[BitPool] Mesh networks to bypass ISPs

[Elwar]

I've often seen mesh network type projects, why exactly haven't any of them taken off?

I also usually see that there is no financial incentive in most of these projects. Once the few people working for free move on to other things, nobody replaces them, waiting for those people to come back.

[1713547015]

1713547015

[cbeast]

Greed would destroy it. People would jam their competitors bandwidth to get more money.

[franky1]

Greed would destroy it. People would jam their competitors bandwidth to get more money.

i fully agreed

instead of a transaction going from capetown to eastern russia, where 200,000 people get a satoshi each. 5 super nodes (one per main country on the route) would share out the 0.002btc between them (0.0004btc each).

[cbeast]

Greed would destroy it. People would jam their competitors bandwidth to get more money.

i fully agreed

instead of a transaction going from capetown to eastern russia, where 200,000 people get a satoshi each. 5 super nodes (one per main country on the route) would share out the 0.002btc between them (0.0004btc each).

Meshnets would probably work fine when the endpoints are in densely populated areas. Monopolies would still own rural networks and take a big chunk of the revenue.

[Elwar]

Greed would destroy it. People would jam their competitors bandwidth to get more money.

When you have to pay for the bandwidth you use, and your competitors get paid for providing that bandwidth...how would people be able to jam their competitors bandwidth?

[cbeast]

Greed would destroy it. People would jam their competitors bandwidth to get more money.

When you have to pay for the bandwidth you use, and your competitors get paid for providing that bandwidth...how would people be able to jam their competitors bandwidth?

I use the term "jam" figuratively. Someone will find a way to throw a monkey wrench into the system. Look at ASICs and mining pools.

[raganius]

This is a very interesting (and also very important) subject.

I have become curious about mesh networks since I first learned about p2p (freenet, tor, etc...), and then I have realised that we depend too much on the Internet.

The Internet is very fragile. Too fragile to be trusted in the long run. There's no way we can continue depending on it indefinitely.

A really independent mesh network is necessary. Independent from the Internet. It's resilience will give us enough safety.

I'd like to share here some interesting links that I am sure most of you are already acquainted, but it seems to be important as reference:

• https://projectmeshnet.org
• https://openwrt.org
• https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/documentation/MultipeerConnectivity/Reference/MultipeerConnectivityFramework/Introduction/Introduction.html
• https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=372904
• https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=6477

I am so sorry that I have no technical knowledge to be of much help though, but I'll always be watching this thread. I hope good ideas and projects will come up.

(I hope that we will never really need a mesh network: that in the end the world's sinister totalitarian trend is reverted, and freedom prevails after all... but, just in case...)

[DannyElfman]

google wifi drones

The company that spies on us for the government.

i meant the concept of flying wifi routers buzzing around the skies of a town. (not specifically requesting them to be google owned)

These nodes would need some kind of incentive to operate or else they would not operate. If you were to say that it would give the owner access to the rest of the internet/network, then what if a node operator used much more bandwidth for himself then he relayed for others? Other nodes would not want to relay data packets to him because he is taking much more then his fair share.

[franky1]

These nodes would need some kind of incentive to operate or else they would not operate. If you were to say that it would give the owner access to the rest of the internet/network, then what if a node operator used much more bandwidth for himself then he relayed for others? Other nodes would not want to relay data packets to him because he is taking much more then his fair share.

one of my other posts mentioned a 1sat fee per node or large fee for distance relaying, as an example

[Elwar]

A really independent mesh network is necessary. Independent from the Internet. It's resilience will give us enough safety.

Early on it could certainly tunnel through the current Internet.

[ShakyhandsBTCer]

if it only cost 1satoshi per repeater to transmit the TX. and the range of a repeater was only 100 metres. it would cost 0.00043000 for a tx US east coast to US west coast. and a hell of alot more to go from lets say capetown (southafrica) to eastern russia across land 0.002 relay fee

Wouldn't this add a lot of TX to the blockchain? Like huge amounts.

