[Cu-wireless] How can one person start a Community Wireless Network?

[Todd Boyle]

There are *many* people who want to start community networks
but they are too thinly distributed, geographically to have a big
meeting together and establish a single company or provider.
Only Portland Oregon and very few others, have ever succeeded
in establishing a group that is so dedicated that they actually install
nodes.

For the individual activists, it is entirely impossible to do it alone,
unless somebody provides a blueprint of some sort.

It would require that tasks be kept below 50 hours a week.
It would require that his/her costs be kept in the low $ thousands.
It would require tangible progress within weeks, not years.
It must not require that *anybody* ascend any long learning curve,
    either technical, financial, legal, marketing, social, or managerial
    or organizational.

Some first level conclusions.

1.  it has to be built into a box.   The box must go and go, for years
without rebooting or futzing around with it.

2.  the users would need to perceive very substantial value in the
box.  It would need to have a financial payoff, because they already
have abundant telecom choices at known prices and low risks.

3. the CWN would have to be scalable to large numbers because
if it is good, then, it will gain large numbers.   If it is crap then it will
fail anyway.    So, from Day One, if smart people believe there is
some sort of natural limit or extinction event in 2 or 3 years, then,
they will not even take the first step on that path.

4. the CWN must have a longterm future to amortize its costs. But
the flip side is, if it *does* have longterm future people will buy it.
Most of the adult population in the US has investments.  The yields
are around 5% if they're lucky.   Most of them *will* invest in a risk-free
investment yielding 5%.

The market value of a bare, 64Kbps carriage around the city is
worth no more than approx. $10/month.  With an ISP it may be
worth $25/month.   The value to people who already have Internet,
is zero unless they cancel their existing contracts.  The value to
people who can thereby cancel their broadband Internet may be
$30 to $50/month.

The cost of broadband Internet service appears to have stabilized
around $40 to $50/month.  There are lies and short term promotions,
bundling deals, and misrepresentations, but in the Seattle area it's
$50/month for the most basic, tethered, restricted-use broadband.

If you are paying $50/month that's $600/year.  The capitalized value of an 
income stream of $600 at 5% would be $12,000.  (check it yourself: a bank 
deposit 12000 x 5% interest is 600) Therefore, a rational citizen will pay 
$12,000 to escape from a recurring cost of $50/month.

Surely, by now, there are technical solutions by which, citizens might 
operate our own broadband network, with off the shelf equipment far cheaper 
than $12,000.

You can't build a wireless network without considering why they are needed. 
Here are Six Good Reasons we need decentralized, owner-operated, 
peer-to-peer networks:

- free telephony,
- free commerce including unregulated payment/settlement infrastructure,
- free software,
- free music. unregulated transmission of content such as MP3 files,
- free speech.  freedom of expression, and
- individual privacy.

Now, don't shoot me.  I am just the messenger.   These are natural 
consequences of an unregulated bit pipe.  The entire forces of the State, 
its legal and regulatory class, and broad segments of the Fortune 500 and 
now the police establishment, are arrayed to prevent an unregulated, 
unpoliced bit pipe.

But when a CWN provides the conditions for reaching these goals, many users 
will realize financial gains above $100/month from a CWN.

5. Because of the overriding importance of the broadband-cancelling
decision (recovery of the $50 of cost recovery, the BOX needs to be
reliable.  Not 100% reliable but pretty darn reliable.  The BOX and
the whole urban network must never go down more than a few hours.
You could lose half of the users population from one such event if
its a monthly payment deal.  If its a capital purchase then, there must
not be any bad reputation whatsoever, otherwise people won't buy it.

More of this kind of thinking... at...
http://ledgerism.net/requirementsCWNs.htm

....and at...
http://ledgerism.net/whyP2Pwireless.htm

Todd Boyle - Kirkland WA - 425-827-3107
Mutual AR/APs http://www.ledgerism.net/
home , http://refusenik.org
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