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Open Park Project Gives Free Wi-Fi to Capitol Hill
mindless4210 writes "The Open Park Project has made free Wi-Fi internet access available to anyone around the Supreme Court, Library of Congress, and Capitol Visitor's Center. "It's a hotspot for democracy," said Greg Staple, Open Park's co-founder. The non-profit organization has also received a significant donation of Wi-Fi equipment from Tropos Networks, which it plans to use to establish a mesh of free hotspots across the National Mall."
What kind of bandwidth can you get on the WiFi, measured by Libraries of Congress?
First correct reply gets a cookie.
now I can receive SPAM while I am around Supreme Court, Library of Congress, and Capitol Visitor's Center.
On the positive side, I can go in the supreme court sue the spammer.
Consensus is good, but informed dictatorship is better
Hordes of geeky types hanging around the Mall with their laptops trying to hack into Senator's and each other's PCs.
I Am My Own Worst Enemy
Now I can anonymously hack into the government while sitting right in front of a government building!
"free Wi-Fi internet access available to anyone around the Supreme Court, Library of Congress, and Capitol Visitor's Center."
That's all we need: A flock of music pirates, child porographers, warez people, movie pirates, huge doom or quake mulitplayers all in one area...
Hmmm actually, it sounds like a party, lets go!
Time to get the nice 10db 802.11 antenna up on the jeep, park nearby and soak up the packets!
1.) Park Car/hangout with laptop, with linux->kismet->dsniff
2.) Soak up logins/passwords, web surfing (pr0n), instant messaging habits of congressmen, aids, lobbyists etc
3.) PROFIT!
Sounds like a prime location for some internal investigating...Maybe the FBI has a wireless varient of the "Carnivore" blackbox.
Creative Demolition
One of the arguments for government censorship of broadcast television and radio is 'pervasiveness'. That is, since radio and television broadcast signals can come into the home 'uninvited' and received into the eyes and ears of children, the government must provide a filter. As free Wi-Fi access points like this become more ubiquitous, giving internet access a similar pervasiveness, it will be interesting to see if internet censorship gains more support.
They've been pretty dangerous with LANs, I don't want to think about open/poorly encrypted WiFi.
One line blog. I hear that they're called Twitters now.
Just some interesting points from their AUP:
"Open Park supports the free flow of information and ideas over the Internet." but conversely
"THE USE OF THE SERVICE FOR THE FOLLOWING ACTIVITIES IS PROHIBITED:"
* "Obscene or Indecent Speech or Materials"
* "Defamatory or Abusive Language" (we aren't allowed to swear?)
* "Forging of Headers" does this mean I can't change my User Agent ID to pretend to be M$IE?
* "Hacking" - I can't program?!? oh wait they mean cracking: "Accessing illegally or without authorization computers, accounts, equipment or networks belonging to another party, or attempting to penetrate security measures of another system." but for some reason it doesn't allow alot of network diagnostic tools to be used: "This includes any activity...including, but not limited to, port scans, stealthscans, or other information gathering activity."
---
It seems to be the following would be more appropriate: You are not to use our network to do anything illegal or take "actions that may lead to liability for Open Park".
Why can't they just say that instead of all this legalese mumbo jumbo?
groklaw, wired and slashdot. The holy trinity of work based time wasting.
Lots of folks besides the USG will have their ears perked right up. Israel, China, and the Soviets come to mind.
Like the terrorists and our other enemies won't be sifting through that network data looking for gold.
Sorry, maybe I read too much bad sci-fi. It just seems to me that this free stuff, while it might be a wonderful thing, could be used against someone pretty easily.
. Quit playing Monopoly with Bill. Switch to one of many non-Microsoft products today.
Sounds good to me. Last time I checked, starbucks WiFi access on a monthly basis was more expensive than my broadband, and for shorter lengths of time it's even worse. $10 for 1 day of access. The 10 cents/minute plan sounds good until you read the fine print and see it's a 1 hour minimum charge; so it's $6 just to check your email.
Jason
ProfQuotes
This is good, but I can't wait until WiFi coverage is as ubiquitous as, say, cell phone coverage. I wouldn't mind paying a per-packet fee for near universal wireless access. Who will fund this project? My guess would be wireless providers, they already have their foot in the door.
;-P
That said, some issues must be solved first. WiFi security is still too lax, and uneducated users only make it worse. We need a truly idiot-proof security protocol - the problem is that idiots are so ingenious
I noticed after I clicked on the link "free Wi-Fi internet access available" my Norton AV said it quarantined the Trojan Virus Trojan.Mitglieder.I located in my IE Temp folder.
So clicked back twice to get my default webpage, I cleared my cached internet files, clicked on my Slashdot fav link, and then on the link in the story again. Immediately again, Norton pops up and says it quarantined that Trojan.
Is anyone else having this happen from this Dailywireless.com webpage?
"If it's got a switch... it's my bitch!!"
5. FREE Wireless could be most useful in helping break the rediculous monopolies on broadband access that the cable and dsl companies hold.
:)
openpark IS free.
good other 4 points, however...openpark in the future could be accessed from say, the washington monument to get directions to a restraunt, to upload images from a protest on the mall...etc
Stop whining. Get a job. Steal a laptop. Do something about it.
...the testing grounds for "Carnivore II".
I have something in common with Stephen Hawking...
It is also the weaker of the arguments. While some radio waves come into you house uninvited, they are not recieved by your eyes unless you deliberately invite the signal to be displayed on your television. Really what this argument is saying is that it is okay to sell whatever you want but should be restricted from giving certain things away, which is rubbish.
The stronger argument is that the broadcast frequencies are limited resource owned collectively by the people and thus regulated according to the will of the people.
With broadcast television, only one person can broadcast on a single frequency, and thus the number of broadcasters is limited. Therfore, content is also limited and thus suitable to be regulated by the will of the people.
However, this is not the case with the WiFi. While the airwaves it is using are a limited resource, the content is not. Therefore regulating the proper use of the airwaves is justified, but regulating the content is not.
Furthermore, the very fact that there are a limited number of broadcast TV, and an unlimited number of websites makes it possible to censor broadcast TV and makes completely impossible to censor the web. So not only is the argument flawed, any attempts to do so will have no real effect (except for creating more unevenly applied laws).
now our congress-aliens can sit in the park, with 10 security agents of course and work remotely, that is if they can in fact operate a computer. What is gonna be even more fun is when the RIAA sue's someone using one of those IP's for music pirating :) That might be the ONLY to get congress out of the RIAA's back-pocket, have them bite the hand that is force feeding them like barn raised veal...
errr....umm...*whooosh* *whoosh* Is this thing on ?
A bunch of geeks with laptops in a park? Never mind the hacking - this sounds like a hotspot to get yourself mugged.
Yeah, I'm just outside the "compound" on New Jersey SE.
I checked out the hotspot description and map on thier website. It's located on the eastern edge of the Capitol grounds opposite the Supreme Court, and they say coverage just barely reaches the Jefferson Building of the LOC next door. So it's pretty much useless unless you're sitting on the steps of the Supreme Court or on the 7 square feet of the Capitol grounds that aren't a huge construction pit.
I guess they picked this location as their first hotspot because it's the "center of democracy" and blah blah blah. But rom a practical standpoint it's not a very useful location. Their #2 hotspot out on the mall will be much more useful.