[franky1]

if it only cost 1satoshi per repeater to transmit the TX. and the range of a repeater was only 100 metres. it would cost 0.00043000 for a tx US east coast to US west coast. and a hell of alot more to go from lets say capetown (southafrica) to eastern russia across land 0.002 relay fee

Wouldn't this add a lot of TX to the blockchain? Like huge amounts.

i wrote a big long explanation, then thought it was too long and waffly.. but in short

depends how the mesh network was set up.. and for what purpose.

but so far the idea is just at the dream stage, it seems that it needs thrashing out and theorized.. hense why im throwing lots of idea's/theories into the mix to help whomever wants to go ahead with it. to see it from different angles.

currently the internet works for bitcoin. but in a scenario that the internet wasnt around, and a different method of peer-to-peer relaying was required.. lets say a totally different protocol. and was named meshcoin then the blockchain would look and act very different.

if used just to transmit from countries where internet was blocked, into countries where it wasnt blocked. then the data that is relayed could simply be an encrypted offchain balance movement API command.. (much like webwallet services(coinbase) credit users internally)

thus the fee would be distributed internally. without spamming the blockchain

[ShakyhandsBTCer]

if it only cost 1satoshi per repeater to transmit the TX. and the range of a repeater was only 100 metres. it would cost 0.00043000 for a tx US east coast to US west coast. and a hell of alot more to go from lets say capetown (southafrica) to eastern russia across land 0.002 relay fee

Wouldn't this add a lot of TX to the blockchain? Like huge amounts.

i wrote a big long explanation, then thought it was too long and waffly.. but in short

depends how the mesh network was set up.. and for what purpose.

but so far the idea is just at the dream stage, it seems that it needs thrashing out and theorized.. hense why im throwing lots of idea's/theories into the mix to help whomever wants to go ahead with it. to see it from different angles.

currently the internet works for bitcoin. but in a scenario that the internet wasnt around, and a different method of peer-to-peer relaying was required.. lets say a totally different protocol. and was named meshcoin then the blockchain would look and act very different.

if used just to transmit from countries where internet was blocked, into countries where it wasnt blocked. then the data that is relayed could simply be an encrypted offchain balance movement API command.. (much like webwallet services(coinbase) credit users internally)

thus the fee would be distributed internally. without spamming the blockchain

Who would control that "internal distribution" that would be responsible for making sure everyone pays and is paid properly?

I like the idea of have the fees be distributed internally as each transmission could easily have 100 or more outputs if each node were to only transmit data 300 meters.

Another issue would be that of large websites that have a lot of traffic. Wouldn't surrounding nodes of where the node for major websites like CNN.com get overloaded with traffic?

[theblacksquid]

I've yet to see the killer system; the Bittorrent or Bitcoin of this space.

Maybe safecoin is the answer to the bandwidth issue:
The resources in question are storage, CPU, online time and bandwidth.

I'm not sure how they deal with paying for bandwidth and online time but it might be a good way to reward each node.

http://www.safecoin.io/

MaidSafe and safecoin only addresses the storage and movement of data between machines, but doesnt address the hardware needed to actually relay the data around like radio, wifi or cable connections. It would still go through centralized ISP's.

But, we could take MaidSafe's idea on a totally different scale. Imagine each mobile device around converted into mini-nodes passing around packets of data, buildings fitted with more heavy-duty nodes to facilitate bigger areas (city blocks, towns, cities), blimps and cubesats then disseminating that info accross oceans and continents.

