The event was attended by around 8,500 people inncluding Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi in the Hanns-Martin-Schleyer-Halle in Stuttgart Germany. The objective of the event was to build bridges between different cultures and peoples, between citizens and institutions, and give a new impetus to the construction of the Europe.
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It was the second such international gathering and was preceded by a two-day congress with 20 different forums looking at a wide variety of non-denominational spiritual and social themes. 'Together for Europe' is a European group of 250 associations, movements and communities. |
Satellite links were established from Stuttgart to sites in Africa, Europe, North and South America. Video programmes were transmitted with audio channels in English, French, German, Italian, Polish, Portuguese and Spanish, over a standard DVB-S (Digital Video Broadcasting) satellite connection.
| In the words of Chris Hoffmann from 'Together for Europe': "We are very grateful for having had the opportunity to participate in this important event. Worldwide satellite communications have the possibility to create a network of solidarity relations and strongly contribute to reconciliation, justice and peace. Congratulations!" |
What makes all this possible is the outcome of a project called MediaSpace, which was funded through ESAs ARTES programme, (Advanced Research in Telecommunications Systems). MediaSpace provides multimedia satellite services at an optimised cost anywhere in the world through a combination of satellite and terrestrial networks. One MediaSpace platform is located at ESA-ESRIN (Frascati) and is used as part of the Telecom Technical Assets to support projects.
| The MediaSpace system has been designed to answer the needs and requirements of users typically part of the world of No-Profit organisations, by offering a wide range of satellite-based telecommunication services. |
Its various solutions, from fast Internet access to video-conferencing have been developed according to the individual needs of each organisation's departmental field, such as education, health, local economy, culture, sustainable development, religion, cultural exchange and more.
MediaSpace is not a proprietary system, but is rather the result of a collaboration between complementary partners - IT and Telecom companies, operators, business providers and Non-Profit Organisations, who have joined together to implement and operate the system and ensure its evolution.
Moreover, it uses and promotes standards while answering the requirements and constraints of the users. The objective of MediaSpace was to set up a Non-Profit Alliance creating an operational framework adapted to the mission of the system and in particular to bridge the North, South, East and West with a truly global infrastructure. The MediaSpace project has a long history of serving NGOs. To read more about it or its preceding project 'SpaceforScience' click under related links at the top-right of this page.images Together for Europe
