Wincam employee Joe Viglione to address City Council yet again

See, I told you so. Joe Viglione will in fact be giving his point by point analysis of the Mayor's State of the City Speech at Tuesday's City Councl meeting. Please note the Council Agenda item slated for next Tuesday. This information comes to us through the courtesy Of City Clerk Ed Finn and a Public Records Request (handy little things those PRR's - one can learn so much through them).

13-298- Petition by Joseph Viglione, 59 Garfield Avenue to address the Council on Councillor Dello Russo’s statement from February 26, 2013 and the Mayor’s State of the City Speech.

Yes, I know what you're thinking "Big whoop! We already knew this. Tell us something we didn't know!" Sure thing, folks. What we haven't previously known is that Joe Viglione is going to speak about Councilor Dello Russo's statement of last week. First off, we learn from Joe's request that he's not savvy enough to know how to make a proper request. Joe, each petition you make carries a ten minute time limit per petition - not per item on the petition. You will have ten minutes total to talk. You should have submitted two petitions, one for each topic. Oh well... at least your loss (the loss of ten minutes to speak) will be our gain; we will save ourselves from hearing ten more minutes of your foolishness.

What Fred Dello Russo said last week that Joe Viglione wants to respond to is the comment that Public Access television is largely obsolete and not worth wasting the Council's or the City's time on (my paraphrasing). Now of course these are "fighting words" to Joe Viglione - eveyone knows Public Access is Joe's lifeblood. How can he be an "award winning Public Access producer" if there is no Public Access to give him an award? Hey Joe, come into the 21st Century. Wake up and smell the mold - that moldy smell Public Access rotting and mouldering away with one foot in the obsoletion grave and the other in a puddle of stagnant water.

Joe, everyone but you knows that all of PEG is going away at the end of this contract. What do you think "Project Open Voice" is all about? It's not about bringing Public Access to those cities that don't have a proper one. It's about replacing all of PEG all over the country! Didn't you see the announcement by Comcast giving the end date of this "test period"? Didn't you notice that this ending date for the "test" just about exactly coincides with the end of Comcast's current contract with the City of Medford? You think that's a coincidence? Now, unless you really are The Village Idiot you know that after a test period ends, the item tested upon will go into production. For Comcast that means at the end of the "test period" Project Open Voice will be in place in every single City & Town that Comcast serves.

Once this happens, as each PEG contract comes to an end, it will not be renewed. The Cities & Towns will then all be free to take the 5% franchise fees and put them into their respective fund accounts. Remember, the franchise fee is the fee the Cable Company pays to obtain the franchise. It only has to go to PEG if the City/Town decides to have PEG. If they don't want to provide PEG that money is for them and them alone. PEG is dying and with it, your Visual Radio program will disappear from TV screens all across this land. Sure, you can still put it on Project Open Voice, but with all the PEG stations gone, where are you going to get the camera from to shoot it? Where are you going to get the editing equipment from to edit it? The PEG stations will just chuck their old equipment, no longer having any use for it. Maybe if you save up your pennies, one of the PEG stations will sell you some of it cheap. But don't expect to get that deal from Public Access here in Medford. My understanding is that with all their equipment flooded, short circuited and moldy (as you have been frequently reporting), they're just going to pack it all up in a truck and bring it to the dump!