Todd,
Near downtown Urbana, Illinois, we have just linked the first two stations in a community wireless network. We have all the equipment to add a third node, just as soon as a landlord or homeowner says "ok." We know so many people who are "hip" to the idea of the CWN, all of them living within a block or two of the existing stations, we may find ourselves in the peculiar position of having our CHOICE of stations for growing the network. I do not think any of them will ask for any compensation for hosting stations on the network. What holds us back is a lot more mundane than lack of "peer-to-peer resource accounting." Lack of time and money hold us back. Inexperience holds us back. To install a fourth node, and subsequent nodes, we will need to buy antennas. We will run out of expensive RF connectors, soon. At about a dozen nodes, we will run out of radios and computers. The computers we have were loaned from an angel at a forgetful institution with a large PC surplus. The radios are on loan, too. One of the station hosts graciously gave six hours to attach an antenna to the chimney on his apartment. Six hours! A practiced person would have done that in an hour, but we don't have the luxury of hiring one, and our handy friends have better things to do on a weekend, ya know? All I can say about the host is, wow, what a patient and generous guy he is. We have other volunteers, however, who have given even more time. Designing and programming and testing the software for this network occurred in bursts of effort by myself and by collaborators. Some design discussions and testing was repeatedly postponed until volunteers' schedules meshed. Development continues, and it will continue, and it's not going to go a lot faster unless we land a grant so big that one of our volunteers can quit their job. I have a feeling that the telco and cable co will try to end our network before lack of peer-to-peer resource accounting is a problem. But right now, we just need a landlord's or homeowner's approval. Dave On Sat, Sep 21, 2002 at 08:45:53PM -0700, Todd Boyle wrote: > There's nothing stopping community wireless networks except > the lack of peer-to-peer resource accounting. If the thing had a > coin slot to pay for days or gigabytes or QOS, and a way for the > owner of a node to harvest the coins, a lot more people might be > willing to install expensive nodes and maintain backbones and > internet gateways. So, I agree with your comparison with > hippies in that, our neglect to provide for simple economics has > left us in the dustbin of history. > > Unfortunately, in the US, individual buying/selling is not something > that is familiar, or commonly practiced among the geek population. > It's not part of the geek culture. > > The economic context surrounding software and networks > is overwhelmingly institutional. i.e. corporate, academic, > and government. Oh-there are consumers who buy software-- > but the recipients of all revenue in software are highly concentrated. > Large software vendors, and IT providers to organizations. > > So, there has never been much commitment to free markets, > among the geek population. Everything in their experience is > that you are powerless unless you get a job working for the > large, centralized corporations, sooner or later that's where > almost all software or network engineers goes back to. > No aspersions intended, the same could be said for accountants :-) > > Our geeks are busy with their day jobs and the CWNs don't have > any mechanism to generate coins to pay them to build our network. > > Every node should have a Webfunds wallet built into it, or at > least, a repository of bills sent, and bills received, versus other > nodes it knows. > > Another trouble with CWN economics is everybody thinks its > too cheap to meter, or that nobody could figure out who owes > who, anything. Jack Rickard wrote many excellent essays on > this problem in the 1990s, why it proved impossible for 40+ > operators of networks to agree who-owed-whom for peering. > Well, a CWN is not a global internet, it is a local apparatus > that has an upstream (the internet gateways, which must be > paid for) and it has a downstream (users of gateways and > routes to reach them) and there is not going to be any CWN > unless USERS are willing to pay a few bucks. > > Todd > > At 01:02 PM 9/21/2002, you wrote: > >I'd agree that some of the WiFi/HotSpot work has followed the typical > >pattern shown in GPL/OpenSource projects; lots of initial activity and > >buzz (Linus Torvalds will change the world and kill off the evil M$), > >followed by fragmentation and disagreement over standards (Mandrake is > >cooler than Debian, RedHat is for lamers, etc), then a transition into > >the corporate realm (http://tinyurl.com/1kji: IBM to resell RedHat.) > > > >It's a double-edged sword; the same drive to create anew does not always > >translate into a desire to complete, continue, and finalize. Visions > >for the initial project are supplanted by new ideas and new visions; and > >somehow things never get completed. In a sense we're like hippies > >running through field throwing vegetable seeds everywhere with a dream > >to create a communal vegetable garden---then six months later when the > >field is full of food we're too busy to harvest it because we're off > >throwing around flower seeds with our new dream of creating a communal > >flower garden. So a sharp-eyed businessman buys the field, hires some > >immigrant labor to pick the vegatables, and when he gets rich selling > >tomatoes we complain about "corporate greed". > > > >...dtw > > > > > >-----Original Message----- > >From: Julian Bond > >Sent: Saturday, September 21, 2002 12:37 AM > >To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > >Subject: Re: [BAWUG] Nicholas Negroponte (Wired Mag) on WiFi > > > >These days, when Wired do a whole print issue on a subject you know it's > > > >time to move on to the "next greatest thing". > > > >But then I spent a lot of yesterday evening wandering round all the WiFi > > > >sites. My perception is that the enthusiast activity has essentially > >stalled. There was a great outpouring of thought 18 months ago and now > >we're left with a lot of hard work and coding to bring all that into > >reality. And it's not really happening. It would be sad if the BigCos > >(M$?[1]) hijack WiFi and twist it to their ends just as we're on the > >verge of having a critical mass of end users. > > > >That's probably going to upset the people here that *are* beavering > >away. So I'm not belittling your efforts. Just expressing a bit of > >disappointment. And you'll have to excuse me for not doing enough myself > > > >but my hands are full of other things at the moment. > > > >JB > > > >[1]I've argued before that we need an MS Win hard/soft package that is > >simple to install and solves both the internal home WLAN but also plays > >well with the outside world. And does it in a way that protects all > >(ISP, WLAN Owner, WLAN User) the parties involved. That could be a great > > > >strength of the M$ package. But unfortunately it's unlikely to "play > >well with the outside world". > > > >-- > >general wireless list, a bawug thing <http://www.bawug.org/> > >[un]subscribe: http://lists.bawug.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless > > -- > general wireless list, a bawug thing <http://www.bawug.org/> > [un]subscribe: http://lists.bawug.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless -- David Young OJC Technologies [EMAIL PROTECTED] Engineering from the Right Brain Urbana, IL * (217) 278-3933 -- general wireless list, a bawug thing <http://www.bawug.org/> [un]subscribe: http://lists.bawug.org/mailman/listinfo/wireless
