By Burt Lum

At a recent seminar I attended, the presenter quipped, "The solution to all this information is more information." We all chuckled at the speaker's admission that the statement sounded a bit absurd. But in reality, that statement has a lot of validity. The key is to be able to find the source of the problem. Whether you are troubleshooting your network connection or trying to understand the global economy, more information can be a good thing.

But the process might be a bit arduous.

It starts unassumingly with a discussion about Internet radio and low-power FM (LPFM). Both technologies offer the ability for information, opinions, ideas, etc., to be communicated through a medium that does not require you to be a big corporation. Both media appeal to the individual and grass-roots organizations. They are democratizing technologies. But both are under siege. I've written previously about the effects of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act and the fee structure it is imposing on Internet radio. For LPFM, it is the National Association of Broadcasters (see www.radio4all.org).

To learn more about low-power FM, go to www.fcc.gov/mb/policy/lpfm/. The concept seems appealing: to enable nonprofit, community-based radio in rural areas. The power output for these stations is limited to 10 or 100 watts, and frequencies are allocated as to not interfere with commercial stations. I found myself immersed in the free-radio movement and the Center for Democratic Communications, www.nlgcdc.org.

I ended up at Microradio.net, listening to some very interesting topics you might not hear on headline news. One audio stream of interest comes from the Seattle Independent Media Center, seattle.indymedia.org. Perspectives on globalization, biotechnology and space missions are covered.

Taken in the context of what is happening to corporations such as Enron, Global Crossing and Worldcom, there is much to be said about community-based businesses that are not exploitative.

Burt Lum is a click away at burt@brouhaha.net.