For more information contact:
Paul Pease, (650) 322-2072; email paulpease@cheerful.com
Palo Alto, September 3, 1997: Steve Cisler of Apple Computer and Harry Saal of Smart Valley, Inc., two nationally known experts on how electronic communications technology can best serve people and communities, will speak Thursday, Sept. 25, in Palo Alto on "Electronic City Streets/Electronic Driveways: Building Community via the Internet."
The special program will be part of a Palo Alto City Council "candidates' virtual vision night" sponsored by Palo Alto Community Network (PA-ComNet) and co-sponsored by 15 community organizations. It will be held from 7:30 to 9:30 p.m. in the City Council chambers, 250 Hamilton Ave.
Cisler, an Apple Technology Fellow, senior scientist and Librarian, will share his personal experiences while working with communities on the Internet and will discuss opportunities for local uses of the Internet and for improving the ways people interact with local, regional and national governments.
Saal, founding CEO of Smart Valley, Inc., a resident of Palo Alto and charter member of PA-ComNet, will discuss his experiences with Smart Valley and projects aimed at increasing public access to the Internet. After the two opening talks, Council candidates will be asked to make short statements about their views of the prospects of online communications improving city services and fostering community involvement.
In the second half of the evening, candidates for City Council and members of the community will be invited to share their ideas, vision and possible concerns about the use of electronic communications in neighborhood and civic affairs. A question-and-answer period will conclude the evening, and written questions will be accepted for later posting with answers on the PA-ComNet website. Jay Thorwaldson, a former journalist, Director of Public Affairs at the Palo Alto Medical Foundation and a PA-ComNet member, will moderate the evening.
PA-ComNet is a community group dedicated to improving community civic participation through universal, affordable access to the Internet. While exploring how best to assure optimal access to high-speed electronic communications for residents and businesses, PA- ComNet played an important role in the city's decision last year to build a "fiber ring" to facilitate higher-speed communications within the community. It is presently exploring options for bridging the gap from the fiber ring to homes and businesses the so-called "last mile" connection, although Cisler and others prefer to call it "the first mile."
PA-ComNet holds a monthly meeting with guest experts and conducts a con-tinuing on- line dialogue via a "listserve" (email-based discussion/information group). Its website is http://www.pa-comnet.org. "This is a rare opportunity to be able to hear two such distinguished hands-on visionaries discuss a subject that will increasingly affect all of our lives, and in the very near future", PA-ComNet Chairman Imsong Lee said of Cisler and Saal appearing to-gether.
Thorwaldson added that if people think back to what the Internet was four years ago, then try to imagine what it might become over the next four years (when some of the candidates will still be serving their first terms on the City Council), the urgency of community decisions to be made in the next few months becomes apparent.
Co-sponsors of the September 25th event include:
Steve Cisler has more than 23 years experience working in libraries, with information technology, and in helping build community computer networks. Before his current career he served two years in the Peace Corps in Togo as a teacher of English, and three years in Coast Guard search and rescue operations in the Caribbean.
He has worked in the Apple Research Laboratories since May, 1988, managing a grant program called Apple Library of Tomorrow. He now runs the Network Outreach group, where World Wide Web research and wireless spectrum-allocation work is being carried out.
He has organized two international conferences on community computer networks, in 1994 and 1995, and has supported numerous other such efforts. He is a frequent speaker on Internet issues and has lectured in many states as well as in Thailand, Cuba, Turkey, Canada, Venezuela, Mexico, United Kingdom, and Chile.
He serves on the Advisory Board of the Internet Society and writes for publications such as Online, American Libraries, Library Journal, Whole Earth Review, Big World, and Wired. On The WELL, a computer bulletin-board system (BBS) in California, he runs a conference on information technology issues. In 1993 he received the Library and Information Technology Association/Gaylord Award for achievement in library and information technology. In 1996 he won a Silver Award from the U.S. National Commission on Libraries and Information Science (NCLIS) for sustained contributions to libraries and information services at the national level.
Harry Saal is a magna cum laude graduate of Columbia University, where he received his Ph.D .in High Energy Physics in 1969. He then served as Deputy Director of the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center's Computation Group and later as visiting associate professor of computer science at the State University of New York at Buffalo. From 1973 to 1978, he worked at IBM's Scientific Center in Haifa, Israel, and at the IBM General Products Division in San Jose.
In October, 1978, he founded Nestar Systems, Inc., a pioneer in local area network systems for personal computers. In 1986, Dr. Saal left Nestar to form Network General Corporation. His goal was to make Network General the first company wholly dedicated to the area of network diagnostics.
Dr. Saal was the founding CEO and President of Smart Valley, Inc., a non-profit organization chartered to create a regional electronic community by promoting an advanced information infrastructure and helping assure access to it. Smart Valley's mission is to facilitate the construction of a pervasive, high-speed communications systems and information services that will benefit all sectors of Silicon Valley: education, health care, local government, business and the home. Smart Valley is affiliated with Joint Venture: Silicon Valley Network, a broad-based, grass roots coalition launched in 1992.
Dr. Saal is Chairman of Network General and serves on the boards
of several other high technology firms. Ernst & Young named him
the Bay Area 1990 Software Entrepreneur of the Year, and he received
the John W. Gardner Leadership Award in 1995. He is active in
philanthropy and community affairs. His personal interests include
race car driving, hiking and rock climbing, genealogy and ham radio.