How can we get people to use this? Simple, they get free internet, everywhere! But it only after it reaches a certain critical mass

[franky1]

if it only cost 1satoshi per repeater to transmit the TX. and the range of a repeater was only 100 metres. it would cost 0.00043000 for a tx US east coast to US west coast. and a hell of alot more to go from lets say capetown (southafrica) to eastern russia across land 0.002 relay fee

Wouldn't this add a lot of TX to the blockchain? Like huge amounts.

i wrote a big long explanation, then thought it was too long and waffly.. but in short

depends how the mesh network was set up.. and for what purpose.

but so far the idea is just at the dream stage, it seems that it needs thrashing out and theorized.. hense why im throwing lots of idea's/theories into the mix to help whomever wants to go ahead with it. to see it from different angles.

currently the internet works for bitcoin. but in a scenario that the internet wasnt around, and a different method of peer-to-peer relaying was required.. lets say a totally different protocol. and was named meshcoin then the blockchain would look and act very different.

if used just to transmit from countries where internet was blocked, into countries where it wasnt blocked. then the data that is relayed could simply be an encrypted offchain balance movement API command.. (much like webwallet services(coinbase) credit users internally)

thus the fee would be distributed internally. without spamming the blockchain

(1)Who would control that "internal distribution" that would be responsible for making sure everyone pays and is paid properly?

(2)I like the idea of have the fees be distributed internally as each transmission could easily have 100 or more outputs if each node were to only transmit data 300 meters.

(3)Another issue would be that of large websites that have a lot of traffic. Wouldn't surrounding nodes of where the node for major websites like CNN.com get overloaded with traffic?

(1) code would ultimately deal with it. for instance on btc-e.com they do offchain transactions between users by offering btc-e codes which are generated by code, users email them to each other and the receiver deposits the code to get credited. coinbase does it differently by allowing a user to say in laymens terms "pay ShakyhandsBTCer : 0.5btc". and the coinbase code just adjusts the senders balance 0.5 less and adjusts your balance 0.5 more

(2) well bitcoins are not sent 300 yards, they have to go through miners and sit on a blockchain. so thats means transactions need to be sent out of country to where there is internet. or if it was a new protocol (like meshcoin idea i brainfarted) then the principles of a blockchain as we see it today would be different.

(3) many websites have large userbase. but using the africa analogy. not every user would independently be sending data to the webwallet. instead the supernode that have a internet connection would (and they would be getting rich because of being the last node of the whole trip). if their computer couldnt handle such volume if suddenly 1million africans somehow all wanted to send data his direction all at the same time. then while offline another node with internet would relay it, getting the reward for doing so.

maybe part of programming the mesh network would be to ensure there were suitable supernodes that can handle large volume, and have limits of transmission per minute to allow a fair distribution for all nodes at the north african border who have internet. so that not only one node gets their part of the fee. eg to distribute the greed that one node isnt the only node transmitting to the webwallet

but these are all theories of how the back bone of a meshnetwork could turn out to be like in the future.. no one has really gone into too much detail about how value/balance would be confirmed in a non mining/short distance per-to-per network. or how transmission bloat/thousands of relays going through a single node at a country border  would be dealt with

[Elwar]

I could see something like a "subscription" base for nodes connecting to nodes.

Each node pays for X amount of bandwidth up front to another node. That node does not know if it is a relay or a user connecting. Something like .01 BTC for 10Gb of data transfer. Once that amount is used up, the node or user has to pay again. This has been shown to be a viable way of paying for Internet service with bitcoins.

You could set the amount you want and your nodes could seek out the best rate among nodes. Users could also seek out the best nodes to connect to for their Internet access.

If a node is getting paid a lot for traffic it then has to pay other nodes for the traffic needs from them.

There could be different levels of access for short term access like in an airport where you only need 10Mb or so, or higher subscriptions for major hubs.

The market would push the rates down as anyone can drop in a node and set their price.

