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The Story Behind "Free Public WiFi" - It's Not

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Re: The Story Behind "Free Public WiFi" - It's Not

#21

Post by dedward »

ajg1977 wrote: post #12

When a computer running an older version of XP can't find any of its "favorite" wireless networks, it will automatically create an ad hoc network with the same name as the last one it connected to -- in this case, "Free Public WiFi." Other computers within range of that new ad hoc network can see it, luring other users to connect. [...] Computers with the XP bug that try to connect to the Internet will remember the n…

Nope - because people very rarely create ad-hoc networks these days - full infrastrucure-mode APs are everywhere - the only time people tend to select ad-hoc without realizing it tends to be he one called "Free Public Wifi" - it just happens to show up in airports and hotels and is passed around from machine to machine because of the name. Lots of people try it out (it never actually works) - but it's enough for the netowork name to keep propagating.

Re: The Story Behind "Free Public WiFi" - It's Not

#23

Post by dedward »

anon-e-moose wrote: post #10

This is not a "bug" or a virus. XP simply remembers the last ad-hoc network you connected to, to be used when there are no actual APs around. As a blindingly obvious differentiation, ad-hoc networks have a different icon and say "computer-to-computer network". Back when Windows XP was introduced, ad-hoc was extremely useful as lots of places didn't have wireless internet access. My friends and I often used it to swap…

It's an emergent behaviour of a complex system involving people and machines. What's fascinating is how this non-functional string/ad-hoc netowork beacon, whatever oyu want ot call it, with this specific name, has spread globally to every corner of the world as far as we can tell. Hit any airport or hotel lobby in the world where there are laptops around, and odds are you won't have to wait long before you see "Free Public WiFi" pop up. That, in and of itself, is fascinating. It's been going on for a decade.

Re: The Story Behind "Free Public WiFi" - It's Not

#24

Post by tommusic »

mayank wrote: post #20
Cushman wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not contradicting me? Evolution is a special case of emergent behavior in a complex system. The rules of the buggy system mean that any ad-hoc network can be replicated if a user connects to it. That creates selective pressure on the name of ad-hoc networks in that convincing more users to click on them causes further replication. So we have a (somewhat) self-replicating entity, with variation, and a selective…

Yeah I went back and read your comment again and see how you meant "evolution", which is perfectly valid (i.e., special case of emergent behavior). However, I know this is going to get increasingly pedantic, but evolution usually implies some sort of survival-of-the-fittest rule, which seems to stretch the definition here: > That creates selective pressure on the name of ad-hoc networks in that convincing more users…

I wonder if this virus has been able to effectively spread to Madagascar.

To put it another way: I wonder if "Free Public Wifi" was the surviving ad-hoc phantom in countries where the primary language isn't English.

Re: The Story Behind "Free Public WiFi" - It's Not

#25

Post by Cushman »

tommusic wrote: post #24
mayank wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah I went back and read your comment again and see how you meant "evolution", which is perfectly valid (i.e., special case of emergent behavior). However, I know this is going to get increasingly pedantic, but evolution usually implies some sort of survival-of-the-fittest rule, which seems to stretch the definition here: > That creates selective pressure on the name of ad-hoc networks in that convincing more users…

I wonder if this virus has been able to effectively spread to Madagascar. To put it another way: I wonder if "Free Public Wifi" was the surviving ad-hoc phantom in countries where the primary language isn't English.

Wow... that's a cool thought.

Even cooler is if you did manage to find a Madagascar that hadn't developed any widespread variant of its own either, you'd have the chance to design and introduce it. It'd be a neat social hack.

Re: The Story Behind "Free Public WiFi" - It's Not

#26

Post by mayank »

Cushman wrote: post #25
tommusic wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if this virus has been able to effectively spread to Madagascar. To put it another way: I wonder if "Free Public Wifi" was the surviving ad-hoc phantom in countries where the primary language isn't English.

Wow... that's a cool thought. Even cooler is if you did manage to find a Madagascar that hadn't developed any widespread variant of its own either, you'd have the chance to design and introduce it. It'd be a neat social hack.

That's an interesting algorithmic problem. Assuming that you knew the structure of ad-hoc networks in terms of wifi range in a smallish region (for example, by wardriving in a dense urban area), you could pick geographical regions to target for introducing your local "adhoc network meme", which would just involve standing in strategically placed locations broadcasting that ad-hoc network SSID. That would vary with the geographical distribution of WinXP computers in the region. I think the whole social hack could be doable with detailed wifi maps of a region and a laptop. Wonder how much work it would be to implement.

Re: The Story Behind "Free Public WiFi" - It's Not

#27

Post by imd »

jamii wrote: post #18
Cushman wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not contradicting me? Evolution is a special case of emergent behavior in a complex system. The rules of the buggy system mean that any ad-hoc network can be replicated if a user connects to it. That creates selective pressure on the name of ad-hoc networks in that convincing more users to click on them causes further replication. So we have a (somewhat) self-replicating entity, with variation, and a selective…

Evolution requires mutation. If the name occasionally got garbled then it would be evolution.

Evolution requires survival of the fittest. If the name got more enticing over time then it would be evolution.

Re: The Story Behind "Free Public WiFi" - It's Not

#30

Post by jforman »

imd wrote: post #27
jamii wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Evolution requires mutation. If the name occasionally got garbled then it would be evolution.

Evolution requires survival of the fittest. If the name got more enticing over time then it would be evolution.

Technically evolution does not require survival of the fittest or mutation. Evolution is merely the change in allelic frequency in a population over time.

Without selective pressure (i.e., "survival of the fittest") you can still have evolution via drift, the founder effect, etc. Drift is a very important source of evolution in a lot of situations (during my PhD I studied how a source of seeming drift in the coding regions of genes was actually caused by selective pressure in some cases).

Without mutation a population can still evolve, too - for example, if a disease struck and there was no mutation, an allele that protected against the disease would quickly dominate the population. This is a much more pedantic thing to point out (on my part), though, since every stretch of every organism's DNA mutates. The different mutation rates of viruses, bacteria, and humans due to replication errors (and the resulting effect on evolution) is a pretty fascinating topic, though.

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