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WiFi On Two Wheels
MeGaBiTe1 writes "Yury Gitman is not the average cyclist from Brooklyn. His goal is to bring more easily accessible free wireless hotspots to the masses. To do this, he has created what he calls the Magicbike, a bicycle equipped with a laptop, power supply and antenna. Gitman's bike has allowed people in NYC to browse the internet freely in local parks and gardens. 'I am like the ice cream man, but with no music and I deliver free wireless access and not ice cream'."
I wonder how long it will be before a cop pulls over his bike and tickets him for inappropriate and bizarre analogies...
Honey, I shrunk the Cygwin
I bet the wardrivers with GPS are going nuts trying to pin him down while he's riding.
Props to GNAA!
Wireless Review did an article on the wheelbike back in February.
k e_wheel_deal/
http://www.wirelessreview.com/ar/wireless_magicbi
in theory, but exposing your equipment to the elements, vibrations, and possible accidents, and even theft. Good lord its New York. I mean maybe in cars, like CB radio-style. But by bike, ehhh... I would be a lil afraid for my own property.
je suis parce que j'aime
Isn't it possible that some legalities could result from "amplifying" someone elses open WiFi network?
What happens when someone does something illegal from his 'hotspot'?
Moo
Can we just buy one of those magic bicycle and keep it in our room?
Definitely a topic that's been on Slashdot before:
The Internet by Motorbike
I do have to wonder, though, if this is really that fast. His uplink is either cellular (dog-slow) or bridged to another WAP, and I'd have to say I suspect the latter isn't the dominant mode of operation.
In case the site gets slammed later, here's the About page text:
Magicbike is a mobile WiFi (wireless Internet) hotspot that gives free Internet connectivity wherever its ridden or parked. By turning a common bicycle into a wireless hotspot, Magicbike explores new delivery and use strategies for wireless networks and modern-day urbanites. Wireless bicycles disappear into the urban fabric and bring Internet to yet unserved spaces and communities. Mixing public art with techno-activism, Magicbikes are perfect for setting up adhoc Internet connectivity for art and culture events, emergency access, public demonstrations, and communities on the struggling end of the digital-divide.
Weaving Internet Infrastuctures into Cultural Fabric
Magicbike aims to weave wireless infrastructures into an existing mobile and socially active cultural fabric, bicycle culture. Bicycles are extremely versatile vehicles that travel many places inaccessible by automobiles and other forms of transportation. Bicycles are also traditional symbols of political movements ranging from the women's movement in the latter 19th century, to the labor movements of the early 20th century, through today where bicycles are held in high esteem as a clean, energy-efficient alternative to a global dependence on oil and urban sprawl. Since WiFi is an emerging technology based on open standards it is malleable. Superimposing WiFi technology onto bicycle culture pushes the technology towards the particular needs, tastes, and motivations of bicyclists. Wireless and computing technology gain from becoming more (mobile and) bicycle and street friendly. The culture around wireless is also influenced by century-old cultural trends of political consciousness, social responsibility, and physical health.
Bicycle Hotspots Tech Description
Magicbike turns common bicycles into WiFi hotspots. The end effect creates bicycles that broadcast free WiFi connectivity to their proximity. The technology behind this is not complex. Magicbike is simply a creative configuration, or reconfiguration, of widely available computer, bicycle, and WiFi gear. WiFi antennas mounted on the bike's frame feed into a laptop embedded into a specially outfitted bicycle side-bag. The bike's embedded laptop is configured to be a wireless repeater and hotspot. The bike receives its uplink connection either from the cellular network or from far-off WiFi hotspots (with the help of its mounted antennas). With this uplink connection from any one of various sources, the bike is able to serve-up its own Internet connection.
A Magicbike hotspot operates like standard hotspots, able to serve up to 250 users in a radius of 30 meters indoors and 100 meters outdoors [although its antennas can increase the hotspot's accuracy and range]. A group of bikes can repeat and/or bridge the signal down a chain of wireless bikes. Meaning, a bicycle gang can snake into subways stations or across hilltops to provide Internet connectivity to (fringe but) vital communities and spaces ignored by the traditional telecommunications industry. A grassroots bottom-up wireless infrastructure can be formed and pedaled to any place accessible by bicycle.
