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Caveats In Reselling DSL Bandwidth To Neighbors?
chrisleetn writes "I'm contemplating getting Slashdot (Speakeasy) 6Mbps broadband or something similar and offering wireless internet access to my neighborhood. Speakeasy even has a plan to allow this. What should I be aware of as far as legal/business/regulatory implications? I know I need to restrict obvious illegal stuff and probably p2p to be safe, but is the local cable modem company going to come after me for competing with them? Has anyone done this who can offer some insight?"
On what logical basis did you come to that conclusion?
Providing it free as a service probably wouldn't be too difficult. But would it make sense to go through all the hassle for the few bucks you can make?
- To err is human; but to really screw up, you need a computer
At 768 up you would need some way to cap their upload. Otherwise you'd risk a neighbor ruining it for everybody.
You might want to set up something like NoCatAuth. NoCatAuth redirects users to a login page, implementing a captive portal system. This is important if you're selling the service because you want to be able to grant and deny access, and 802.11[A-Za-z] is otherwise full of holes.
How am I supposed to fit a pithy, relevant quote into 120 characters?
In the broadest sense, once people start paying money, no matter how small, the relationship changes.
When connectivity on Sunday at 7am goes down, people will look at where they can get help. If they have a door to knock on, then woe betide you.
In post Patriot Act America, the library books scan you.
i can't think of a problem. the 802.11b/g spectrum is unlicensed. you can use it for whatever reason you wish. if your kick-ass provider lets you do this, then they won't complain.
as another poster said, is it really worth the trouble when it comes to billing?
also keep in mind that using wireless opens up their computer to the world. make sure folks know this before you let them join your network.
... I will go after you for competing with me. Bitch.
This is one of those cases where some simple common sense comes into play.
Alright, so you not going to be an illicit reseller, but an authorized body capable of forming a legal binding agreements with your customers.
ISP's do this all the time... they simple resell bandwidth they have purchased from their providers.
Basically, write out what services you will provide and clearly define what you won't allow. It needs to be clearly written and agreed upon by your clients.
After that, you simply need to track ip addresses (assumming DHCP will be in iuse), keep mail logs (if you provide smtp/pop service) and generally ensure that you can track illicit activity back to the source if requested to do so by a court order.
It's simply a matter of accountability and this is something you can easily do given it is a service you can provide.
Anything else is just extra, but it would probably be a good idea to track bandwidth usage.
"You should always go to other people's funerals; otherwise, they won't come to yours." -- Yogi Berra
Dude, get a clue. Peer-to-peer file sharing is illegal!
What you do with your bandwidth, as long as it doesn't violate terms of service, is your business, not that of your local cable company.
However, would your neighbors be willing to pay?
In my neighborhood, I can count no less than 9 unprotected networks. Most of them are all on the default linksys channel of 6 with the default SSID of "linksys". That can sometimes make them difficult to use since they tend to interfere. Some of them are configured well enough to be usable but are still not protected.
I've found that in the rare events that my internet connection goes down, I've been able to easily just use a neighbor's. I'd feel worse about doing it if it weren't for the fact that it's so common, but it's very common.
A friend and I drove around town one night with a laptop and a wireless 802.11g card and we kept finding Netgear and Linksys routers all night.
Most of them had the default passwords. It's very scary, really.
The scary ones are the ones who know enough to make serious changes to their configuration, but still don't have the sense to change their passwords.
"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"
Moderation Totals: Wrong=2, Stupid=3, Total=5.
Well, I certainly wouldn't sign up for your plan to share a 6 Mb connection with others.
But for those that do, what are you going to do to guarantee them that one of your neighbours isn't going to hog all of the bandwidth?
I know just in my house (also a 6 Mb connection), if I'm downloading something through Bit Torrent, it really slows down any internet stuff on the other computers, and if another computer here downloads a file or checks email, it makes games on mine stutter.
Are you going to give them bandwidth caps? And will those go down everytime you get a new customer?
If you go through Speakeasy, they set it up so that the people you sell it to are their customers, and not yours. The deal is that the more you sell, the less you pay. It's a good deal.
I'm no attorney but if it were me, I would look into possibly incorporating, perhaps even as a non-profit cooperative or something to that effect if you plan to offer the service for free or at cost. I don't have any personal expereince running a community ISP but incorporating seems like a good precaution against liability.
Speakeasy allows for reselling of your connection.
