Providing Free WiFi from Home

I live in a relatively small city and thought it'd be fun to see if
there were any wi-fi hotspots in town. I knew a couple of the local
college campuses provided free wireless but I doubted anywhere else
did. So imagine my surprise when I plugged in my card and found 3
networks from my apartment bedroom! I don't live near any businesses
so I'm guessing these are coming from the other apartments around me.
I set up my own wireless access point by way of my cable internet
provider and told some of the people in my building to feel free to
log onto it. I'm completely supportive of the free wireless nation
dream that seems to have died out due to commercialism, but I was
wondering if its legal to provide such a service and if many other
people have done the same. I called up my ISP and asked them about the
number of computers I could have hooked to my network and he said 4 or
5 at a time won't draw any suspicion at all. Thanks,

Adym Roxx wrote:
> I live in a relatively small city and thought it'd be fun to see if
> there were any wi-fi hotspots in town. I knew a couple of the local
> college campuses provided free wireless but I doubted anywhere else
> did. So imagine my surprise when I plugged in my card and found 3
> networks from my apartment bedroom! I don't live near any businesses
> so I'm guessing these are coming from the other apartments around me.
> I set up my own wireless access point by way of my cable internet
> provider and told some of the people in my building to feel free to
> log onto it. I'm completely supportive of the free wireless nation
> dream that seems to have died out due to commercialism, but I was
> wondering if its legal to provide such a service and if many other
> people have done the same. I called up my ISP and asked them about the
> number of computers I could have hooked to my network and he said 4 or
> 5 at a time won't draw any suspicion at all. Thanks,
Sharing your connection is certainly gracious of you, but you should be
aware of certain possible problems.

1) People sharing your Internet connection are also sharing your local
network connection. That is, if you have any shares available on your
conputer(s), you could be vulnerable someone accessing you computer,
seeing your data, even deleting data.

2) You have certain legal obligations and obligations based on your
contract with your ISP. For example, not to spam, probably not to run
servers, etc. Unless you make changes to your network to prevent users
from abusing the connection, you could be denied access by your ISP. If
someone using your connection, for example, distributes copyrighted
material, you could be charged by the RIAA, since the distribution
originated from your ISP assigned IP address.

I think sharing is an excellent choice. But you need to be careful.

In article <(E-Mail Removed) >,
(E-Mail Removed) says...
> I live in a relatively small city and thought it'd be fun to see if
> there were any wi-fi hotspots in town. I knew a couple of the local
> college campuses provided free wireless but I doubted anywhere else
> did. So imagine my surprise when I plugged in my card and found 3
> networks from my apartment bedroom! I don't live near any businesses
> so I'm guessing these are coming from the other apartments around me.
> I set up my own wireless access point by way of my cable internet
> provider and told some of the people in my building to feel free to
> log onto it. I'm completely supportive of the free wireless nation
> dream that seems to have died out due to commercialism, but I was
> wondering if its legal to provide such a service and if many other
> people have done the same. I called up my ISP and asked them about the
> number of computers I could have hooked to my network and he said 4 or
> 5 at a time won't draw any suspicion at all. Thanks,
>
Don't just take the person you spoke with's word on the subject. Be sure
you re-read your ISP's terms of service agreement to see if you are
precluded from allowing your bandwidth to be used by others...
--

Ben E. Brady
http://www.clariondeveloper.com/wepgen
FREE! Effectively manage your Wi-Fi network.
Change your WEP keys often!

http://www.clariondeveloper.com/webcloak
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Keep spam bots from sending you spam!

http://www.firewallreporting.com
Personal firewall log analysis tools for
ZoneAlarm, BlackICE, WinRoute Pro and Windows XP
Take stock of your firewall settings and take action against intruders.

http://www.videoprofessorscam.com
Don't get stung by this scam!

Adym Roxx wrote:

> I'm completely supportive of the free wireless nation
> dream that seems to have died out due to commercialism, but I was
> wondering if its legal to provide such a service and if many other
> people have done the same. I called up my ISP and asked them about the
> number of computers I could have hooked to my network and he said 4 or
> 5 at a time won't draw any suspicion at all. Thanks,

My concern would be someone using it for illegal purposes. Also, there may
be something in your AUP, that prohibits sharing with neighbours.

--

Fundamentalism is fundamentally wrong.

To reply to this message, replace everything to the left of "@" with
james.knott.

Adym Roxx wrote:

> I live in a relatively small city and thought it'd be fun to see if
> there were any wi-fi hotspots in town. I knew a couple of the local
> college campuses provided free wireless but I doubted anywhere else
> did. So imagine my surprise when I plugged in my card and found 3
> networks from my apartment bedroom! I don't live near any businesses
> so I'm guessing these are coming from the other apartments around me.
> I set up my own wireless access point by way of my cable internet
> provider and told some of the people in my building to feel free to
> log onto it. I'm completely supportive of the free wireless nation
> dream that seems to have died out due to commercialism, but I was
> wondering if its legal to provide such a service and if many other
> people have done the same. I called up my ISP and asked them about the
> number of computers I could have hooked to my network and he said 4 or
> 5 at a time won't draw any suspicion at all. Thanks,

"Free wireless nation dream" is a good way to phrase it. No matter how
much you rationalize it, bandwidth costs money. Somebody somewhere is
paying for it, even if it isn't you.