Wireless Bikes as Art Objects
Wireless bikes are a tacitly surrealistic Ready-made that playfully reframe our assumptions about the interplay of technology and art. The tradition of Ready-made objects in modern art is credited to start with Marcel Duchamp's "Roue de Bicyclette" or "Bicycle Wheel," his first "Ready-made." The bicycle's role in art seems to be that of a transcendent object acting as a vehicle to interface conceptual and m
In Korea, long hair is for old people!
Someone miniaturize a wifi hotspot enough so that you can strap it to a pidgeon, then put some around New York. Then I'll really be impressed! Access for peanuts... or breadcrumbs... hey let's try squirrels maybe then it can be for peanuts.
Introducing the new Occam Fusion! Now with sqrt(-1) fewer blades!
... but with no music
... and with wireless internet service instead of ice cream
... and with a bike instead of a truck
... and it's free instead of costing money
... and I'm really more of a boy, not a man
... come to think of it, I'm nothing like the ice cream man at all... I was just talking outta my ass.
Portable versions of Firefox, GIMP, LibreOffice, etc
^ Why I hate being an artist. Make your mark with your work, not with the hype.
Sorry to sound like a party pooper, but it only brings wifi 100m closer to the masses. It's kinda neat but it doesn't seem all that useful.
What? no music? On ya bike son...
"I think it would be a good idea" Gandhi, on Western Civilisation
Hopefully the site isn't hosted on this bike...if it got slashdotted and crashed, we could all get sued for his injuries!
Sheesh, it's amazing that no one has remarked upon the important thing about this guy, which is that he's freaking cool! This is exactly the kind of thing I'd like to do if I had the money and time! Good ol' selflessness and wonder and doing good for your fellow man! Just because!
What a nifty idea, wow. And I liked his analogy too, which I saw as more of a humor thing than a real analogy anyway.
or is the wifi coming out his ass!?!?
Icecream indeed.
"He's coming around the park again~ Quick! hit
the reload button while you have the chance!"
-- Connected to Wi-fi bike boy --
-- 11.00 mbits per second --
-- signal stregnth low --
*swoosh*
--wireless internet conneciton unavailable--
"damnit. . . "
Saying "Militia really just means National Gaurd" is like saying "Press really just means PBS"
The point of finding a free acess point, for most people, is to get on the internet, to send/receive e-mail. Some people might be interested in fiddling around with 'clueless user Linksys #82", but mostly finding an acess point is a means to an end, not an end in itself. A mobile acess point is not a roving Lan party, it is sort of useless. Unless he has omnidirectional wireless internet connection with him (nope) then most people will be kind of disinterested in what he has to offer. Most people won't even bother (or know how!) to browse the network. I really wonder where he is going with this.
Even those who arrange and design shrubberies are under considerable economic stress at this period in history.
"Why do computers need inundate every single aspect of our lives?" ... said the Anonymous Coward who used a computer to read the article and post his/her response.
Want to improve your Karma? Instead of "Post Anonymously", try the "Post Humously" option.
...how long before spammers just load their software onto laptops and start blasting out spam from the nearest hotspot? Are there any safeguards that will prevent this?
Q: What does the "B." in Benoit B. Mandelbrot stand for? A: Benoit B. Mandelbrot
Big Electronic Human Energised Machine, Only Too Heavy
Check this out
but the first thing that ran across my mind is that this poor bastard is going to end up in court because some pervert used him to anonymously download kiddy porn off of the net.
LK
"Hi. This is my friend, Jack Shit, and you don't know him." - Lord Kano
On the one hand what he's doing is kind of cool and nice. Interesting to say the least... On the other hand walking around like he's a saint or he's bringing vittles to the starving masses makes him look like an imbecile... I mean for chrissakes, you're giving people limited wireless connectivity, in the random chance that you happen to be parked by a guy with a laptop...
;)
You want to be a hero or feel good about yourself? Be a volunteer firefighter. Restore PCs for senior citizen centers, donate to cancer research foundations, give a starving Afican or Chinese kid lunch money. Driving around giving out free wireless internet... *snickers*
The very point of it is pointless. It's basically just a "Lookit me, I'm special-decial like Homestar Runner." I think the guy needs a hobby...maybe he should try being a kernel hacker, I hear that eats into your free time.
Free Wi-Fi on a bike? Why not a train?
