Advice On A New-School Old-School BBS

An anonymous reader asks I am thinking about setting up a local "community" network over WiFi minus internet connection. In other words, I would like to run a small server isolated from the web as an experiment in small scale networks (e.g., serving a café-heavy one-block radius.) I have plenty of clever ideas -- discussion/gripe boards, weird artistic projects -- anything to bring back the old-school BBS memories where online users were drawn from a single geographic location. But everything I've learned so far is how to act as a small node on someone else's network. How can I make my own -- and make it wireless? Google doesn't pull much up that I can find: it is mostly targeted towards those building a (free or profit) Internet access point." (Read on for more.)

" Does anybody have sources of information for how to learn about setting up the network I have in mind? Basic tutorials and those covering more advanced issues such as security would be very helpful. Finally, is there anyone out there with real world experience? Beyond imparting technical help, do you have suggestions for implementation? What worked, and what didn't? Did the lack of internet access make the project unpopular? (And if you did provide internet access as a teaser, how did you handle liability and financial issues?)"

(This reminds me of the Community Memory Project; can anyone point to some modern equivalents?)

Comments

Did I miss something?

[fishbowl]

People are actually pining for the bad old days of the regional bbs, when we clung desperately to even the most tenuous connection to other nets?

interesting

[Schlemphfer]

Back in the olden days, free access to BBS's was constrained by your local telco calling area. Which meant that you could reach one, and stay on as long as you'd like, for free, so long as it was less than about 20 miles away.

And these days, the magic distance is perhaps a quarter mile.

And you call that progress? ;)

a couple suggestions

[aderusha]

first suggestion - better make sure that anybody in the universe is interested in this project before you spend a lot of money and time on it. there's very little reason at all for anybody to participate in something like this when they can join the community of the internet at large, and still get the local flavor from local websites if they like.

having said that, you could probably accomplish just about everything you need with existing wireless access points with some hacked-up firmware. wi-fi box is offering free replacement firmware for the linksys WRT54G series access points that offers a captive portal and some advanced routing features including WDS. what this means is that you can display a splash page to anybody who types in an arbitrary URL (say, www.slashdot.org) and inform them that they only have access to a certain few pages (links provided of course.) with WDS you can chain multiple access point together wirelessly, although you may be best served splitting some areas into subnets and cabling them together with tradional CAT5.

there are other options for the WRT54G firmware - www.sveasoft.com is one of the most popular. just be careful with this one, because the author thinks that reselling GPL'd software for $20 is a great idea, and if you have the gall to say otherwise here on slashdot he'll ban your ass from his forums and ftp servers in a heartbeat. you can distribute his software as allowed by the GPL, but if he catches you doing it or questioning his policies he'll make sure you can't access the software anymore. here's my original post on sveasoft that lead to the banning in question: http://ask.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=109547&cid =9304955

the guy is a real pecker and probably doesn't deserve your $20 anyway.

Don't limit yourself

[Elvis Maximus]

This is a great idea, but I think you're limiting yourself artificially. You will probably have a hard time attracting wireless users to connect only to local content.

The BBSes that were really good were the ones that had decent content. If you lived in an area that had a lot of BBSes, the duller ones fell by the wayside pretty quickly. If anything kept them alive, it was the fact that you didn't get a busy signal when you tried to dial them.

Why not put something online that has very local content and let a broader cross-section participate? If the content is good, and you can get the word out, they will come.

Why this is a great idea.

[rufusdufus]

Several posters have made glib comments about this idea being retro and unworthy.
Let me tell you why I see this sort of grass-roots things as the wave of the future.

First and formost, the primary feature of this system is that it has no recurring cost [well, assuming you are using solar]. Free is good.

Next, there is no controlling authority with rules, regulations and contracts. You know that your rights are severely limited in the contract you signed with your internet provider right? Freedom is good.

These intranet hotspots will be by definition local. They always talk about web communities, but they arent really. A bunch of anonymous jerks out trolling each other. This idea allows for locals to get together and be social. Community is good.

This sort of setup has no agenda. No chinese shyster selling penis pills, no corporation telling you what to think.
No agenda is good.

The most interesting thing is the possibilities that arise from synergy with other hotspots and the internet itself. If the number of local hotspots becomes large, and they become ubiquitous, there will be bridges formed between them..again all free, expanding the social network in interesting ways. New cultures will arise from these interactions without the debilitating noise of too many voices.
Culture is good.

I envision in the future rather than wi-fi, we will see wi-max versions of this idea. The neat thing about this is that you will be able to bridge to internet via your home isp when you wish to, and still use of the local hotspot would be free.

Biggest problem

[TheKubrix]

I think the biggest problem will not only be interest, but understanding. You're average user will be confused as to why this "network" doesn't have internet access. You have to remember that back in the BBS days, it was generally restricted to those who were not only in the know how, but could set it up (much easier to get internet access and surf the web). At any rate, good luck.