Questions and Answers
Q: What exactly is the proposal for? Can I see the proposal?
A: A draft executive summary of our proposal is posted here: Comments and feedback are welcome.
A brief overview of all proposals submitted has been posted at broadbandUSA.
Q: What exactly will the $40,000 cover?
A: The budget is flexible, but must represent a very high-impact investment for increasing your center's capacity to get new communities using the internet, including but not limited to (listed in priority):
-Hardware, internet connectivity, or consulting support to establish a local Drupal website with the Open Media Project tool-set
-Website development, implementation of, and training for the Open Media Project tools
-Development and exchange of media content promoting broadband adoption in underserved communities
Other needs will be assessed on a case-by-case basis, and we expect the cost per station to vary.
Q: What is the match for? Do we have to PAY for this grant?
A: All stimulus grants requrie matching funds. Participants are NOT required to pay Open Media Foundation for any services received, but are required to share at least 25% of the cost incurred for their organization (The NTIA suggests at least 30%). Even if the NTIA did not require the match, our experience in the Beta-Test Phase taught us that the success of the project in each facility was most strongly correlated to the participant's willingness to invest in the process with both cash and in-kind support.
Q: When it says "in urban areas with less than 40% broadband adoption" does this mean a sector of the city that has less than 40% adoption?
A:The NTIA has not clearly addressed this question, but it is our perspective that if an applicant commits to focusing on a specific sector of their community that has demonstrably low broadband adoption, and ensures that the majority or entirety of the funds will be leveraged only for serving that community, this should suffice.
Q: How are we to measure or prove broadband adoption numbers?
A: The NTIA realizes that these numbers are difficult to come by, and the best we can do is show that we've given a best effort to get this info.
The best guidance we've received on this complex issue comes from Sascha Meinrath and the New America Foundation, who suggests that we demonstrate that you've requested numbers from broadband providers, and state or city officials for any ISP data or report findings, whether or not such requests are answered.
We acknowledge that bad data will be problematic and that its better to acquire some limited, but accurate representative data rather than generate or repeat unreliable data. So, where data simply doesn't exist, its best to commit to performing statistical sampling/canvassing in the area and extrapolating to represent the larger targeted population.
Q: If we are already an Open Media Project partner, would we qualify for this funding opportunity?
A: The appeal of our proposal is our promise to take Public Access TV stations who are still clinging entirely to the Cable TV system, and who have not yet fully embraced the internet as an avenue for serving their community. Public Access stations often represent significant untapped capacity to serve their community with internet and computer education and resources. The prospect of transforming a Public Access TV station into a more integrated community technology center is far simpler and more sustainable than proposing the development of entirely new community centers.
With a budget of $50,000 per station, we are anticipating at least 50% of that budget being devoted towards building a fully-functional website for each participant, including development services, hardware, and potentially, a new level of internet service in their facility. For those organizations, it will be easy to convey the significant, transformational impact of the investment, taking pre-existing organizations already serving communities on the other side of the digital divide, and helping them expand into integrated community media/technology centers, using the internet to truly serve their communities for the first time.
The Open Media Project partners, funded by the initial Knight Foundation grant, generally already serve their communities with online content and in other ways we're promising through this program. Current Open Media Project partners will have to convey to us (so we can convince the NTIA) that this investment represents the same level of transformational impact on their community.