Haha, I love how you're going to ban almost everything that people buy DSL for. Why don't you just ban porn sites too and put the final nail in your startup coffin. Seriously, you are making the mistake of concluding that you are doing the right thing before asking the right questions. How are you going to handle people who say "why can't I download music?" and "why can't I go to such and such site?" You just don't want to get involved with this stuff if you value your relationships with your neighbors. Sharing a connection with your next-door neighbor to help lower your costs is one thing; running a whole operation around that concept is quite another. My recommendation? Enjoy your high-speed connection and recommend that your friends get the same service if they ask about it.
The problems that result when you become a full-service provider are not worth it on such a small scale. That's why I never sell complete computer systems but am happy to charge people for service on systems they buy elsewhere. There's no way I can be blamed for a hardware problem on a system I didn't build, so I maintain a better relationship with customers by separating the concepts of sales and service. I wouldn't do it at all if it wasn't extremely lucrative because people, even friends, become surprisingly demanding when you can provide something that they want.
Be VERY careful. If you help one neighbour even once with a connectivity issue, chances are your door will never be silent again. This is not a joke. Trust me, you will be sat in front of other people's computers more than you are your own. Be firm from the outset. I'm sure you have better things to do with your time than being dragged from house to house to put the WEP key back in, only to have some luser remove it again.
Resistance is futile. Reactance buggers it up.
How the hell is this offtopic?
As an ISP we would not allow our customers to host or re-sell bandwidth commercially unless we specificily sold them uplink for that purpose (which is much more expensive then home-uplink).
Charging lets you assign value to your service, and assigning value is a key way to keep customers in line while covering your nut.
In terms of the cable modem companies "coming after you," you need only worry about legal competition -- no franchise agreements come to mind that completely lock out all broadband competition. It's worth noting, however, that Verizon has backed legislation in Pennsylvania to prevent municipalities from setting up free broadband services -- a bad step in the direction of market control.
If you *are* going to charge, then you've got some additional costs to consider:
Good luck!
"It was a summer's tale: Just a boy, his Linux, and a head full of dreams..."
Thats why they'd be pissed, at the very least they would cut off your service.
I think you missed the point. They can't cut his service, because they aren't providing it. What he means is that the CABLE companies might come after him because he is reselling the bandwidth he is getting from his DSL provider.
One reason they might do this is because they would be afraid that he might set some kind of example that their cable customers might expect they could get away with. After the cable company THEN has their own customers doing this, they are forced with the decision of either allowing it themselves, or cutting off their customers. That would be sending business to the competition.
"Everything you know is wrong. (And stupid.)"
Moderation Totals: Wrong=2, Stupid=3, Total=5.
The FUCKING ARTICLE SUMMARY says SPEAKEASY ALLOWS THEIR CUSTOMERS TO SHARE THEIR CONNECTION.
The article isn't even about the cable modem company, its about DSL (the submitter was wondering if the Cable Co. would come after him for competing with them, which makes you and the grandparent twice the idiot)
There was this guy I used to work with who got his cablemodem from the company we both worked for. He decided to share his cablemodem with his whole building, which was CLEARLY against our Aacceptable Use Policy. Every other person in the building has this cable company. This guy was so smart he put flyers all over the building telling everyone how to get free internet through wireless. With over 80 units in his building, one might think he might have shown some restraint.
Well some Cable Company Wire Technicians found his flyer and tracked down his apartment and he was fired. Smooth move exlax!
In this case though, as long as YOUR allowed to do it by the ISP in question, nobody else should bother you.
- You're now earning income. You at least have to tack this onto your normal income tax to be legal. If you're making enough money, maybe you also have to get a business license. - If you do have to get a business license, you have to deal with zoning laws. If this is a small business being run out of your home, you can't meet with clients at your home, at least in some states. There's a good chance you don't care about either of those, as maybe you're not going to pay taxes or file for a business license, etc, but you asked, so it's something to consider
" But would it make sense to go through all the hassle for the few bucks you can make?"
meanwhile i am making NOTHING by posting this link which, im sure you'll agree, is worth the "hassle". merry xmas
This should answer your questions. It's all good.
Dude, I think I can see my house from here.
I have had broadband over cable for close to 5 years now. From the beginning, my uploads have been capped at around 48KBps (384Kbps). In this period, the technology has changed; prices of almost everything in this field have come down drastically; there's a massive bandwidth glut (with oodles of dark fiber lying around), and yet my upload speed is still capped. My question is: why?
