Monday, February 24: Wireless Network Infrastructures & Uses

Via Wikimedia Commons

This week we’ll dive into types of wireless networks that have been designed and built for different social contexts and shaped by community goals and limitations. In particular, we’ll explore networks designed for resistance, resilience, and other social goals, and we’ll collaboratively design our own “speculative” networks.

Workshop: Every Network Tells a Story

Guests: Scott Rasmussen & Shea Molloy (NYC Mesh)

To be reviewed before class:

SUPPLEMENTAL RESOURCES:

One Reply

  • The idea of a DIY network really interests me because of the extent of what we can consider a network. We have spoke in class about network ways of thinking that human beings already exhibit and how important these ways of thinking are to our social organization. I think that the infrastructure and uses of network technology has the potential to deeply affect our social organization. Yet the infrastructure for this new technology is still deeply attached to the infrstructure of previous technology and previous agreements, both commercial and public. Understanding the borderland between huge instiuitions and buisnesses that control our connectivity and the ability for DIY, is a helpful step in understanding the future of connectivity both technological and social.
    All of the articles especially Greta’s touched on the hardware required to create networks. In many cases the hardwares minimalism, like the internet in a box, actually proves to not only be more convienent but in some cases more resiliant. The article used the example of hurricaine sandy and red hook, a neighborhood right on the coast of BK and thus very heavily exposed to the hurricaine. All other network and communication systems failed through most of BK exept the DIY mesh network put together in the community but local organizers. Besides an infrastrcutural win, I wonder how DIY networks would change the conent of the internet and what was shared or the purpose it was shared with. I know this is a general question and doest give any idea of a a real scenario. The article makes me wonder about the future and about its potential.

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