Melbourne
Nick Langmaid

It's a tradition! Every year, the Melbourne region reports a major upgrade to its network infrastructure. And this year is no different!! We doubled our 64kbps ISDN line to 128kbps, installed a separate 64kbps link to bring in our news, and added a thumping great server to handle the load. It's called hock in memory of Warwick Hockley, one of our most committed volunteers, who died last year.

In other news

• APANA in Melbourne has been successful in re-establishing a club atmosphere with significant attendance at monthly meetings, lead by an active and enthusiastic regional committee. Our meetings consist of a regional committee meeting followed by a general meeting which boasts speakers presenting topics of interest, regular giveaways to the members, an overview of the current goings on in the region, general discussions and (quite often) biscuits. The meetings provide a good opportunity to meet people interested in new permanent connections. They also give people a chance to look at the hub site and watch the lights blinking.
• We've maintained the APANA "vision" and coped with the departure of some significant public access sites which have left us to try their hand as commercial ISP's.
• We have our first non-profit organisational members.
• And we have our first international member (in Bangladesh!)
• APANA in Melbourne has taken a firm stance against members breaking the rules and acceptable use policies of the association.
• We have re-established a sound financial position for the region. (Last year, things were looking decidedly shaky.) If you'd like to know more, come to the annual regional meeting in September.
• Ross House - what an asset! We're trying to give something back. Stephen Bruce is helping the other community groups here to find the most effective way to access the Internet.

But all this good news doesn't mean we are without challenges for the next year. In fact, we face some bigger challenges than ever before. We need to

• Develop a balanced, equitable pricing structure for our services, which will cover the increased cost of the upgraded links and server. At the same time, we want to reward public access sites who provide service to APANA members. And settle the related membership policy issues around the use of technologies like SLIRP/TIA.
• Increase publicity, so that we can maintain the growth of our membership. We'll need that to further increase our link bandwidth and establish redundant links to improve reliability.
• Find a natural role for APANA as the Internet becomes a commodity service rather than a specialist interest. Understand how we will compete with things like broadband services from Optus and Telstra. Identify additional services which can be offered by APANA to its members.
• Face up to the challenge of public access sites departing. Identify the role and attractions of public access sites. Stimulate the development of new public access sites.
• Respond to members (especially our large public access sites) who need advanced facilities such as ISDN links to APANA to remain viable.
• Support members outside the immediate Melbourne area interested in establishing new regions. Support the national organisation too.
• Continue to develop the club atmosphere, while firmly enforcing APANA policies, and coping with the pressures of growth. Not to mention bringing new blood into the regional committee, sharing the workload and broadening the volunteer base.

  Anyone feel like taking the challenge? There may be a place on the next regional committee for YOU!