Wireless Freenets As The Parasitic Grid

Lester67 writes: "Infoworld has a pretty cool article on the "the Parasitic Grid," which is basically people (mainly in large cities) opening up their high-speed access through 802.11b to anyone that wants to use it, and how it may threaten telecom profits. One guy has a pretty interesting use for a Pringles(tm) can too (but only after you've removed your hand)." This article ties together several of the recent stories on free-for-all community networking, and fits in nicely with the recent post on bridging networks with 802.11b.

How can this work?

[Reality Master 101]

I mean, wouldn't they interfere with each other? Would you sit down and reboot in order to DHCP an address? When you walk around, would have to reboot periodically as you went to another station?

I mean, most of the complexity of the cellular system is "handing off" in a relatively seamless way.

I don't think the telecoms have much to worry about.

i think they need more research...

[htmlboy]

from the article:

"Internet access will be the primary mover for these free networks. Sharing a cable modem or a DSL line might annoy some folks [broadband providers], but it's probably legal," said Phil Belanger, vice president of wireless business development at Wayport Inc. in Austin, Texas, a for-profit provider of 802.11b services at airports and hotels."

If the person who's sharing their connection to their ISP has agreed to an AUP prohibiting redistribution of service, account sharing, or wasteful behavior, I'd think such a system would run into legal issues. Granted, it'd be hard to stop, but I (not being a lawyer) have to think that guy's statement to be blantantly wrong.

chris

Re:How can this work?

[echo]

You must run windows. There are OSes where you don't have to reboot in order to get a new IP address.

Re:Parasitic?!?

[quartz]

From the article: Sharing a cable modem or a DSL line might annoy some folks [broadband providers], but it's probably legal[...]

Something tells me it won't stay legal for a very long time. Wait till there's enough of those guys to seriously annoy the big providers, and the watch them buy up some more laws...

Re:How can this work?

[mindstrm]

1) You don't need to reboot to get a new address.
2) This is more about being able to plop down somewhere and use the net, not about driving around in your car. If it were, read up on mobile-IP and such.

I don't know about you folks...

[mystery_bowler]

but I'm not sharing my connection with anyone until I can be almost 100% sure those who are using the connection aren't just using it for warez, mp3s and porn.

Re:a nice perk

[Reality Master 101]

If I were a landlord, I'd be all over this.

If I were a landlord, I'd be all over it, too -- making sure everyone understood that I had nothing to do with it. The cost of a network like this is not the hardware, it's the support.

Maybe you want to be constantly going around fixing everyone's network connection, figuring out why it sometimes stops working when the refrigerator goes on, etc, but there is no way in hell I would want to do it. And there's NO WAY I would guarantee it to a renter.

Re:How can this work?

[RedX]

From a command-line in NT/2000/XP, "ipconfig /renew" renews the IP from a DHCP server with no reboot required. Changing a static IP in NT does require a reboot, but 2000 and XP can handle it without the reboot. Can't speak much about command-line options in 9x as I haven't used it in ages, but I do know that changing a static IP in 9x will require a reboot as well.

Am I missing something?

[schporto]

OK we complain if someone has open ports on their servers allowing others to log into their servers and send spam endlessly, start DOS attacks etc. And here we're lauding people who want to comepletely open their networks? Gee if I was a spammer I'd be loving this. Just walk along and keep poping into different networks and send my bs. Nice.

-cpd

Re:The telco companies are not going to like this

[alen]

I see the ISP starting to limit the number of computers that can share a link. They would be well within their rights.

And what do you mean by braindead politicians? You mean our government shouldn't interfere when somebidy decides they wantsomething for nothing. Somebody has to pay for the routers and people who run them. Or do you volunteer your services for free to run an ISP?

Re:Bad idea

[rkent]

Right. My first inclination when I heard about "Free wireless networks" was, "That'll never work. People won't give service away forever."

But then I got to thinking about Citizens' Band (CB) radio. It was a bit before my time, but my grandfather still had one when I was a child, and it was apparently all the rage in the late 70s. It was basically a huge network of private radios that people used to get help in emergency situations, warn others of speed traps, or just generally chat on the road.

Of course the difference between that and free
internet, is that there's up "uplink" from CB's. You just chat with each other. But I definitely think an "alter-net," if you will, might work; people sharing their wireless bandwidth to send email, share their webcams, whatever, even if the ISPs crack down on sharing an internet uplink.

But anyway, why this is a response to the kiddie pr0n post: the downfall of this free wireless net could be the same as the downfall of CBs. They're still available and the bandwidth is still there, except that now it's full of foul-mouthed truckers cursing all night and all day, making civilized conversation all but impossible. Even on the emergency channel, apparently, it's just people hurling insults. So to the average user, it's objectionable and serves no use.

If the free wireless net started getting up to the same level of conversation, for instance, rampant porn (or free mp3...) trading, it would probably fall by the wayside for legitimate users. Even worse, if it was used primarily for child porn or bootleg video swapping, the bandwidth would be swamped AND the cops would crack down, making it not only objectionable, but downright evil in the eyes of some. Let's hope this project doesn't get ruined the same way.

But you know when you eat food

[netjeff]

First let me say that I agree that in the long run we will need to pay for bandwidth used rather than all-you-can eat. However there is a legitimate problem.

One user noted:

it would force me to be worrying all the time "am I downloading something here that's too big? Will I be billed for this?

To which you replied:

By that same logic, shouldn't you be worrying about what it costed you every time you eat a little food as it is? We are adults, we are supposed to be able to budget ourselves, and supposed to be able to handle costs, even when they are incremental.

The difference here is that I can't accidentally eat too much food. But it is easy to accidentally use a bunch of bandwidth (at least given the state of software and networks today).

If we go with a pay-for-what-you-eat model on bandwidth then we will need to have better feedback from our software telling us what we are about to eat before we start.

What price "free"?

[Anonymous Coward]

Y'know, I'd really like to share with my neighbors, and I'd really like to borrow wireless from neighbors adjacent to parks and other public places, and I love to see cool solutions spring up spontaneously from duct tape and individual efforts.

OTOH, my DSL CLEC is Chapter 11 with $1.4 billion in debt, *their* competition is already dead, my cable modem ISP is following shortly, and the remaining Baby Bell could get tired of pushing their crap-quality losing DSL venture uphill any old time.

Am I helping my community by sharing my broadband connection, or is my community screwed in the end when we ALL have to re-connect our 56K modems?

Just asking, and just a little worried.