I have also put some thought to this problem and after reading some here are my definitive conclusions that still remain for all mesh networks to achieve:
- We need hardware that solves radio mesh problems:
- Multifrequency (more than 8 bands and frequencies with different range) with programmable hopping between them (as opposed to LoRa default hopping which is random). I will use LoRa hardware for now on 169MHz to increase range and force frequency change in a non-random way. Still as mentioned LoRa rules cannot scale so we will have to build it in a non scalable manner and then change the limitations if adoptions ensues.
- The radios need to be able to receive on many frequencies at the same time, atleast for the stem nodes.
- We need glue between old sync. IP/TCP/UDP (HTTP/SMTP/DNS) and async. IP2/"events" as he calls them.
- To scale geographical position is paramount and to remain independent of GPS we can use trilateration.
- The debate about encryption is a problem because it will have to evolve and to hardcode it into the base protocol will cause big disruptions down the road. I suggest the base layer is open and you apply encryption at the end; the reason for this is that privacy deters scalability and I prefer to have a truly scalable system that knows your position than the other way around. (also less chance the network can be used for military purposes then)
The resolution of range negotiation also has to be very granular: One freq. has to be the main "I'm here" channel and then dependent on density you have to releagate nodes to smaller and smaller range frequencies because a large city needs to cover a density of many thousand nodes per square kilometer.
So 169MHz is a good starting point (for range and less hops to reach bridge nodes) but you eventually need 433 and 868 too in the same device the main problem then becomes the antennas!!
To aim for complete decentralization over only radio is probably too optimistic, we could aim for distributed centralized independent networks instead with fiber interop so that mail and very simple web works on the base implementation to give immediate usability.
Finally a note on privacy, Tox is the only usable network that tried this and ohboy is it difficult to get any normal human being to adopt it when they have WhatsApp that has all humans on it allready.
To me unencrypted SMTP is a better attack vector because it is even more widespread and can be encrypted very easily later. Except of course destination encryption which works against scalability as I said previously.
The final reason I'm putting more energy into MMOs is that radio is easily disrupted and so far our existing internet show little technical reasons to abandon it yet. That can change in a heartbeat though.
Edit: Receiving my first meshtastic hardware for the C64 in a week or so but I still believe nobody has solved the scalability yet. I will eventually try to over at http://radiomesh.org