By Eliza Ridgeway

joe hu/town crier Kelly Coan of Camino Medical Group instructs Francis Lau on how to use a laparoscopy device at the Mountain View Business EXPO.

At the Mountain View Chamber of Commerce Mixer and Business EXPO May 17, shared information was the name of the game, with individual networking, a talk on Google WiFi’s business opportunities, and informational booths set up by local businesses.

During the mixer, held at the Computer History Museum, local businessmen and women sipped wine and stood in big circles introducing themselves and sharing upcoming opportunities, like the weekly networking group recently begun by Jerylann Mateo of Alain Pinel.

Upstairs at the business expo, booths with banners, samples and freebies shared information about businesses from the very local (WineShop at Home consultant Betty Kaufman) to the gigantic (AOL and Verizon). Dr. Lucy Osgood of Chiropractic Performance Center had brought a massage chair to demonstrate her trade. In addition to attending the expo, Osgood enhances her practice as co-chair of the chamber of commerce Business Connections group, which brings professionals together to network and brainstorm.

Non-profits attended the expo in addition to conventional businesses. The Community Health Awareness Council’s Araceli Brun knew one thing she could share with other businesses: the group’s upcoming swanky fundraising event, “Tasting ‘Round the World,” is still seeking business donors. Chef Chu’s, Le Petite Bistro and Fiesta Del Mar are some of the local businesses already participating.

Rich Fischer, superintendent of the Mountain View-Los Altos Union High School District as well as chairman of the chamber of commerce, explained his motive for leadership in the business community: “A strong local economy depends on good schools. We can learn a lot more from private partners.” Freestyle High School, the district’s technology-oriented academy scheduled to open next year, has already formed partnerships with Google and Microsoft. And Fischer said that current Mountain View High School students pair with Google to train about its local WiFi network.

The WiFi network was the subject of the keynote address for the evening. Minnie Ingersoll, the project manager responsible for installing Mountain View’s WiFi, gave the audience a business-

oriented project update. The new network will work on any wireless-enabled device and offer speed of about 1 megabyte a second. Ingersoll said that the WiFi (free to Mountain View) will not always be free in all locations. She estimated that nearly 300 cities (and the Silicon Valley Joint Task Force) have issued requests for proposals for further wireless networks, but that very few have gotten beyond that initial stage.

“We’re doing something new and exciting in Mountain View,” said Ingersoll, who told the audience that Google was interested to see what innovative uses locals could make of this new network.

Because the network offers primarily outdoor coverage, she walked business owners through the details of a device they can buy to boost the signal indoors. Google plans to stock the “Customer Premises Equipment,” which runs about $100, in local software and hardware stores.

Once shoppers or residents access the WiFi network, they are automatically brought to a Google-designed page - one that local businesses can use to keep interested customers updated. The page doesn’t run ads but rather customer-selected features, similar to miniaturized notice boards, called modules. Anyone can design

a module: a Mountain View High School student made a school events module (prom is coming up), and businesses could do the same, highlighting sales or special events.

Google maintains a free search of local listings, like a white pages, that businesses can update with their own information at no cost. And of course, Ingersoll described ways to optimize Google’s fee-based advertising, which can be localized to customers within a single region (such as Mountain View) searching for a single term (she suggested “organic cat food”).

Anyone who accesses the network will become a de facto Google customer because of the required user log-in and password, but Ingersoll said that the requirements are far less stringent than those of traditional Internet service providers - and that Google’s eerie ability to “sense” what customers are typing doesn’t lead to an invasion of privacy. “Google isn’t storing any of your usage data, and files transferred are not stored,” she said.

The WiFi timeline anticipates a rolling launch, and while it is not officially up yet, Google has deployed the network and made it available to test-users, as it tries to improve coverage in key areas (such as downtown). Ingersoll said that anyone interested in getting involved with the network early and giving it a test-run should e-mail mvwifi-support@google.com.