Community Wireless Networks

(from the Draft pile)

Senator Lieberman's proposed "Protecting Cyberspace as a National Asset Act of 2010, S.3480" http://is.gd/cUM8E is basically a government controlled internet "kill switch". Granted, it may not shut off the entire internet, but anything critical enough to be "at risk" shouldn't be accessible via the public internet as we know it. I would think that large internet-based corporations will have enough pull (and security savvy) to keep their business models running. With "Net Neutrality" also being an issue, its about time that us technically savvy geeks start roughing-out a decentralized substitute.

Decentralization seems to be the most resilient way to do most things, including commerce, energy, food, and governance. The internet seems to be the greatest distraction since TV, and it can really shine as an enabler of decentralization. Any useful internet-based decentralization effort needs to happen on a decentralized internet.

The ability to support HD video isn't nearly as important as the services I've outlined in my "Community in a Box" wiki at http://www.openideaproject.org/Projects/OIPeople/CommunityInaBox and such things as the Mesh Potato project at http://www.villagetelco.org/2008/06/the-origin-of-the-mesh-potato/.

There are probably enough older, flashable wifi routers around to start building-out basic community networks. Add some cantennas http://www.turnpoint.net/wireless/cantennahowto.html recycled solar panels or home-made wind turbines, and gel cell batteries (or potatoes http://www.greenprophet.com/2010/06/20/22907/potato-battery/) Such units could be placed just about anywhere, small-ish UPSs could even be used if nodes are located at locations with access to AC power.

A collaborative, Commercial Free wifi mesh network could connect people, their objects, and their skills, with others that are interested in them.