OK, one answer could be: ISPs have to pay to send traffic to other ISPs. But that begs the question: why can't I get fullspeed (10Mbps) to my neighbor, if we are both on the same ISP? I can understand this peering argument to have merit when you're crossing ISP borders, but why doesn't the ISP let me get the full benefit of the technology to people in the same subnet?
My cynical guess is that this prevents file-sharing, the bogeyman of the entertainment industry. Since cable ISPs are beholden to (if not owned by) this industry, they are deliberately keeping the UL rates low.
Any thoughts?
Incorporate yourself; shield your personal assets from legal liability. You are contemplating a business venture, and you _have_ to isolate your business activities into their own legal sandbox. The paper work and fees cost ~$300-$400, but the peace of mind is well worth it.
I am doing this exact thing, except I'm in Sweden. I do not block things like P2P but I do use keyword based filtering through a proxy if the client requests this (usually if it's family computer where they want to keep the kids from visiting Goatse.cx,
Anyway, I'm no legal expert but I would think it'd help to keep the logs from Squid so you can account for who visited what and when. That way, you can always identify the person responsible if it ever comes to that.
I would not worry about your local ISP coming after you for stealing some of their potential customers as long as _your_ deal with _your_ ISP says that you can share your connection with others.
Oh, one more thing... You might want to looking into putting a contract together for your customers / friends who'll be using your line. You could basically ensure that _they_ are infact resposible for what they're doing on your xDSL.
Because the contract you sign for cable/dsl service specifically forbids the resale of the bandwidth being provided to you. It is akin to asking if it would be okay to resell the cable TV service you subscribe to. I know criminal penalties apply to the latter. However, I am not sure about the former. But civil liability does apply. Prepare to pay money and not receive any further service.
--
How many dumb AC's can you fit on the head of a needle?
The NetShare service from Speakeasy does look nice, but let's say you decide to use it with the 6mbps package. It costs $110/month. Don't think you will be making a profit with this type of sharing, at least not considerable profit. It MIGHT cover the cost of the connection, if you find enough willing customers. Let's say you resell 768Kbps to 7 people, for $20/month. You'll be making around $20 after taxes and other overhead costs. Considering Speakeasy's cheapest offering is $40/month, you could potentially resell half that bandwidth to twice the people for the same price ($20.) This would mean around $280 in sales, minus overhead around $140-$150 profit. If you can manage this, wow! One of my main concerns for this type of connection sharing would be the upload bandwidth. If you divide all the upload bandwidth in 14 equal shares, everyone is left with around 50Kbps of usuable upload bandwidth, or around 6 kilobytes per second. They'll all have 90k/sec down (including you). If you can properly set up bandwidth restrictions, these numbers are actually not too shabby, if you don't plan on uploading anything. Now when they are wondering why they get shitty speeds with Bittorrent, they'll go to you, but that's another issue. The NetShare service actually looks pretty usuable. They'll take care of everything (billing and all) but they don't mention profit, only "bringing down the cost of your connection", but I'm sure there's a way to use it for profit. And of course if you don't live in an apartment building, I'd say forget it. You could reach 5-6 houses if you're lucky, and not all will want to share a connection. Also you need to consider teaching all your customers about proper methods of protecting their data. If they're sharing anything and it is used against them, they'll blame you.
Since you're not an ISP-proper, you'll probably take a bit more heat and then get arrested for "their" child porn.
It's pretty obvious why the cable company would WANT to go after them (competition bad). The question is, do they have any right to do so? And if not would they do it anyway?
But I'm sure it violates Comcast's TOS to do this, but Speakeasy not only doesn't care, they encourage it, w/in the confines fo their program (they bill, you support, you get 80% of your mutual clients' rate off your bill).
Dude, I think I can see my house from here.
Just don't tell your provider; saves you lots of time (you lost some already by posting here; but so do i; that's another slashdot effect...). i had such an arrangement with a neighbor Then, in palo alto), by the use of a 150ft cat5 cable connected to his dsl. no problems; over the ca. 6months, there may have been two mornings when i politely waited until 9 to ask him about a problem (being early up myself due to a certain family member). i paid him half of his bill. if it doesn't work out, there should be no obligations; as simple as that.
