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Amazon details its low-bandwidth Sidewalk neighborhood network

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Re: Amazon details its low-bandwidth Sidewalk neighborhood network

#41

Low bandwidth mesh networking is super interesting but I would prefer not to have it supplied by Buy'n'Large.

Who else has an install base like Amazon in their Alexas and Rings? No TinyCorp could just decide to roll out a service like this. One of the few upsides of having giant companies is seeing the work of their equally big R&D departments

> Who else has an install base like Amazon in their Alexas and Rings?

a company like Arris that sells DOCSIS3/3.1 cablemodems and GPON end user CPEs to big ISPs like Shaw, Comcast, Charter, Wave/RCN, etc. The main problem with that concept is that if a manufacturer of residential CPEs such as Arris made a unilateral decision to incorporate the tech into their cablemodems and other devices, their $BIGISP customers might not be pleased about it and would buy elsewhere.

Re: Amazon details its low-bandwidth Sidewalk neighborhood network

#43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who else has an install base like Amazon in their Alexas and Rings? No TinyCorp could just decide to roll out a service like this. One of the few upsides of having giant companies is seeing the work of their equally big R&D departments

> Who else has an install base like Amazon in their Alexas and Rings? a company like Arris that sells DOCSIS3/3.1 cablemodems and GPON end user CPEs to big ISPs like Shaw, Comcast, Charter, Wave/RCN, etc. The main problem with that concept is that if a manufacturer of residential CPEs such as Arris made a unilateral decision to incorporate the tech into their cablemodems and other devices, their $BIGISP customers mig…

Comcast already shares your internet connection with others if you rent your wifi router from them.

Re: Amazon details its low-bandwidth Sidewalk neighborhood network

#44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who else has an install base like Amazon in their Alexas and Rings? No TinyCorp could just decide to roll out a service like this. One of the few upsides of having giant companies is seeing the work of their equally big R&D departments

> Who else has an install base like Amazon in their Alexas and Rings? https://starry.com/ and https://volkfi.com/ are doing their bits.

Volkfi don't exactly inspire confidence. :/

Re: Amazon details its low-bandwidth Sidewalk neighborhood network

#46

Whitepaper link: https://m.media-amazon.com/images/G/01/sidewalk/privacy_secu...

It specifies that it will accept L1 connections from: LoRa, FSK, or BLE. So this is basically L2/3. Great, but is it an open-source license-free standard that anybody can put on a (e.g.) RPi, or is it just their way of dominating the IoT? Is there an IEEE for secure stateless mesh routing? I would be shocked to hear that AMZN is the first to figure this out.

Re: Amazon details its low-bandwidth Sidewalk neighborhood network

#47
post #22

LoRa is super interesting and this is an absolutely logical step for Amazon and for Google Home. Providing ubiquitous gateways for IoT devices could enable an entirely new markets. Not everyone wants to spend $150 for a LoRaWAN gateway, nor do they see the value in doing so. Devices that come pre-configured with LoRa and can connect to a network through an Echo / Nest / Home device will function right out of the box.…

> The marginal cost of adding something like LoRa or BLE to existing Internet connections is essentially zero.

It is so painful to watch Comcast fail a completely captive customer base in IoT. It would be so easy for them to become the centerpiece of a wide array of independent companies developing devices. Instead they hand the customers to Gooplezon for zero benefit.

Comcast, you ignored my job application to do this for you years ago. That’s okay; I will consult for you for free, and you will become the good guys in this market.

Re: Amazon details its low-bandwidth Sidewalk neighborhood network

#48
post #3

Are there legal implications on an ISP subscriber if illegal activity is conducted via their network? I would very much mind sharing a ‘small fraction of bandwidth’ while having arbitrarily large legal exposure.

I think the security white paper addresses this silently by making the claim that the devices can’t be tracked due to a combination of encryption and periodic re-addressing. I’m skeptical of the security guarantees, but it’s a good step.

Re: Amazon details its low-bandwidth Sidewalk neighborhood network

#49
post #3

Are there legal implications on an ISP subscriber if illegal activity is conducted via their network? I would very much mind sharing a ‘small fraction of bandwidth’ while having arbitrarily large legal exposure.

Piratebox [1] over lora? Is this the future of piracy? [1] https://piratebox.cc/

Max 500MB per device per spec. Also 80kbpsmax , so, probably not.

Re: Amazon details its low-bandwidth Sidewalk neighborhood network

#50
post #47
post #22

LoRa is super interesting and this is an absolutely logical step for Amazon and for Google Home. Providing ubiquitous gateways for IoT devices could enable an entirely new markets. Not everyone wants to spend $150 for a LoRaWAN gateway, nor do they see the value in doing so. Devices that come pre-configured with LoRa and can connect to a network through an Echo / Nest / Home device will function right out of the box.…

> The marginal cost of adding something like LoRa or BLE to existing Internet connections is essentially zero. It is so painful to watch Comcast fail a completely captive customer base in IoT. It would be so easy for them to become the centerpiece of a wide array of independent companies developing devices. Instead they hand the customers to Gooplezon for zero benefit. Comcast, you ignored my job application to do th…

Comcast. Good Guys in this market.

Divide by zero error.

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