May 18-20, 2007 -- The International Summit for Community Wireless Networks.

This week Community Wireless Networking leaders from around the globe are heading to Columbia, MD (right outside Washington, DC) for the International Summit for Community Wireless Networks. This is the third Summit I've organized and each year it grows. Interestingly enough, the development and implementation centers have shifted over the past half-decade -- I'm looking outside the United States for a lot of the innovation, passion, and excitement. Roughly a hundred different organizations will be present at this year's Summit -- it's by far the most international Summit to date.

So we're heading into the final stretch -- I still have to search out local watering holes for the Friday and Saturday evening socials. The Acorn Active Media Foundation advance team is flying in this afternoon to put the finishing touches on things.

Like previous years, the event is being run as a summit, not a conference -- in other words, sessions are interactive, presenters help set the agenda and guide discussion, but every attendee is expected to actively participate. Each time I host the Summit I'm amazed by the passion and intensity of the event. On the occasion of the third Summit, I plan to give a little retrospective on the numerous policy wins we've had in recent years, the amazing FOSS technologies we've seen developed, and the incredible growth in Community Wireless Network implementations around the world.

Each year, the last day of the Summit focuses on documentation and next-step strategizing -- looking through our documentation from 2004 onward, it's inspiring to see how many of our goals have been achieved. While our work sometimes feels Sisyphusian, a retrospective analysis makes one feel highly efficacious.

Looking forward to the IS4CWN!