BIO: Campbell Patterson is a partner in @interactive communications. @interactive is helping communities get onto the information highway by assisting them in establishing Community Based Networks (CBNs). @interactive is working with municipal utilities, municipalities, hospitals, school boards, and commercial entities, to aggregate their network connectivity demands in order to leverage greater bargaining power and economies of scale as the basis for the building and operation of sustainable last mile networks.

Mr. Patterson is directly involved in project managing the City of Kingston's fibre optic and wireless network with Utilities Kingston, and assisting in funding applications and strategic planning for HQnet (Hasting-Quinte's CBN), the Niagara Public Service Alliance (NPSA, a Niagara Peninsula CBN) and the FibreWired Network's group of municipal utilities across Ontario. Mr. Patterson participated in the "Barrier and Models" working group of the National Broadband Task Force, which developed the "Community Aggregator Model" described in their report entitled, "The New National Dream: Networking the Nation for Broadband Access."

TALK: His presentation will begin by defining the terminology of broadband community networking and setting the context of the urban and rural dynamic. Next will be an examination of the emerging trends in communications and the implied imperativefor communities to cross the digital divide. Finally, the presentation will examine how community networks can play a pivotal role in bringing the promise of broadband to all Canadians by 2005, enabling all sectors of the community to develop and launch online applications and e-services.

BIO: Allan Anderson is currently Director, Service Delivery for the Ontario Region of Industry Canada. In this position he is responsible for delivery and promotion of the Industry Canada's Connectedness initiatives for the Ontario Region. The Community Access Program and the Broadband for Rural and Northern Development Program are two of the key initiatives of this portfolio.

Mr. Anderson's career within the federal government spans 28 years in various positions in Ottawa, Winnipeg, and Toronto and as a Trade Commissioner in Canada's Consulate General in Minneapolis. Prior to his current position Mr. Anderson was Director of the Canada-Ontario Business Service Centre establishing the centre and directing its operations and growth throughout its first five years. During a year's leave from Industry Canada he opened the Canadian trade office of the Council of Great Lakes Governors, the first joint state trade office of US states.

In addition to these responsibilities, Mr. Anderson is in charge of Industry Canada's GTA region United Way Campaign for 2002.

BIO: Dr. Hassanein is a leading researcher in the School of Computing at Queen's University in the areas of broadband, wireless and optical networks architecture, protocols, control and performance evaluation. Since arriving to Queen's University in July 1999, he has been awarded a number of research grants at both the national and provincial levels, including NSERC, CFI, CITR, OIT and CITO. Dr. Hassanein is the founder and director of the Telecommunication Research (TR) Lab in the School of Computing at Queen's. Dr. Hassanein has more than 100 publications in the areas of computer networks and performance evaluation. He has served on the program committee of a number international conferences and workshops. Dr. Hassanein was the editor of the IEEE 802.6e standard for Slot Reuse in Distributed Queue Dual Bus networks in 1992. He was a voting member of the IEEE 802.6 standardization committee on Metropolitan Area Networks from 1992 to 1995. Dr. Hassanein is the recipient of the 1993 IEE "Hartee Premium" best paper award, for the IEE proceedings on Computers.