Sunday, August 28, 2005
Public Statement of Sean McLaughlin
Public Statement of Sean McLaughlin
Akaku: Maui Community TV
Board
of Directors Meeting
Akaku studio, 333 Dairy Road, Kahului, Hawaii,
4:00pm, August 26, 2005
To: Akaku's Board of Directors and your appointing authorities
Re: Agenda item - Public Input
Thanks for the opportunity to testify at this open public meeting. Truly, openness and transparency are essential for Akaku to honestly govern local media resources that this organization is charged to manage in the public interest.
It's a particular privilege to offer public testimony here in this building that Akaku acquired to support the mission: "empowering our community's voice through access to media."
Maui Nui is well served by the accomplishments of Akaku over the past decade. Akaku has become known around the world as an ethical, competent and visionary organization - always true to the mission and fully accountable to the people you empower. Congratulations to the amazing staff and the dedicated volunteers who make the vision real and give all of our communities a voice.
Akaku provides five local cable TV channels (Calabash, Visions, Experimental, MCC and DOE), a radio station (KAKU 88.5FM) and online media outlets (akaku.org, etc.) along with digital media production and post-production facilities and training - available and accessible to everyone without discrimination.
But clearly Akaku is greater than the sum of its parts. By empowering the community's voice, Akaku engages people and builds community involvement - with free speech and expression, lifelong teaching and learning, and direct citizen participation in local self-governance.
Akaku provides a civic network connecting neighbors with neighbors, effectively building diverse communities of common and uncommon interests.
If Akaku is allowed to be run in a closed, private and exclusive manner - like the chamber of commerce or a country club - then the potential for favoritism and corruption will be unchecked. The powerful temptation to use the community's media to support special friends, to benefit political supporters, and to trade favors for personal gain is just too great.
From personal experience I know that Akaku is often asked to do special favors for powerful people, including covering a friend's retirement, commercial business activity, family event or other occasion. While it's hard to say "no" and some individuals may remain bitter that their requests are denied, it is essential that no favoritism is granted for Akaku Board members, staff, donors, or other private and political interests.
The allocation of community media resources by Akaku must be made in the light of day for all the community to see - thus ensuring honesty, diversity and non-discrimination. Remember, Akaku is managing public money and priceless assets that rightfully belong to the entire community.
Of even greater concern - and this is the root of the present crisis here - Akaku is often called upon to silence voices that challenge or disagree with special interests. Like many community media operations around the country, Akaku has been repeatedly threatened with unethical legal attacks. And this year Akaku was assaulted with stealth legislative maneuvers at least in part because the organization refuses to censor community voices, holding true to the free speech mission of empowering our community's voice without discrimination.
You all must remember that it is not your place as the governing Board of Akaku to curry favor or personal benefits by offering privilege to special interests - least of all when you are asked to censor or silence the voices of our community.
Do not be afraid of free speech and do not be intimidated by powerful interests that seek to control and direct our community's voice.
Please be ever vigilant and always remain aware that there are special private interests who profit from controlling media and building imbalance. Building im-balance in darkness and out of public view these interests can fatally corrupt the oversight of this organization, divert community resources to State control, undermine your guiding principles, and taint the basic open access operations of Akaku.
You must increase the public accountability of Akaku. You have a fiduciary responsibility to provide fully transparent accounting for all the channels, facilities, network connections, operating policies and funding derived from State cable operator franchises and related activities, directly to the people of Maui Nui.
Although it may not be sufficient to ensure balance and ethics, operating in the Sunshine with open meetings and records is clearly necessary to ensure that Akaku serves the highest vision for Maui Nui, with non-discriminatory open access to local media for all the people.
Just as I accepted, personally, when I served as chief executive officer here, you all have a solemn duty to uphold the basic American principles of liberty and justice for all. This is true not only when your personal interests are served, but even more so when you are called upon to sacrifice your personal interests for the founding principles of a free society and the greater good of Maui Nui.