PointShot (http://pointshotwireless.com), the folks that provided ACE passengers with the country's first Wi-Fi train service, is in the process of trying to bring a Wi-Fi service to Caltrain here in Silicon Valley.
But according to Caltrain management, it is going to take a year to find a free provider:
"Caltrain is currently working on a request for proposal to provide wi-fi on its trains. Our goal is to be able to attract a provider who will provide free wi-fi service through more than just a pilot period. If the entire process goes smoothly, we may be able to offer wi-fi within about a year.
Our long-term vision is to provide complimentary wi-fi and work with companies along our corridor to allow their employees to start their workday by logging on while on the train. We believe this will be a huge quality of life benefit to our customers and their employees."
For those of you that don't know, Caltrain is the Silicon Valley commuter train that serves passengers from San Jose to San Francisco.
If you find "a year" to be entirely too long or you know of interested Wi-Fi providers, email boardsecretary@caltrain.com or go to http://www.caltrain.org/contact.html.
If you want a simple link, 1X works great in North America. GRPS is almost bearable, but is pretty poor in Europe (actually, nothing seems to be good there). Satellite is best, but you WILL lose the link (bridges, trees, tunnels, building, clouds, etc.).
Managing multiple links intelligently is the key.
At work we have a SUV with a DirectPC dish on the roof under a radome, 1X, GPS, and 200 mW 802.11b
We already have it on trains: PointShot Wireless
And let us not forget the classic:
lf(1): it's like ls(1) but sorts filenames by extension, tersely
Every morning when I go out for a jog in the park, I take my laptop computer with me just in case a cyclist, with an attached mobile Wi-Fi hotspot, happens to be getting a bit of exercise at the same time.
It's great! Lugging the laptop around adds to the exercise potential of my jog and being able to read my spam, while in the middle of my jog, really goes a long way to breaking the boredom of exercise regime.
Free Firefox news reader.
So basically, this strange guy provides slow unreliable internet access to people enjoying a bit of air and sunshine in the park. I don't know about the rest of you, but if I want unreliable internet access, I'll do that at home with with Comcast. At least with them, I don't need some weirdo to point a funny antenna at me when I'm trying to surf the web.
This was the title of an article from the New York Times about Yury Gitman and his Magicbike last December. Here is a permanent link to this article (free registration needed).
'I am like the ice cream man, but with no music and I deliver free wireless access and not ice cream'." Or you're like a big dork with too much time on your hands.
This article has recently been linked from Slashdot. Please keep an eye on the page history for errors or vandalism.
the guy who's paying the bill to the ISP whose service he's broadcasting gets canned. note that unless his ISP has an *extraordinarily* open AUP, this is probably against the terms of it...
'I am like the ice cream man, but with no music and I deliver free wireless access and not ice cream'.
If we had bacon, we could have bacon and eggs if we had eggs.
Read reviews of shopping cart software
I like my bike mod better. I attached my old ipaq to the center of the handle bars and with a pcmcia wifi card, serial GPS receiver on the back and the right software i can go biking while wardriving and listening to mp3s at the same time. Wish I had a pic. Anyone else try anything similar?
Oh yeah, and how does he get his connection while on the road, cellphone? Even with Vision or Edge it wouldnt be that great internet access now would it.
Im dreaming ofa big bndwdth, That can resist the
Mixing public art with techno-activism
arg, I hate pop culture. I bet this guy is a 'metrosexual' too. Let it die! techno-activism is a made up word. You're a fruit on a bike! There are tons of wireless hotspots out there anyways, the chances that you're doing the world even a minute's worth of good are slim to none. If you really want ubiquitous wireless net access, try, oh , say, setting up a hotspot in your house. Or donating to a cause or group or company who would set up these spots. The idea that your bike provides wifi is hardly useful. get a life, and this is coming from a computer geek.
Reason, free market capitalism, and individualism
Years ago I met Steve Roberts, a self proclaimed nomad, in Austin Texas. He was riding his recumbant bike literally slewn with solar panels, radios, a trailer with a satellite dish and computers. Here is his web page: http://microship.com/bike/winnebiko2/retrospective .html
He wrote a book, mostly about his love afairs on his cross country trip, but also ended up working for Sun Microsystems in some sort of ad-hoc consultant position. He's gone on to making a high tech Winnebago and now ocean going canoes. Very strange person but also quite entertaining.
Marc