Kenosha Community Media (KCM) invites you to take part in these upcoming activities:

•  Fridays, April 16 and 23 from 6-8 PM:  Take Your Photography To The Next Level.  Kenosha News photographer Kevin Poirier welcomes you to a two-evening course in the art of photography.   Call (262) 656-8497 to register.  This course is open to photographers of all skill levels.   Fee required.

• Saturdays, April 24, May 1 and May 8 from 8 AM-3 PM.   Video Production Course.   Don't just watch television, create it!   Learn video production as a hobby or for a future career by enrolling in Applied Video Production.   This course takes you through the basics in field production, TV studio production, and editing.  You'll receive hands-on training with equipment provided by Kenosha Community Media.   You'll create videos that you may air on Kenosha TV Channel 14 as well as online.  Call (262) 551-5924 to register.  Course is provided by Kenosha Community Media in association with Carthage's Enrichment and Continuing Education program.   Fee required.  Participants must be age 18 or older.

• Monday, April 26.   Southport Press/Sketchcrawl Kenosha Meetings.  Southport Press, the small press publishing division of KCM will host two meetings at Carolyn's Coffee Connection, 1351 52nd Street.  

From 6:00-6:30 PM, Southport Press will welcome everyone to learn about Sketchcrawl Kenosha.  Sketchcrawl Kenosha is a part of a world-wide network of sketchbook artists who enjoy documenting their community with the use of a pencil or a brush.  

Beginning at 6:30 PM,  Southport Press will host a follow-up meeting to its March gathering, so participants may work toward transforming ideas into projects that build community as they also reflect our area's rich environment in the arts, history, and culture.   Both events are free.  The public is invited.

• Saturday, May 15 at 10 AM.   Sketchcrawl Kenosha begins its Spring Crawl.   Meet at Carolyn's Coffee Connection, 1351 52nd Street, for a jolt of java or taste of tea before heading out with fellow artists to scenic destinations.   Destinations will be announced prior to May 15.   Join the Sketchcrawl Kenosha meeting on April 26 at 6 PM at Carolyn's Coffee Connection for details.  Photographers, writers, and videographers are welcome to accompany Sketchcrawl Kenosha and document the day and the surroundings.

 

Kenosha Community Media celebrates the 24th anniversary of its community service, Kenosha TV, on Thursday, November 12th at the Fireside Restaurant on Kenosha's northside.  This event includes a buffet dinner, dessert, awards ceremony, a video presentation, and a magic show by David Kelly.   Event begins at 7 p.m. with dinner.  Doors open at 6:30 p.m.

Attend for only $12.00 per person.  RSVP by November 6th to KCM staff at (262) 656-8497 or send email to jason@kenoshamedia.org.

Kenosha TV went on the air in October 1985 over Jones Intercable Channel 21.   Kenosha TV moved to Channel 14 on Time Warner Cable in 2000.  Kenosha TV's is your community's voice over cable television.  The public is welcome to share their ideas, interests, points-of-view, as well as information and coverage of local noncommercial events and activities of interest to the public on Kenosha TV 14.   Kenosha TV provides programming and bulletin board information 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Special thanks to Oliver's Bakery for providing a 24th anniversary cake for this event, as well as Copy Cat Music of Racine, WI for supplying a sound system.  Special thanks to David Kelly for his gift and presentation of magic to those who attend on Thursday, November 12th.

Congresswoman Tammy Baldwin (D-WI) is working to ensure the local voices are not silenced as the video programming landscape changes.  She has recently introduced the Community Access Preservation (CAP) Act of 2009 (H.R. 3745).     CAP asks that the following items be addressed for public, educational, and government (PEG) access channels:

• Allow PEG fees to be used for any PEG-related purposes.   Currently, community media organizations, such as KCM, may only use PEG fees for capital improvement expenses and not for operating expenses, such as staff salaries, repair and maintenance of equipment, insurance, and more.
• Require PEG channels to be carried in the same manner as local broadcast channels.   AT&T U-Verse places PEG access programming in a menu-format on its Channel 99. 
• Require the FCC to study the effect that state video franchise laws have had on PEG channels, and require operators to provide the greater of the support required under state laws, or the support historically provided for PEG access.   Currently, KCM receives $0.20 per directly billed subscriber, per month for its capital improvement expenses.   Wisconsin 2007 Act 42, signed into law by Governor Doyle in December 2007, places a sunset clause on these funds.  After December 31, 2010, video service providers, Time Warner Cable and AT&T, may cease providing these funds for KCM.   Other Wisconsin community media organizations are also affected by this State law.   Unless these organizations are able to successfully raise a sufficient amount funds through other means, the Kenosha Media Center and many other media centers in Wisconsin will close for lack of funds.
• Make cable television-related laws and regulations applicable to all landline video providers.

Congresswoman Baldwin's legislation is supported by the Alliance for Community Media (ACM) and the National Association of Telecommunication Operators and Advisors.  

