[wsfii-discuss] Press Release: guifi.net has reached the thousands!

Wed Oct 25 19:25:19 UTC 2006

Julian, Guifi,

Just wanted to say thanks for the great content. I am now studying it.

Jeff

 Priest wrote:

>On Mon, Oct 23, 2006 at 11:23:36PM +0200, Ramon Roca wrote:
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>>At wifi we decided to make a press release at the point we reach > 1.000 
>>thousands active nodes. That happened last Thursday.
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>Congratulations Guifi!
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>>A LOT MORE THAN JUST A LIST OF ?HOTSPOTS?
>>guifi.net isn't just a list of access points. Is much more: Is a big 
>>neutral network where the nodes use to have stable wireless links 
>>between them and therefore creating an autonomous stable mesh network, 
>>either on urban areas or rural areas where in some cases there was no 
>>High-Speed internet access before.
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>This neutral network aspect looks like a good one to publicise right
>now with the efforts in the US to fight for the net neutrality bill's
>passage into law and the http://savetheinternet.com campaign.
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>>AN OPEN AND NEUTRAL FREE NETWORK
>>In the current times where the original universal spirit of the internet 
>>is being mediated by private telecommunications operators, by having 
>>neutral networks in the last mile guifi.net is contributing to 
>>counterbalance the strict commercial driven interests. To provide 
>>warranty on this commitment guifi.net adopts the Wireless Commons License.
>>    
>>
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>The early wireless freenetworks always discussed that the creation of
>a neutral wireless access network was partly as a counter to potential
>control of the internet by the owners of the core network. The net
>neutrality fight in the US is showing that sadly this _was_ a real
>threat after all.
>
>The legaslitive fight in the US to enshrine net neutrality in law is a
>fantastic initiative, but the growth of municipal wireless and
>networks like guifi maybe shows that there is an effective
>practical/market approach as well.
>
>It seems to me that building net.neutral access networks where
>services (like internet access) are made available by third parties -
>provides two mechanisms for users to put pressure on backhaul
>providers to be net.neutral.
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>The first is that the net.neutral network organises groups of users
>(aggregation).
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>These groups can then have political and group purchasing power which
>creates a viable negotiating position with backhaul network owners (or
>perhaps even a basis for building backhaul networks).
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>This is going to be the best way to operate where there is only one
>backhaul provider (or none).
>
>The second is that a net.neutral access network effectivley creates a
>competitive market for backhaul (and other) services across it. Users
>can the choose the services that have the properties they want,
>neutrality, high speed, low cost etc.
>
>This will work better where there is the possibility for multiple
>backhaul service providers.
>
>It seems pretty weird to me that municipal wireless had such a bad
>time with anti-competition law. I would have thought that providing
>net.neutral access networks provides precisely the possibility for a
>deep competitive market for services that competition law tries to
>establish with flawed measures based on duplicating infrastructure or
>artificial unbundling.
>
>.. appologies if this feels like an old thread ;)
>
>cheers
>
>/julian
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