Congressman Gerry Connolley, left, and JIm Southworth WASHINGTON DC
Access America.
Does anyone remember that brand from the summer of 1994? It was the hallmark signature of Leo Torrezao when he chaired the Fairffax Cable Access Corp. (FCAC) board almost 14 years ago. Many of their own members did not believe that a public access television station could achieve national prominence, even with the help of some new thing called the internet or “America on Line”. In fact, at the launching of Access America at a public meeting one FCAC member responded, “Now let me tell you why it will never work”.
Fast forward to 2008.
We’re at the Alliance for Community Media conference being held at the Shoreham Hotel in Washington DC. Hundreds of attendees from the nation’s public access stations are in town to see the latest in technology and share happenings in the world of the first amendment. Together with FCAC resident bleeding edge technology expert Jim Southworth, Torrezao is hawing FCAC’s ability to produce productions remotely world wide. At first the conference attendees were skeptical. The level of sophistication and expense of the equipment needed were surely beyond the budget of any Public Access TV station. “Let me tell you why it will never work”. Some things have not changed.
Southworth spoke at every technical ACM session. HAVA Box, WiFi, WiMAX streaming standards and more concepts that made the eyes of some glaze over and the ears of non-geeks bleed.
By the convention’s close Southworth had been invited to do training and presentations to many of the larger access stations and participate in the ACM Server Standards working group. New Jersey’s Access coalition asked to send their technician to Virginia to better understand the implementation of a Newtek Tricaster virtualstudio.
With carriage by Verizon FiOS and our traditional partners FCAC now is available in Arlington, Falls Church, Loudon, Leesburg, Prince William, Stafford and Fredericksburg as well as our home in Fairfax County where we are carried on the Cox system – that’s well over one million subscribers.
Meanwhile at the other end of the hall Torrezao was getting advice from former FCC Commissioner Gloria Tristani. The gist of her advice? Lobby the commissioners directly. Go see them. Tell them about the community you serve. Even if you think you have a political team in place that will be friendly to your cause – don’t let up. The opposition never does.
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