Mesh/20 June 2013

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June 20th Meeting Minutes

Attendees

  • Chris J, Jenny, Max, Juul, Miguel, Eddan.com, Sam

Action Items

Misc Notes

  • Community wireless vs. Municipal (gov run) or Corporate (eg Google Wifi)
  • Hidden Node Problem:

Checking out the hardware!

    • Don't power them up without the antennas!!
    • Need adapters for the external antennas to bullets
    • AirGrids can only run on 5.2V max, meant to run off USB
    • NanoBridges and AirGrids are 5GHz and will serve as the rooftop backbone of the mesh.
    • PicoStations are the street-level routers

Crowdfunding Campaign

  • Raised over $1600 in one week! Awesome!
  • Legal structure of accepting donations
    • Very good accounting
  • Should investigate 501(c)4
    • Talk to folks at the SELC, recommended 501(c)7
  • Talking to Noisebridge and SchoolFactory in the next week or two about umbrella-ing under their 501(c)3

Survey Responses

  • FILL IN
  • 2/3 like the current logo

Name Suggestions

  • Mycelium
  • Wicelium
  • Sudo Mesh
  • Meta Mesh
  • Root Net
  • Super Web
  • The Trunk
  • Hive 10
  • Orga Net
  • Open and Notorious
  • Sudo Net
  • Oakland Wireless Network (OWN)
  • Oakland Community-Organized Resilient Network (OCORN)
  • Oakland Community Network

Marketing Discussion

  • Sudo meant to reflect empowerment to fix it or make it yourself
    • Include a brief definition of SUDO at the bottom of marketing materials
  • 'FREE WIFI' sign and/or stickers for the mesh
  • Adopt-A-Picostation
  • COLLATe utf8mb4_unicode_ci for mounting and running a node and link to online marketplaces on the site

Folks to reach out to

  • Internet Archive and Brewster
  • Kapor Foundation

Report Backs

  • Still need to make a protocol decision
  • Inventory Tracking! Mycelia Zero should be completed by next week: Decentralized network of tools/objects, projects and people/skills - Access control (choose to share)
    • Need a weather-resistant sticker or tagging system - RFIDs?
    • MyAssetTag.com - aluminum matte tags - available very tiny (0.25" x 1") in batches of 100 for $32
    • 'Property Of' stamps / tattoos to discourage theft
  • OpenOakland feedback:
    • Someone has a roof in the hills with a view of the airport (and thus LOL)

Outreach Strategy

  • Origin of the outdoor mesh could be LOL/SOL/Cycles Bikery
  • Would be easier to connect W Oakland
  • We could split the hardware 50/50 between West and East Oakland, then run a campaign to reach across the divides in Oakland to connect the two meshes!
  • Reach up to Richmond to Internet Archive's awesome node!

Mounting Solutions

  • Flower pots! (with plants that won't obstruct!)
  • Birdhouses
  • On the eve of the rooftop outside would be ideal
  • Flags (American or Pirate version)

Firmware

  • Directing network traffic is the major technical challenge
  • Encourage participants to use BitTorrent clients that support uTP (microtorrent protocol)
  • Should have two options:

1. People replace their existing access point (which they donate to us) with a PicoStation 2. People keep their existing access point and add the PicoStation to their setup, which runs off their router

    • Folks can also host a rooftop node
  • Focus on aesthetic unobstrusiveness
  • Set up a way to split the network into several access points: back channel (for the mesh nodes to connect to eachother), open channel (for public connecting) and private channel (for folks in house/etc, more bandwidth, can be secured with password, etc)
  • Things to add to the firmware:
    • Privoxy! Non-caching web proxy for block "obnoxious internet junk"
    • Ghostery (protect from tracking)
    • Adblock (allow for easy opt-in)
  • Put passwords on the PoE adapters and let people maintain their own node's level of privacy, upgrades, etc

Useful Anecdotes

  • Internet Archive has created a super node up in Richmond (~15km from here)
  • Chris has used a dish and 4ft antenna like ours and with line of sight reached up to 2 miles
  • Chris has created a router with an xbee radio (cheaper, takes less power) hooked up to the serial port to take in different kinds of sensor data
    • Air quality egg
    • Router w/ xbee unit for additional cost

Needs

  • Antennas towers
    • Telescoping flagpoles! (suggested by Seattle Meshnet) - up to 20ft, available Harbor Freight for $50
  • Wooden blocks with hinges to direct the Picos
  • Ubiquiti sector antennas as major backbone points (2 x 2 x) - up to 40 subscribers, with dishes pointing the signal outward in all directions

Research Assignment

Homework Assignment: Research a Mesh Project that has succeeded or failed

  • Week 1: Marc
  • Week 2: Jenny
  • Week 3: Chris
  • August: Eddan

Web Resources

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