If you support a nation of free wireless access, go ahead and install
the national infrastructure, hire the multitude of personnel to design,
install and maintain it, and feel free to tell the whole country that
bandwidth is "on the house". I know I'd appreciate it if I had a 1Gb
connection to the internet and you paid for it.

Rôgêr wrote:

> If you support a nation of free wireless access, go ahead and install
> the national infrastructure, hire the multitude of personnel to design,
> install and maintain it, and feel free to tell the whole country that
> bandwidth is "on the house". I know I'd appreciate it if I had a 1Gb
> connection to the internet and you paid for it.
>

I'd even buy him a beer or two, to show my appreciation. ;-)

--

Fundamentalism is fundamentally wrong.

To reply to this message, replace everything to the left of "@" with
james.knott.

On Sat, 08 May 2004 19:14:11 GMT, James Knott <(E-Mail Removed)>
wrote:

>Rôgêr wrote:
>
>> If you support a nation of free wireless access, go ahead and install
>> the national infrastructure, hire the multitude of personnel to design,
>> install and maintain it, and feel free to tell the whole country that
>> bandwidth is "on the house". I know I'd appreciate it if I had a 1Gb
>> connection to the internet and you paid for it.
>>
Eventually, given enough time, YEARS, this will happen. Not too sure
about the 1Gb part though.
>
>I'd even buy him a beer or two, to show my appreciation. ;-)
Enough people do this and you could open your own bar!

f/f george wrote:

> On Sat, 08 May 2004 19:14:11 GMT, James Knott <(E-Mail Removed)>
> wrote:
>
>
>>Rôgêr wrote:
>>
>>
>>>If you support a nation of free wireless access, go ahead and install
>>>the national infrastructure, hire the multitude of personnel to design,
>>>install and maintain it, and feel free to tell the whole country that
>>>bandwidth is "on the house". I know I'd appreciate it if I had a 1Gb
>>>connection to the internet and you paid for it.
>>>
>
> Eventually, given enough time, YEARS, this will happen. Not too sure
> about the 1Gb part though.

Don't be absurd. If history teaches us anything, it's that we learn
nothing from history. Shit, by the time my daughter is a grandmother the
thought of a 1Gb limit will be a long lost hysterical memory.

I notice nobody has a nation of free telephone yet, and it's been well over
a century. Cheap telephone, yes (some places), subsidized, yes (most
places), but free?

I do think the no-charge model is the best way to exploit wifi, but that
doesn't equate to free. It means hotspots that aren't specifically trying to
make a profit off it. It means your coffe might cost a penny more, and your
access time might be limited. It means your tax dollar might pay for access
points on lampposts in the park. This model is alive and well in many cities
(Portland, Oregon and Austin, Texas come to mind).

A national wifi mesh that exploits everybody's non-commercial home DSL and
cable connections would necessarily increase the burden on these
connections, Enormously. The vendors would either shut it down before it
grew very large, or else we'd all end up paying a lot more for commercial
service to our homes. Somebody would have to pay for the additional buildout
required to serve the increased demand, and I guarantee that telcos and
cable companies will not donate it out of the goodness of their hearts.

"f/f george" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message
news:(E-Mail Removed)...
> On Sat, 08 May 2004 19:14:11 GMT, James Knott <(E-Mail Removed)>
> wrote:
>
> >Rôgêr wrote:
> >
> >> If you support a nation of free wireless access, go ahead and install
> >> the national infrastructure, hire the multitude of personnel to design,
> >> install and maintain it, and feel free to tell the whole country that
> >> bandwidth is "on the house". I know I'd appreciate it if I had a 1Gb
> >> connection to the internet and you paid for it.
> >>
> Eventually, given enough time, YEARS, this will happen. Not too sure
> about the 1Gb part though.
> >
> >I'd even buy him a beer or two, to show my appreciation. ;-)
> Enough people do this and you could open your own bar!
>

On Sun, 09 May 2004 01:50:59 GMT, in alt.internet.wireless , "gary"
<(E-Mail Removed)> wrote:

>I notice nobody has a nation of free telephone yet, and it's been well over
>a century. Cheap telephone, yes (some places), subsidized, yes (most
>places), but free?

Define "free". Name me something you think is free, other than perhaps air
or thought, and I suspect we can find how you're paying for it.

FWIW I get "free" telephone calls. I pay 15.99 line rental, and can call as
much as I like.

>I do think the no-charge model is the best way to exploit wifi, but that
>doesn't equate to free. It means hotspots that aren't specifically trying to
>make a profit off it. It means your coffe might cost a penny more,

exactly.

--
Mark McIntyre
CLC FAQ <http://www.eskimo.com/~scs/C-faq/top.html>
CLC readme: <http://www.angelfire.com/ms3/bchambless0/welcome_to_clc.html>


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