  This paper offers an overview of the Commons for Europe (C4EU) project and
the role of Bottom-up Broadband (BuB) in developing the information society.
BuB is characterized by the fact that the beneficiaries of the networks
actively participate in the planning, deployment and maintenance tasks. For the
beneficiaries, this represent a paradigm shift from a consumer-only position to
an active-participant position. We summarize a representative set of the BuB
pilot proposals that have been considered in the context of the C4EU project. A
selection of these proposals will be executed and carefully documented to
define good practices in BuB deployments. The documentation will include
project templates, work plans, case studies, replicable success models and
regulatory guidelines. The overall goal of the project is to assess the
validity of the BuB model to effectively and efficiently complement exiting
traditional deployments in satisfying the networking and technological needs of
the European citizens and organizations.
