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Monthly Reports
Obninsk Civic Networking
January-February, 2000
I want to tell you about an interesting visit to Oak Ridge, January,
14 - 23, 2000, in the framework of the Municipal and Community Problem
Solving Program II " Economic Development Issues 2000 - The Oak Ridge and
Obninsk Solutions"
1. Sunday, January 16 Yurii Koftan presented a lecture "Internet in
Russia" for members of Sunday School of the First United Methodist Church
(FUMC).
2. Monday, January 17 seminar in Technology 2020. This organization
was preliminary selected as a partner for the CSTC Informatization. Mr.
Yurii Koftan and Mr. Thomas Rogers, Director and Executive Director of
Technology 2020 made presentations on the structure, tasks, and projects
of their organizations. Then mechanisms of further interaction between
partner organizations have been discussed. The discussion clearly demonstrated
that tasks of the creation and development of telecommunication and information
resources coincide with tasks of the CSTC Informatization Section (it's
not a legal entity), Obninsk Computer Club, and Obninsk Computer Network
of Education and Science (OCNES). Part of the tasks of Technology 2020
related to marketing and investment promotion is close to those of OCST
and RAPIT.
Mr. Stephen F. Heiner - Deputy Director of Technology 2020 - was appointed
as a contact person for interaction with Informatization Section. On Thursday,
January 20 during a meeting with Mr. Heiner mutual interests and directions
for cooperation were determined:
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Formation of a system to support business cooperation between organizations
in Oak Ridge(USA) and Obninsk (Russia) in Internet. The first step should
be a formation of a system which allows to use the resources of Obninsk
IT specialists in projects implemented by Oak Ridge organizations.
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Development of network systems for remote training.
Taking into account that cooperation with Technology 2020 includes also
issues of innovation and investment support for high-tech business, the
members of Obninsk team agreed upon cooperation between their organizations
and possible establishment of a consortium (association) for such cooperation.
As long as the CSTC and Informatization Section are not legal entities
they will be represented by the "Obninsk - Naukograd" association and Obninsk
Computer Club.
3. During the second half of the day (Monday, January 17) we visited
3 high-tech companies located in Oak Ridge business-park.
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IPIX (Internet Pictures Corporation) - the major direction of its activity
is a creation of three-dimensional graphic components for Web-sites and
tools for their development (digital cameras and software for moving in
three-dimensional images). Now the OK_Club negotiates with sponsors to
purchase IPIX's camera and software and to let Obninsk institutes to use
that equipment.
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ClientLogic - provides technical support and telephone consultations according
to contracts with companies - software manufacturers (one of their clients
is Microsoft).
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ASIC International - developer of complex integrated chips.
4. On Monday, January 17 and Thursday, January 20, there was held
a meeting with Dr. Herman Postma, the former Director of Oak Ridge National
Laboratory (ORNL), member of Board of Directors, Technology 2020. During
the meeting possible directions of cooperation were discussed.
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Dr. Postma has analyzed reasons for the failure of a previous attempt to
use programmers from Obninsk institutions in projects implemented by American
firms. He undertook that attempt under the arrangement with Dr. Zrodnikov.
Not having an opportunity to be engaged personally, Dr. Postma involved
Pat Bizzly (director of a firm that attracts temporary labor). Mrs. Bizzly
in turn tried to involve another American company that had office in Moscow.
That company offered its Moscow partners ... As a result a long chain of
intermediaries has been formed. All of them tried to make their profit
as much as possible and the project became inefficient.
Dr. Postma supports an attempt to renew the above mentioned project on
the basis of cooperation between Technology 2020 and consortium of Obninsk
organizations.
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The second issue that was discussed with Dr. Postma is a remote training.
Dr. Postma's wife Mrs. Patricia Postma is an Assistant Dean at the Center
of Additional Education of the University of Tennessee. They apply a remote
training there to train administrative staff for medical establishments.
During a meeting with Mrs. Postma on Saturday, January 22 an arrangement
was achieved on joint activities to search grants to realize a creation
of remote training network systems.
5. On Friday, January 21 Obninsk team met with Mr. Greg Cole - Director
of the Center of International Network Initiatives (the University of Tennessee).
Mr. Cole is also the Director of charitable organization "Friends and Partners"
engaged in a project of establishment of civic networks in Russia. This
project is a joint Russian-American initiative aimed to use Internet for
support the information exchange and development of mutual understanding.
A consortium of 8 Obninsk organizations headed by Obninsk Computer Club
won a grant from "Friends and Partners" Foundation to establish Obninsk
Civic Network.
Mr. Cole is an initiator and Director of the MirNet program - a joint
Russian-American project designed to use high-speed telecommunication channels
for scientific cooperation.
Mr. Cole's presentation was mainly devoted to the MirNet and perspectives
for its development.
The meeting with Mr. Cole was also attended by:
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David Lambert - employee of the Center on International Threat Reduction,
ORNL, one of the directors of the MPC&A (Material Protection, Control
and Accounting) program;
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Karen Shaw - employee of the "Lockheed Martin" company that operates ORNL
under the contract with the DOE;
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Michael Turpin - manager of computer, information, and network division
of ORNL.
6. After Mr. Greg Cole's presentation there was held a brief conversation
with Mr. David Lambert. Mr. Lambert supervises the CITR Russia Naval Fuels
project under the MPC&A program. Mr. Lambert is interested in using
MirNet for the CITR tasks and, in particular, for cooperation with Obninsk
R&D and educational establishments (Institute of Physics Power Engineering,
Institute of Nuclear Power Engineering, etc.). We agreed that Obninsk organizations
would prepare their offers on cooperation and exchange of opinions on MirNet
tasks.
The note: the CITR Web site contains information on MPC&A conference
that will take part in Obninsk on May 22-26 2000
http: // www-citr.ornl.gov/spring2000.
7. At the end of our conversation with Mr. Cole one more participant
joined us: Mr. Howard Kerr - the CITR employee (Initiatives for Proliferation
Prevention program). He is also the representative of Blount County (Oak
Ridge and Knoxville situated in Blount) at the Tennessee parliament.
Mr. Kerr was interested in an idea of Dr. Zrodnikov related to organization
of remote experiments using the unique installations of Obninsk institutions.
Mr. Kerr is going to visit Obninsk in March - April 2000. He promised to
prepare a list of ORNL installations that can be offered for remote experiments.
He also would like to meet the representatives of Obninsk Institutions
to discuss the issue and to obtain a list of similar installations.
In Greg Cole's opinion the above mentioned project can become one of
major directions of activity in the MirNet network.
Yuri R. Koftan,
Principal Investigator of Obninsk Civic Network,
President of Non-profit Partnership "Obninsk Computer Club"
[English]
[Russian
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