in a Baudcast consumer's PC would automatically
establish a telephone line connection to the system's "head end"
computer only when needed, for example when adding comments to a
discussion or sending electronic mail to another user. While the
appearance to the user could be identical to current telephone
line based networks, virtually all of the text being read will
have been received via Baudcasting, vastly reducing the
consumers' computer connect time related expenses-- and bringing
the per hour reading cost down to a level comparable to
newspapers and magazines.
A grass roots community group, tentatively called "Radio Free
Hackers," is being formed to conduct a several month trial of the
Baudcasting concept. It proposes to use the currently off the
air hours (12:30 to 5:00 AM) of KALW, a non-commercial public FM
radio station owned by the city of San Francisco, to transmit
1200 Baud text under an FCC experimental authorization.
Anyone in the San Francisco bay area with a PC and a normal modem
will be able to receive the experimental Baudcasts by buying a
adapter cable (estimated price under $20), which connects the
modem to the earphone jack of any FM radio. When the daily
transmission ends at 5:00 AM, the PC can automatically print
out the material matching the consumer's "interest profile."
PC's in offices will be able to print out multiple different
copies, each tailored to the interest profile of the individual
recipient.
The proposed service will be free, except for the adapter cable,
which will be priced at cost.
END
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
#102: Blair Newman (metaview) Tue, Feb 13, '90 (13:24) 7 lines
Thanks for the backgrounder, Mr. Fair. Please note that Baudcasting's
a far less ambitious project than a national sat feed, with far, far lower
user entry cost (how much did a VIB decoder cost? Several hundred dollars?),
aimed at a less technoid but broader audience than Usenet. As a wild guess,
I'd predict that maybe 20% or so of the KALW experimental transmissions
will be from Usenet, but that free sample exposure will cause some people
to make the effort to get access to the full Usenet feed.
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
#119: Blair Newman (metaview) Wed, Feb 14, '90 (19:51) 4 lines
Which raises the interesting question of "pledge breaks" on an NPR Baudcaster
like KALW. BTW, the mission statement above should have said "owned by the
SF School District" instead of by the city-- apparently there's some
difference.
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
#122: Blair Newman (metaview) Thu, Feb 15, '90 (11:57) 24 lines
The initial meeting of the core group this morning detected no show stoppers,
and agreed that seed stage corporate underwriting (mid 4 digits) for
preparing a formal proposal with budgets, etc., looks "slam dunk,"
so the Baudcasting project is proceeding.
Some of the participants are volunteering expensively acquired extensive
research in consumer electronic text services (aka "Videotex"), on the
condition such material not be made public, so the project's development
will be via email lists and a private conf on another system being
contributed without charge.
Suggestions, naturally, are still actively solicited. A immediate requirement
is finding a name-- Radio Free Hackers is out, due to public negative
association with the term Hacker. The selected name will be one that's
not specific to the SF Bay Area, or any other region.
Also most welcome are suggestions concerning the Baudcasts' contents, to
maximize audience in both homes and -- as importantly -- in offices (where
more modem equipped PC's are located).
Finally, should the Baucasting trial under an FCC experimental authorization
suceed, it would subsequently be established in multiple cities. Thus the
initial experiment should perhaps involve linked systems in 2 or more cities,
so suggestions of candidate radio stations in other areas are also solicited.
Topic 125: Radio Bypass to the Well
#123: Blair Newman (metaview) Thu, Feb 15, '90 (13:59) 4 lines
M.I.T. Professor David Gifford's secty just informed me that a paper
describing his experiments along these lines on a Boston FM SCA ("Community
Data Network") is in the brand new issue of CommACM. Mucho thanks if anyone
bumps into it and can fax a copy to 415-552-5218.
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