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If only...wifi hardware manufacturers included ad-hoc network configuration an aggressive default. To wit: any time another device was in range, spare bandwidth
by ctdonath 14y ago
If only...wifi hardware manufacturers included ad-hoc network configuration an aggressive default. To wit: any time another device was in range, spare bandwidth would be applied to augmenting regular planned network connections with an on-the-fly spontaneous network. Various complaints could be addressed with ease on a per case basis, but point is the norm would be applying unused capacity.
Wasn't included initially because there wasn't enough expected ubiquity to be feasible. Now that everything but my toaster has wifi support, we could have something approaching a robust free universal Internet not beholden to backbones and pricy data plans.
- TillE 14y agoWifi's range is too short to make a large mesh network genuinely feasible. Even in densely populated cities you're going to have gaps where you need to cross a street. That'd require directional antennae and a huge amount of deliberate effort and maintenance to hook up a large area. Must have longer omnidirectional range and some degree of wall penetration. I'm not sure if that's possible within reasonable FCC limits of frequency and power.