That kind of selfless sacrifice is the real privilege that has been granted to you.
Thank you for accepting responsibility and for being here in the sunshine to consider these thoughts.
Peace,
Sean McLaughlin
e: sean808@earthlink.net
tel: (808) 283-3174
P.O. Box 1146
Puunene, HI 96784
Akaku Board Chairman ousted - Executive Director reinstated
"You all must remember that it is not your place as the governing Board of Akaku to curry favor or personal benefits by offering privilege to special interests - least of all when you are asked to censor or silence the voices of our community." -- Akaku CEO Sean McLaughlin
Read more at ilind.net
Edited on: Sunday, August 28, 2005 6:11 PM
Categories: Akaku, Assorted Shenanigans, History, News, Offsite Links
Tuesday, August 16, 2005
PEG annual reports gather dust on shelf
Aloha Glen,
I can only assume that the reason for the less than timely post of these now 5 1/2 month old documents is because you care less about PEG issues, and even less of those interested in them. Waiting for Akaku's report, which is for a different fiscal year than the other PEGs, is not a valid excuse to outdate timely documents by 6 months! Post them when you get them! Why the intentional delay of the majority of reports that affect the majority of the states population? We both know that money can't be an excuse as CATV has been over collecting fees (far more than even Time Warner) for at least the last 15 years which is documented. It would also appear these funds have been laundered into taxes, which I feel is illegal, and if not, should be!
I see it takes only a matter of weeks to post your bogus, manipulated reviews and D&O "motions" facade, both of which I predict will become, ( as Director Recktenwald put it at the June 9, 2005 Hilo CAC meeting) , "just another study collecting dust on a shelf." PEG Annual Activity Reports and other PEG related documentation has proven to consistently take far longer to post, and are also consistently posted incorrectly at first, so efforts must be duplicated (waste of Public funds) . I sincerely hope " The new process that is used to post these reports [that] will ensure these documents are ADA compliant " is designed to do it right the first time, or at least you will do a more thorough inspection of all future documents to make certain that they are corrected before posting online, not after. Please be more considerate of wasting; your time, public funds, the public's time having to download twice, and bandwidth.
FYI Annual Activity Reports are the tool for DCCA and cable subscribers to determine if funds they are mandated to pay (rather than the cable company, per DCCA's order) are being spent wisely and/or in the public's best interests. Posting these documents so late in the year only serves Cable Television Division & PEG entity interests by delaying any meaningful public opinion until yet another year passes, so opinions are moot.
I look forward to the day when the Cable Television division puts as much effort into protecting subscribers and the general public as it spends on facilitating corporations like Time Warner, PEGs, Maui Developers, and Government institutions. After all, subscribers and the general public constitute a majority. Turn CATV's focus from special interests to more of the Public's best interests. We cable consumers are denied the assistance of Consumer Protection, so CATV is our only protection, and your rules do not fully protect individuals under state law.
It is your division that makes the public pay the rent for the use of their public property that Oceanic Time Warner uses to make money off of. You could assess the fee to Time Warner rather than allowing Time Warner to extract it from the property owners. If it were Time Warner who had to pay the fee, I'm sure you would be more considerate of waste as I'm sure you have a lot of respect for Oceanic Time Warner's well compensated attorneys. I wonder if CATV had made Oceanic pay the fees rather than allowing them to pass it on to the public, if Oceanic would have sued DCCA a long time ago for over collection, thus potentially saving subscribers millions of dollars?
I look forward to the successful post of Hawai'i PEG access corporations 2004 Annual Activity Reports and associated documents within the next two weeks.
Sincerely,
Jeff Garland
Proper PEG Channel Promotion or a political nonprofit money laundry? What's your preferrence?
Aloha Governor Lingle,
I just got off the phone with our Hawaii monopoly cable company. For the $240,000 (or more) Olelo spent on promotions in 2004, Oceanic would have provided 12,000 (that's right 12 thousand), 30-second Public Service Announcement spots.
