El projecte guifi·net celebra el seu 15è aniversari

On the 27th, 28th, and 29th of September, the celebration and annual meeting of the guifinet SAX took place

The guifi·net project celebrated its 15th project anniversary between Vic and Gurb last weekend with a series of open events for all audiences.

The events started on Friday the 27th in the morning with a round table at the Gurb City Council under the name 'Opportunities and initiatives to bring Internet throughout the territory' where the following participants were present: Carles Salvadó, head of Telecommunications Services of the Generalitat; Carme Freixa, member of the Association of Micropueblos; Arnau Basco, mayor of Orís; Francesc Canalias, director of the SIGMA Consortium - Consortium of the environment and public health of Garrotxa; Ramon Roca, president of the guifi·net Foundation.

The table addressed current issues related to telecommunications such as the current state of deployment of the Generalitat's Open Network, the needs of villages with less than 500 inhabitants in terms of fiber optic, the evolution and growth of the guifi·net network of commons, the deployment of the commons network promoted by the Orís City Council or the XAFOGAR project - Fiber Optic Network of Garrotxa promoted by the Garrotza County Council and the SIGMA Consortium. The final debate of the round table highlighted the need to establish a participation body of civil society (companies and territory) and administrative cooperation at all levels with the aim of creating a working group that promotes coordinated deployments and addresses all the needs of the territory.

Photo: Round table on Friday at the Gurb City Council Culture Hall. Odoo text and image block

Photo: Òscar Alavedra and Efren Carles presenting the monitoring tool with RaspberryPI.

The events continued on Saturday morning with the SAX meeting (Health, Love, and Network) in Vespella (Gurb). This is an annual meeting organized for the guifi·net community and this year it was organized by the guifi·net Foundation as it wanted to take advantage of the 15th anniversary celebration. During the morning, there were three talks.

Víctor Oncins and Roger Garcia, members of the association for the Expansion of the Open Network, explained the Internet access and Carrier Services architecture. Subsequently, Òscar Alavedra and Efren Carles, members of the Guifinet Users Association of the Terres de l'Ebre, presented the monitoring tool with RaspberryPI that they have developed from the association itself. And, finally, Joan Francesc Arbona, member of Gotes.org - a cooperative from Mallorca that offers Internet access through the commons network, explained the guifi·net project experience in Mallorca.

After the talks, in Vespella itself, there was a fraternal lunch with almost fifty people, all of them somehow linked to the project.

Photo: Celebration of the 15th anniversary at the Plaça dels Màrtirs in Vic.

Photo: Víctor Oncins and Leandro Navarro during the talks at the Plaça dels Màrtirs in Vic.

On the same Saturday afternoon, the more festive events resumed. At the Plaça dels Màrtirs in Vic, the celebration of the project's 15th anniversary took place. The event consisted of two more generic talks with the aim of reaching a wider audience the work of these 15 years. Víctor Oncins presented the situation of non-commercial operators in guifi·net and Leandro Navarro, a professor at the Polytechnic University of Catalonia, reviewed guifi·net's contribution to research. The event ended with a cocktail party and a musical performance by Edu and Xumari Duo Jazz. The day ended again with a fraternal meal.

The next Sunday morning, in Vespella, the annual guifi·net community meeting SAX2019 was concluded where Miguel Àngel Irigoyen, a project volunteer, presented the processes carried out to bring fiber optic through the commons network to El Valle de Erro (Navarra) as well as the current state of this deployment. Thus, a weekend marked by a review of the trajectory of a project that continues to grow and faces the future with enthusiasm as it must meet the need to bring Internet access through new technologies and a sustainable and local network throughout the territory.

Therefore, it has been 15 years promoting the arrival of Internet access without discrimination to uncovered areas or areas where large companies do not want to reach. 15 years bringing, to homes, buildings, or farms, the alternative solidarity, sustainable, and local through a model of common telecommunications and with the collaboration of different actors. Actors from different areas such as local operators offering services, public administrations, users, volunteers, or user associations. Therefore, from the guifi·net Foundation we want to thank all the people who have participated in some way and still are part of the guifi·net project. These 15 years belong to everyone. We want to have 15 more!

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Guifi·net celebra els seus 15 anys i la trobada anual de guifi

The days 27, 28 and 29 of September between Gurb and Vic different events have been organized