this is an area that i am quite interested in, but from a hands-on do it yourself perspective. i'd like to offer/build/support/maintain community based technology demonstraton/"training" learning resource centers that allow for community members (the African Family Community, in whichever "hood" it is in!) to gain enough understanding and familiarity that they can put together the stuff that they need to do what they need to do, not what the $upremelunatic $y$tem limit$ them to.
if you would, oldsoul, you "heard" what i was offering in chat. (shoot, didn't have to be in chat to hear what was i saying since i have been saying the same thing ever since i got here.) as a "community" project, i'd love to build, manage and maintain the infrastructure to support the communication needs ... ... (if i said "systems administrator", "systems integrator", "systems designer" would that make more sense?) i'm a hardware guy; i'll keep the hardware running so everybody can do the consultancy/cad/whatever stuff. i ain't looking for the "chee$e", i'm looking for Progress for My Global African Family Community: ain't nobody gotta pay me to do that!
"where there is a will there is a way":
for educational/familiarization purposes there is a planet full of "dumpster/legacy technology" that is going into landfills. this hardware does work. fortunately, it won't do the "late$t and greate$t", so won't be as subjected to the "malware war", but can still be configured to do the basics of all the stuff. for basic learning, all the gimmick$ just get in the way, and is quite too much stuff to try to grasp all at once. once the basics are fully understood, folks can take that knowledge and teach themselves all of that other stuff ... if they think they want/need it. but at least they'll be ABLE and WILLING to THINK the thing through FOR THEMSELVES.
good luck, y'all, i hope your effort$ get $omeplace. sadly, when you get there, you'll have a $tructure that perpetuate$ all the crap that you are $creaming to get out from under! ain't no way to get out from under that crap$tructure a$ long a$ you are u$ing that crap$structure to get $omeplace that the crap$tructure you are implementing is expre$$ly de$igned to keep you from getting to!!
ah well. $ince i have long refu$ed to get jacked by working the $y$tem cha$ing that delu$ional dream, I can't $peak the language$ that are all that you can hear,
well, i've gotta go try to figure out how to save some of my lab: i have to move by the 15th and am still no closer to the pulmonary/physical therapy that would help me to do the work than i was when this mess jumped off in october. and, of cour$e, i don't have the dollar$ to do it. ah well; i guess if i my heart/lungs quit on me while trying to do this, i will have died trying! YES IT IS THAT BAD, but i don't have any choice. ("help"? "family"? "friends?" <sigh> well i guess that stuff works in theory, but it hasn't really worked for me when i need it.) the only "coin" that i can offer for "hands on, get this done NOW" quality "help/support" is my lab, my tech skills, my hardware/electronics knowledge and my "Unconditional Love" driven desire to build a telecommunications infrastructure in support of my African Family Community.