The deal is for nonprofit corporations who pay for a package. However many times that package pays for a PSA to air, Oceanic matches each air time with an equivalent airing for free (2 for 1).
The company also provides totally free airing of nonprofit PSAs, which would secure approximately 25 airings a week, in mostly least favored time slots.
If Olelo administrators can't create the PSAs for free with their three staff use only Avid Systems and their full-time paid staff program producers, perhaps they could have their newly trained clients do them for their required class projects for certification? Why do you suppose not one PSA has ever been created or provided to Oceanic for even a one-day trial run ($80) after 15 years?
I'm sure Oceanic's three appointed Olelo board directors of nine couldn't make such a suggestion or vote on this use of the promotion budget as they fear it could be perceived as a conflict of interest, or self dealing transaction. Must be why no Oceanic appointees ever thought of it in the 15 years their three directors have been on Olelo's board, especially Oceanic Vice President Marilyn Yoza.
That of course means that only your DCCA director's majority appointed directors can or could have proposed it. Of course we already know that those directors prefer laundering funds to be used for tax purposes and promoting programs created for their favored nonprofit corporations and politicians over promoting Olelo services that should be provided on a "first-come, nondiscriminatory basis" to facilitate countervailing voices. I'm sure they feel the funds are better spent with Olomana Marketing, who can then share Olelo's no-bid generosity with its clients.
See http://olomanamarketing.com/clients.php
If Olelo does a poor job at its true mission, Oceanic doesn't have to provide it with additional channels, which Oceanic is currently fighting DCCA to not have to do.
See Oceanic's "Motions for Reconsideration" on DCCA Cable Television Division's Decisions and orders at http://www.hawaii.gov/dcca/areas/catv/decisions_orders/reconsideration/ and http://www.hawaii.gov/dcca/areas/catv/decisions_orders/
A poor job also helps protect government officials from criticism.
With Olelo's quarter-million-dollar lawsuit to avoid giving out voter lists to clients for campaigns of their choice for their single elected director, the public will continue to be stymied on all attempts to make the slightest of difference in the board's makeup, therefor direction, for at least another 5 years the courts will stall the appeal.
This and the state's stealth ability to fire PEG administrators guarantees Hawaii's status quo fractured soapbox is here to stay, as is, until the franchise fees dry up. This will likely happen before the appeal is finished.
Fret not, I still believe that this can all change in a heartbeat, so I will still not give up. Sorry to those who hope I'd finally see the light and quit.
As I see it, and Robert McChesney on PBS's now, if the government likes what the media is doing, the media isn't doing its job. It is evident that you, Gov. Lingle, and the other elected and appointed officials on Oahu love what Olelo is doing. Need I say more?
Please stop these funds, earmarked for the empowerment of all the people, from continuing to be used to the favor of those already in power. Educating individuals to share truth versus more propaganda is not a difficult choice for any level playing field and "sunshine" respecting person to make.
Jeff Garland is the vice president of Community Television Producers Association of Hawaii and Owner of Hawaii Public Access Media. He can be reached via email at mailto:digitaleye@hi.net
Monday, August 15, 2005
ALLEGED HOSTILE TAKEOVER OF AKAKU
Aloha Folks - Notable new site developed by independent producers and media activists for Maui County, State of Hawai'i -
Citizens to Save Akaku http://www.saveakaku.org
Edited on: Monday, August 15, 2005 8:55 PM
Categories: Assorted Shenanigans, Correspondence, History, News, Offsite Links
The Wiki that ate Public Access
"I was going to call it Quickweb,” Cunningham explained in an interview "and then I remembered these buses I took during a trip to Hawaii and I thought that's cooler!"
Read Wikimania. For $200,000 a year (which is a $100,000 less than Ho`ike's annual budget), one paid programmer, and hundreds of thousands of volunteers, wikifolks have provided and spun off a worldwide democratic knowledge base (based on inclusion) which puts to shame the weak PEG effort. Seems accepting "any" money that comes with "strings" assures corruption, discrimination, lack of participation, total collapse and utter failure. Public Access television's failure is drawn stark when contrasted with the success of the wiki movement.
