The forum probably needs a sticky thread or a large graphic at the top that explains what othernet is, epically the one way flow of information. There is a common theme in mutiple posts thinking it is satellite internet or a two way messaging system; clearing up it is one way, up front, will help focus the discussion on development. I have been following outernet/othernet since it was mentioned on satellite guys years ago. Even before that I was excited about what OLPC could do. There are places in the world where a trickle of information from othernet could make a huge difference.
I put together an outline of some use cases for othernet, see below.
Othernet Dreamcatcher Usecases
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Dreamcatcher as stand-alone wi-fi information center, no internet connection
- Permanent Subcase: no internet available in area ever, such as a remote deployment
- Wiki articles and news will be good to get information from the rest of the world
- A way to prepopulate prioritized wiki content before deployment would be good
- Temporary Subcase requires dreamcatcher to have power
- Example scenarios
- go into an area with no internet such as bring the dreamcatcher on a camping trip
- Good for receiving news
- Good for receiving messages from satellite
- Natural disaster or terrorism knocks out wired internet, power, cellular network
- With coordination this is where othernet can shine
- Messages of where help is coming, where to go for safety, where to get supplies
- News articles relevant to area hit by disaster
- Content sent to help with morale
- Entertainment
- Distraction
- Encouragement
- go into an area with no internet such as bring the dreamcatcher on a camping trip
- Example scenarios
- Permanent Subcase: no internet available in area ever, such as a remote deployment
-
Dreamcatcher part of a larger network, no internet connection, dreamcatcher hosting content for network
- Wireless Subcase
- Dreamcatcher connected to network by wifi
- Wifi may be the bottleneck
- Wired Subcase
- Dreamcatcher connected to network by ethernet
- Dreamcatcher CPU/USB/SD interface may be the bottleneck
- Wireless Subcase
-
Dreamcatcher as part of a larger network, no internet connection, dreamcatcher feeding updated content to server on network, such as internet in a box
- Server on network would copy content from dreamcatcher as it comes in
- If server has a local copy of Wikipedia then as wiki content comes in from Othernet server can update the local Wikipedia
- Othernet transmission rate of less than 0.1 Mb/s means wired or wireless connection will not bottleneck dreamcatcher server communication
- Would probably want users, such as students, from directly being able to access dreamcatcher
- Server on network would copy content from dreamcatcher as it comes in
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Dreamcatcher as an alternate patch for information to come into network, typically an internet connection is available
- typical North American and European use case
- Internet is available most of the time but outages happen
- Othernet is interesting
- Amateur radio
- Satellite communication
- Tinkering
- Gadgets
- Develop product for the good of the world
- Way to get news if the internet goes out
- Way to get content if internet goes out
- Messages coming in from satellite could allow for one way digital communication
- Post disaster scenario
- Othernet only works if the uplinks are working so post apocalypse is iffy
- Dystopian censorship depends on where uplinks are and where users are
- Natural disaster or terrorism knocks out wired internet, power, cellular network
- Assume dreamcatcher and rest of network has power
- With coordination this is where othernet can shine
- Messages of where help is coming, where to go for safety, where to get supplies
- News articles relevant to area hit by disaster
- Content sent to help with morale
- Entertainment
- Distraction
- Encouragement
- typical North American and European use case