Wireless mesh routers and DIY ISPs

A new startup aims to make everyone an ISP, whether you have access to a wired …

If you've been reading my coverage of connectivity issues here at Ars, then you might have noticed that I'm real big on the idea of ad hoc, peer-to-peer, wireless mesh networks as the future of the Internet for densely populated urban areas. (See this post on the last mile problem, or this one on Bluetooth and UWB, for instance.) This being the case, I was excited to read GigaOM's piece on a new start-up out of MIT called Meraki Networks, which aims to bring exactly this sort of wireless mesh networking to the masses.

The company's goal is to commercialize the results of the MIT Roofnet project by offering a hardware and software combination that will let users with wireless access points essentially become ISPs. But before I talk about Meraki, let me explain just how the Roofnet project works, to give you some context for Meraki's new product offering.

Router on the roof

In a nutshell, MIT's Roofnet allows people in and around Central Square in Cambridge to gang together their wireless access points into a kind of wireless cloud that anyone with a WiFi device can access if they're in range. There are some specifics I'm leaving out—you have to use a particular model of router, and you have to sign up for the program—but you get the general idea.

There are two ways to participate in Roofnet as a wireless access provider: as a node on the mesh, or as a gateway. If you participate as a node, then all you do is put the right model of wireless router running the right software in your window and turn it on. The router connects to other, nearby wireless routers, and it routes packets for the network and acts as an access point for end users. Of course, there have to be wired connections providing Internet connectivity somewhere in the mesh, and that's where the gateways come in. If you participate in Roofnet as a gateway, then you're sharing your own personal cable or DSL bandwidth with the rest of the network.

Meraki Networks plans to commercialize this mesh network model by offering a small, cheap ($50) wireless router, the Meraki Mini, that comes pre-loaded with the mesh network software. You can use the Mini to launch your own wireless network by just plugging it into your own broadband connection. The Mini's software lets you do traffic monitoring and shaping, branding, and billing, so that you're essentially reselling the bandwidth of a company like Comcast or AT&T. (Yeah, the telcos are gonna love that idea, but more on that in a moment.) Other users with Minis can connect to your router and extend the network outwards, choosing to participate as nodes or as gateways. With enough of these devices, you could cover a whole apartment building, or a whole block, with wireless... that is, if they don't step on each other.

Potential problems

As I said at the outset I'm a big fan the wireless mesh network idea, but it's certain to face a mix of technical and legal challenges. On the technical side, you can only fit so many wireless networks into a given volume of space before they start stepping on each other. Those of us who live in 'Net-savvy apartment buildings know this interference phenomenon all too well. So there's a kind of natural upper bound on the number of nodes in an area.

The ultimate solution to this, as I never tire of pointing out, is ultrawideband (UWB), which can accommodate a theoretically infinite number of overlapping networks in the same volume of space. Hopefully, by the time meshes get so dense that interference really start to take a toll, UWB hardware will be available.

As for the legal challenges, everyone from the federal government to the RIAA to your broadband provider are going to want a piece of you the moment you hang out an ISP shingle and start billing customers. Will you be obliged to comply with CALEA if you choose to route VoIP traffic? Will your (quasi?) official status as an "ISP" grant you immunity to RIAA lawsuits while making you the target of subpoenas instead? Is Comcast really going to sit still while the number of wired Internet connections in an apartment block drops by half or more, with their remaining customers acting as competition by reselling Comcast's own bandwidth to former customers?

Of course, not all ISPs are like Comcast and Verizon, which forbid sharing your wireless connection with others. Speakeasy, for instance, actively encourages their users to share their connection with the public. I think ISPs could get creative and ask for a cut of the proceeds that users get from reselling bandwidth, in effect making their end users authorized bandwidth resellers. But that idea makes sense, and when it comes to anything that smells of "P2P" and "grassroots," rationality rarely prevails in the boardroom.

I'm certain that Meraki is aware of all these issues, and this is probably an instance of a technology company deliberately moving much faster than the law in an effort to create "facts on the ground" that the legal system is left to respond to. If this idea gets any real traction in the market, we're going to see a wave of attempts by ISPs to lock out routers that aren't using approved firmware. The wireless mesh network phenomenon threatens way too many entrenched interests to be allowed to grow uncontested.

Expand full story

You must to comment.