Until this year, I'd never heard of white spaces or white space devices, yet, according to this article by Sascha D. Meinrath of New America Foundation, they "have the potential to be one of the most revolutionary new technologies to come along in the past twenty years".  Prometheus Radio Project has also recently provided an article on white spaces and promises more information in the near future. (While you're at the Prometheus Web site, please take time to read its home page on Prometheus ongoing' work to bring low power radio stations to more communities.)

The Board of Directors to Kenosha Community Media (KCM) invites you to attend a special meeting on Tuesday, June 23rd at 6:00 PM at the Kenosha Media Center, 1403 Washington Road (inside the Time Warner Cable building). 

Click here for an agenda of this meeting.

At this meeting, the Board will report on upcoming activities and events of KCM and solicit your input to help KCM continue to provide our community with the ability to share information via cable television and through other communication resources.

Like many media centers across the United States, KCM is facing economic challenges.  However, KCM is also embracing opportunities to build relationships with other non-profit organizations in the Kenosha area to not only strengthen KCM and these other organizations but to build awareness and provide services to Kenosha. 

No RSVP is necessary to attend this June 23rd meeting.   Both Kenosha TV producers and anyone interested in local media are welcome to attend.   If you have questions, please contact the Kenosha Media Center at (262) 656-8497.   Hours are 9:30 AM-10:00 PM, Monday-Thursday, and 9:30 AM-5:00 PM, Friday and Saturday.   The Center is closed on holidays, including on Friday, July 3rd and on Saturday, July 4th.  Please call ahead before visiting the Center.

Please note that the Center will also be closed on Thursday, June 25 until 5:00 PM.  It will be closed all day on Friday, June 26th.   The Center will also be closed on Monday, June 29th until 5:00 PM.  

Kenosha Community Media will be the videographer for the Community Spelling Bee, presented by the Kenosha Literacy Council.   This event takes place on Wednesday, April 22nd at the Madrigrano Auditorium of Gateway Technical College, 3520 30th Avenue, from 5:30-9:00 PM.   It features teams which represent area businesses and organizations and a panel of celebrity judges.   Tickets are $20.00 each or $150 for a table that seats eight.  

Local businesses and organizations will field their own spelling bee teams, competing for a team trophy, bobble-head individual trophies, and bragging rights. 

100% of proceeds support the English literacy programs of the Literacy Council. The 2009 Spelling Bee is sponsored in part by a generous donation from the John J. and Ruth F. Kloss Foundation.

For more information, visit the Kenosha Literacy Council Web site here.  The Literacy Council provides English literacy education to adults with the assistance of trained volunteers.

 

Kenosha Community Media and Kenosha Public Library want to hear from you about your favorite book, CD, magazine, DVD, or audiobook.   Visit Southwest Library, 7979 38th Avenue, Kenosha, on Saturday, April 11th from Noon-3:30 PM where Library mascot Book Bug and friends will invite you to appear in front of a Kenosha TV camera to give us your review in sixty seconds or less.   All ages are welcome.   Your video may appear on Kenosha TV 14, the KCM Web site, and on social networking sites of the Kenosha Public Library.   It's fun.  It's free.  Tell your friends about it.   This activity precedes National Library Week, April 12-18th.  Visit Kenosha Public Library online here.

 

I recently received this article in which an associate editor of MediaShift discusses the current and future relevance of public access television.  You're invited to read it here and provide your responses to questions:

Is public-access TV still important or is it a relic of a bygone era?

How would it have to change in the future to stay relevant?

And, if you're a fan, what shows do you watch on public access?

 

 

One of my favorite Web sites is Ted.com (Technology • Entertainment • Design = TED) where some of the world's greatest thinkers and doers present their stories and ideas.  TED is embarking on a new experiment and hopes that someone like you, dear reader, may help them. 

Here's how: First become acquainted with TED.  New programs are available on a regular basis on this Web site.  I first became acquainted with TED through a link at ExposeKenosha.com which directed me to a marvelous talk by symphony conductor Benjamin Zander .  I later read his book, The Art of Possibility, which he co-authored with his wife, Rosamund, and am currently immersed in Mahler's 9th Symphony, conducted by Zander.  Zander is one of many creative thinkers who populate TED to share their wisdom and humor with you. 

Next, consider holding a salon or book club around TED content.  You could hold this activity in your home, at dinner parties, brown bag luncheons, or at the Kenosha Media Center, where you could screen TED videos on the Center's giant screen.  You could invite your friends and fellow Kenoshans to join you.  Your friends at Kenosha Community Media could help you put this type of activity together.    Anyone interested?

I read with dismay that Kenosha's online news source, The Daily Kenoshan, is for sale and could close down by the end of the month if no buyer comes forward.   I've enjoyed reading the Daily Kenoshan and hope I can continue to read it.   I think the future of journalism is online and that the Daily Kenoshan regularly has outdone that other news source/daily paper here in town.   Thank you to John Nordquist, owner/publisher of the Daily Kenoshan, Lisa Loring, editor, and all of the other contributors to it. 

How about it, Kenosha, will a viable new owner of this news source please come forward?  Click on the Daily Kenoshan logo for information.  You will be directed to DK's Web site.