- The Public Access television's mission is to provide first come, non-discriminatory access to encourage a diversity of ideas upon which a viable democracy depends.
- The non-profit Wikimedia Foundation's stated goals are to promote the creation of free educational content – and to make it available to the public free of charge.
- Public Access is funded with state mandated cable subscriber money.
- Wikimedia is totally funded with user voluntary contributions.
- New public access television users have declined dramatically H`oike for instance has had no new users according to the 2003-2004 required annual report to the Department of Commerce and Consumer affairs (DCCA).
- Wikimedia is "Created at virtually no cost by citizen-volunteers working collectively and using a wiki, which enables anyone to write and edit on a web page.
- According to a Time Warner motion for reconsideration of the DCCA Decision and Order No. 320 to give `Olelo a sixth channel date June 8, 2005, Time Warner noted that the five channels operated by `Olelo had "slightly over one half of one percent (.57 percent) of the total viewing hours. `Olelo is the richest public access entity in the US with around a five million dollar per year budget from state mandated cable subscriber monies.
- The wikipedia.org site has experienced explosive growth in the past two years and now ranks among the top fifty most visited websites in the world.
Finally notice Ward Cummingham predicts wikis and blogs will merge. I will go him one better and predict they already have. Well, I guess that's not a prediction, but a fact. The following technologies are coalescing into a single desktop interface;
- Wiki
- Blogs
- Bittorrent
- RSS
- Instant Messaging
- Podcasting
These technologies allow anyone of modest means to avoid the unpleasent gatekeepers down at the local public access station and distribute multimedia worldwide 24/7/365.
The chatter from th public access "industry insiders" at the recent annual ACM conference indicated they have a simpleminded after-the-fact awareness of this worldwide tidal wave about to break on their heads. Instead of blaming their mission failure on their noninclusive gate keeping behavior, and blame the medium of television and wonder "how they can we fit i" to the new media. But the success of wiki and other communication technologies is free, collaborative and under user control. There is really no place for those who would be gatekeepers filtering and controlling user content through the arbitrary applications of operating procedures to deny users first come, non-discriminatory access. The media was not the problem. The sticky strings of government and special interests monies corrupted public access in it's infancy. It never recovered Now, typical of the survival behavior of entrenched bureaucracies they are concerned with "industry survival" (i.e. keeping their jobs). "They left early, haven't arrived, and don't know they aren't going to." - Quote from the introduction of the film Seven Beauties by Lina Wertmuller.
Read "wikimania" at URL: http://www.roryoconnor.org/blog/
Sunday, August 07, 2005
CTPA Complaint about Ho`ike's violation bylaws and DCCA requirement
Director Recktenwald,
It has come to the attention of CTPA that Ho`ike - Kaua`i Community Television, Inc. has held an election for a board member in violation of Ho`ike bylaws and a DCCA requirement as articulated by you in a July 13, 2004 letter to J Robertson, Ho`ike Managing Director. That letter stated "The PEGs shall be required to amend their bylaws and to complete their election process prior to September 30, 2004." Ho`ike did not amend their bylaws before September 30, 2004 as required by DCCA yet Ho`ike proceeded with the election in violation of their current bylaws
CTPA has already filed numerous complaints with DCCA regarding the many violations of fair and standard election practices incorporated into both Ho'ike's and Olelo's election processes. Your responses and insistence on correcting these practices have fallen well short of rigorous
What action, if any, will DCCA take regarding Ho`ike's failure to adhere to this DCCA requirement and Ho`ike's proceeding with an election in violation of its bylaws? We are hopeful that DCCA's action will consist of more than a nunc pro tunc excuse that places the stamp of legitimacy in this flawed election process
Edward Coll - CTPA