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The Well-Connected Park Bench

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the welcome-to-the-non-fray dept.

|proc|meminfo writes: "MSN is bringing internet access to park benches in Bury St. Edmunds, England. The bench (for now) will be in Abbey Gardens, and those with laptops will be able to hook up to recieve free MSN internet access through the bench. MSN says it should be ready for operation in August/September."

Interesting to see Microsoft's approach here -- a park bench on the internet is a good idea. The concept of connecting community centers with computers predates the Net and is going on all around, though; you may find these two academic overviews (here's one, and another) intriguing, especially the mentions of the Berkeley-area Community Memory project. And looking beyond parkbenches, various community networking groups like consume.net are working to decentralize Net access, at least for those living where coverage is available.

8 of 139 comments (clear)

  1. This will come in very useful... by saihung · · Score: 4

    Glad to see that MS is trying to retain the loyalties of the great mass of newly-unemployed IT workers who no doubt will soon be living on these in addition to accessing the net from them. It'll be like having my DSL back!

  2. Hate to nitpick by Zach · · Score: 4

    Interesting to see Microsoft's approach here -- a park bench on the internet is a good idea.

    Isn't it vice versa - the internet on a park bench? I believe so :)

  3. This is getting out of hand. by empesey · · Score: 4

    Do we really need to have this much connectivity? Soon we're going to have 12 step programs for internet junkies and people getting mugged for their bandwidth.

    Hi, my name is smith@parkbench.com and I'm an internet junkie. I've been broadband free for 3 weeks.

    Hello smith@parkbench.com.



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    Entropy ain't just a good idea. It's the law.

  4. Connected how? by Guppy06 · · Score: 4

    Sounds like a great application for IP over avian carriers to me!

  5. Re:theft? by nakaduct · · Score: 5
    [but people steal ATM machines!]
    Maybe the article didn't make this clear, but the bench is not filled with money.

    You can buy a wireless phone for, umm... nothing. Stealing one from the middle of a half-ton of concrete sounds like a lot of effort to me.
  6. WRONG SEAT! by neema · · Score: 5

    But how come no one makes the seat that everyone loves internet accessible? I'd be on the toilet and on the internet a whole lot more then on a bench.

  7. Re:MSN? by FatOldGoth · · Score: 5

    Someone should develop an Open Source park bench.

    Yeah! Then we could compare the performance of the two through a series of benchmarks.

    Sorry. Couldn't resist. I'll go quietly.


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    --

    I would be a paid subscriber if Taco and Hemos weren't such cunts
  8. if the MSN logo is on the seat... by npongratz · · Score: 5

    ... Microsoft can finally (literally) kiss my ass.