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Internet in a Box

internet-in-a-box.org

61–70 of 263 posts

Re: Internet in a Box

#61
A feature that would be good to have is if a "Internet in a Box" could also store the update files for serving to other "internet in Box" machines.

( However having worked as a technical software tester in similar systems for over 20 years , its probably to complex to implement reliably, being able to handle all the edge cases. Is my GUESS )

Re: Internet in a Box

#62
post #8

I remember encountering this project: https://piratebox.cc/faq , I even still have a compatible hardware at home. I wonder if allowing it to have instant messaging (including offline asynchronous messaging) would change how people in a small community communicate each other. I wonder if, for one, it would induce Internet trolling.

I have one of these, not in operation but could deploy by just plugging into power and attaching it to a higher gain antenna. It does have a message-baord type function included, but it's anonymous and there's no sign-in so there's also no way to administer it or edit / delete your own messages (piratebox is a product of a more innocent age, maybe). It's also possible to upload files to it, anonymously.

Both of these things make me worry about liability in the event of the type of jerks where the term "jerk" is possibly the nicest way to describe the person.

(I have it on a GL.Inet Mango device and it took me a lot of digging to find the install binaries and instructions, and I don't even know if said binaries and instructions specific to the Mango exist anymore - I don't have the time / energy / motivation to try to dig it up again, I remember there were lots of trails that led to almost the right information)

Re: Internet in a Box

#64
Such a cool idea.

In addition to Wikipedia, I’d love to see a mirror of all the health (NIH) and similar data

- key imagery, for example the human body

- (wishful) chatGPT 4o

Re: Internet in a Box

#66

With the crazy news we have those past months, I actually started to wonder what would happen if internet went offline "for real" (let's say, several weeks) here in developed countries. I know we can easily download Wikipedia and Openstreetmap. But what else? And how to share it? I can do a hotspot home, but would my neighbors understand it? I would need some kind of captive portal to tell them when they connect to m…

I've gone a step further, I have built a 50 TB NAS and I'm loading up as much as I possibly can.

I’d love some detail on your setup. Which NAS, which drives? Key data sets? (Would love to build one myself)

Re: Internet in a Box

#68
This has off-grid written all over it. You could build your own content pool for education + entertain and you would never have to pay a forever subscription for an Internet connection. (Assuming you don't work online or something.) Quite an interesting idea to consider how to add the tools to this so its practical to unplug. This idea appeals to me a lot tbh.

Re: Internet in a Box

#69

With the crazy news we have those past months, I actually started to wonder what would happen if internet went offline "for real" (let's say, several weeks) here in developed countries. I know we can easily download Wikipedia and Openstreetmap. But what else? And how to share it? I can do a hotspot home, but would my neighbors understand it? I would need some kind of captive portal to tell them when they connect to m…

Too little bandwidth and too few nodes to do this in the sense I think you mean.

You can build a hotspot and try setting up meshes with any of the available hardware or software packages out there, but you're going to end up being the gatekeeper to the service. HAM radio ends up working out the same way, as I understand. It's just too technical for people to have this spring up collectively without a single person or team doing everything.

Lack of tech experience to even know how to build a mesh let alone prioritize its limited bandwidth is why the general public isn't going to assist.

>And then, could they repeat the hotspot, to build a mesh? I know there are projects to do that, but what do they accomplish exactly?

Yes, pretty much. The problem is poor definition of the problem, though.

What are we trying to solve? A way to send trickles of comms out, like "Mom and Dad, we're alive?" or "We have life-threatening casualties at x',y'?" Emergency kiosk to send emails one at a time? Doable if you have an Internet source like a Starlink, or any other uplink that's still up somehow.

Or is to restore the "Internet" as generally known, which might as well be synonymous with YouTube and Netflix and web browsing for people. You and your system would be overwhelmed as soon as your mesh comes up.

Re: Internet in a Box

#70
post #12

What would it take to give these poor children a Starlink connection?

The answer to ubiquitous Internet in an area is going to look like 5G and mobiles, not highly valuable terminals you now saddle them with having to guard.
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