[franky1]

my past couple posts were going off to a tangent of a country wide ISP avoidance.. so lets simplify it.
yes im continuing on about payment side of internet access. but because its local im not worrying about payment protocols as its easier to manage bitcoins with not many non-direct internet hops locally  

imagine in a town 5 people had the internet(blue circles) and were willing to open their wifi internet connection to random people and relays(red circles) to make a whole town WIFI accessible


infrustructure
each WIFI connection, instead of a 'computer name' it was a bitcoin address and a price per hour
EG
connct to:
1Bitci0n4ddr355BlaBlaBla&price=$1

other users phone/ipad/device computer would have their device name set as their bitcoin address, so that the wifi connection would know who was connected and paid to use the connection. and blocking connections that did not pay. simply by comparing received transactions vs connected pc's

Scenario 1 meshnet owns all the relays
those with internet worked out on average their internet bill was ~$30 a month and 1 meshnet connection was made to him, so he charged meshnet $50 a month, same goes for the other 4 people
because meshnet owns all relays they have a combined cost of $150 to all 5 internet connections,

Scenario 2 random people own the relays
those with internet worked out on average their internet bill was ~$30 a month and 1 relay connection was made to him, costing that relay $50 a month. the relay had an average of 3 other relays connected to them so the first relay could divide the $50(and profit) charging $27 for each of the 3 connecting relays($81 combined). those connected relays would have 3 other relays so dividing and profiting, theyd charge $15 each ($45 combined).
so by the time it got to the centre of town (based on image above) the 'cost' to run the relay would be under $10 a month. but due to connections, the signal would be weak. meaning (and being fair) the closer the network is to a true internet connection, the more average joe walking along the street would pay.

now imagine 5000 residents in their homes or wondering the streets wanted to use the internet
scenario 1= 3 cents a month per user because the costs are divided down ($150/5000) so meshnet could be greedy and charge $1 a month per user. ($5000/$150=$4850 profit)

scenario 2= those relays closest the internet connection have their costs met by the other relays, so if the town agreed on $1 a month per user for high speed, that is pure profit and its offering priority high speed. the relays at the centre paying $10 internet. and have low speed due to distance and amount of relaying, may only charge an agreed 50c a month per user.

which if each relays coverage was 250 users the one closest to the internet connection would get $250 a month (greedy Bstard ) and the one at the centre would only get $115 ($125 income-$10 relay fee). and the ones inbetween would vary depending on distance.

making scenario 2 where the fee/profit ratio is linked to distance away from the internet. and scenario 1 is a set fee no matter where

pre-empting rebuttles
.. yes i know the relays are making more then the homes with true internet but for now im pointing out that for atmost $1 a month users could have a wifi connection anywhere in town

.. yes i know the IP limitations of routers (im theorizing, no need to knit pick its just an example)

.. yes i know i used dollars instead of bitcoins. but the dollar amounts were not important, just used for easy math purposes

.. yes i know the system would work better with average users were getting better internet speeds if 5000 were not just sharing 5 connections, but instead 50,100 or more

.. and yes i know the profit margin of the relays would be less greedy for the same $1 user value with more internet connections, but im trying to keep it simple

so which would you prefer
scenario 1A. set fee paid to one entity no matter the signal strength (distance from the true internet connection)
scenario 1B. varying fee paid to one entity dependent on signal strength.
scenario 2A. set fee paid to random relay owner no matter the signal strength (distance from the true internet connection)
scenario 2B. varying fee paid to random relay owner dependent on signal strength.

or if none of the above, how would you monetize the project

[Elwar]

my past couple posts were going off to a tangent of a country wide ISP avoidance.. so lets simplify it.
yes im continuing on about payment side of internet access. but because its local im not worrying about payment protocols as its easier to manage bitcoins with not many non-direct internet hops locally  

imagine in a town 5 people had the internet(blue circles) and were willing to open their wifi internet connection to random people and relays(red circles) to make a whole town WIFI accessible

I like the part about having your bitcoin address tied to your computer. You could have your connecting client sign a transaction for verification.

I do like how the closer you get to the "real" Internet the higher the cost because of the assumed better bandwidth.

But there should be a way to pay (and charge) for the best speeds and higher traffic. This would encourage people to be like miners and upgrade their hardware often with the final result being blazing fast network speeds and high data ceilings.

[kelle]

I use routers to  bypass ISPs.

[Elwar]

Greed will destroy you.

Still using dial up to connect to the Internet?

Or are you enjoying the benefits of the greedy companies that want to offer more and more speed to make money?