Young webreporters left without internet at the Hilton hotel!

[Lize De Clercq]

Armed with portable pc's, digital cameras and tons of enthousiasm, 20 young reporters from Poland, Romania, Spain and Turkey came to Vienna to webreport on the e-Inclusion Ministerial Conference & Expo that is being held at Messezentrum Wien from November 30th to December 2nd.

They were invited by the European Commission to report the conference "in their way" and show society how youngsters use ICT's and the internet as a tool to bring out their view on what is happening at such an event.

"Our way" Silvio Stoian (20) and Sergiu Dema (20) said, "that's using video, but after filming, it takes some time before we finish our editing and can post something onto the web. We are in such a hurry, because we need to finish before the venue closes, as we have no free internet access at our hotel rooms. Being lodged at the Hilton hotel is a great experience, but we cannot afford to pay 22 euro every 24 hours if we want to make use of the internet. It's a bit of a contradiction, because we kind of feel 'e-excluded' at this e-inclusion conference" - they joked.

"Same for us" said Aneta Hryszko (21) and Sebastian Skorulski (18) from Poland. "We are trying to solve the problem by working as a team and dividing tasks among us. Some of us attend the sessions and take notes, while others take pictures. Then we come together in the press room and start to write our story, but it would be much better if we could finish uploading our pictures and blogposts at our hotel room at night."

The coach of the Romanian team, Adrian Popa, said it was uncomprehensible that the Hilton is charging 260 euro for a room and not offering free internet access. "I am afraid it is not a good publicity for the Hilton group to host participants of a Ministerial conference on e-inclusion and at the same time exclude people from the net."