Simplify your life - go old-school and run actual Ethernet. They already have holes in their apartments for those roof-mounted satellite antennas anyway. No more wasting time with wireless setup, eliminating all WiFi security risks. Heck, plug them into a Linux box that's a p90 with 64MB RAM and n+1 dirt-cheap tulips (where n = your number of clients), don't share their connections, use htb for smart bandwidth throttling, and so on, and so forth. You can probably add a monitoring port that mirrors all packets for analisys on a fast machine.
Must-not-watch TV!
Actually, I just realized that very few kids actually want to visit Goatse.cx, or at least that's what I would like to believe...
Moving on...
Dude, if you can really identify "obvious illegal stuff" that you believe you have to block, you could make megabucks selling software to do that.
Depends on a lot of different things. First it depends on you. Are you willing to put up with handling billing and tech support? You'll have to make sure people pay you on time, and they won't sometimes, and you'll need to be tech support for them. You need to ask yourself if you are willing to spend the time to do that.
Also depends on what kind of people your neighbours are. A biggie here is what kind of tech support they'll want/demand. Given that you are right next door, they may expect that you should fix ALL their computer problems, if you provide them service. So find out, and if they are the demanding type, decide if you can deal with this, because they are likely to be unhappy if oyu can't.
Along those lines, you need to decide what kind of support you are willing to do. You have to do basic Internet support, that's part of the deal, but what extra support are you willing to do and at what point does it start to cost extra money? Only you can decide on that, but you need to decide before, not after. Lay out the terms in teh beginning, or there will be problems later.
You will also need an AUP, and you probably want some hardware to enforce parts of it (like blocking ports, controlling traffic, etc). A M0n0wall box is a good idea for soemthing like that. However equally important to the harwdare to enforce it is a policy, stated before. Let people know what they can and can't do.
Mostly, it depends on your willingness to be support and the disposition of your neighbours. I provide net for roomate, not neighbours, but you still get the full gamut of people. Some are real easy to work with. My current roomate doesn't even bother me when the net goes down, he knows I know and will get it fixed. Some seem to think that since I provide them net, I should have to fix every problem that happens on their computer.
However, so long as you lay things out before hand, stick to your guns, and are comfortable with providing whatever level of support you commit to, it should work well. This is all assuming you know your neighbours of course. If they are basically just strangers that just happen to live next to you, well then all bets are off.
Greetings,
I am a world traveller who am seeking to find a nice ISP that is low cost and cognizant of privacy concerns. Your outfit seems just like that fits my needs. I am needing your connection because I am involved in the following pursuits:
1) Threatening the President of the United States
2) child porn distribution
3) credit card fraud
4) Al-Qaeda recruitment
5) spam
As you can see, signing up with a regular ISP would not allow me to do such things. But if I can count on you to take the heat for me, I would like to become your customer. Please mail me as soon as possible with the price.
Your esteemed collegue,
Osama bin Laden
Just throttle or otherwise limit bandwidth so that leeches won't ruin it for everyone. And then keep sufficient logs so that you know who had what address at a given time. Then if someone is doing something naughty, you have a means of knowing who to pass the buck to, instead of having it stop with you.
The idea is: when someone sends you a DMCA notice or humorless Secret Service dudes show up to inquire about a presidential death threat, do you want it to be your problem, or someone else's?
At least here in Australia if you provide communication services which cross a property boundary then you have to be a licensed telecommunications carrier.
I believe that in NZ this is not a difficult thing to do (about as hard as applying for a passport) but the Australian Government is not fond of the idea of administring millions of telecommunication carriers, and has made the process much more difficult.
I think if you dig deeper in your juristiction you will find that similar rules apply. Remember all the regulations which apply to carriers: having to provide wiretap facilities, etc. Legally, this could be quite messy
http://michaelsmith.id.au
I like to collect episodes of that wacky comedy show "Full House". Those Olsen Twins are hotties!
ObL
I have seen a couple sites lately offering .torrent files to reduce traffic on their server. Would these also be blocked?
Do NOT sell access to a Slashdot subscriber.
Speakeasy even has a plan to allow this.
Support the First Amendment. Read at -1
In Spain, sharing your broadband connection (via wireless or with a ethernet cable to your neightbourd) is forbidden by law.
:(
In fact, some small villages had made a public wireless net, so everybody could use internet (we're talking of tiny villages with no access to broadband etc), and they were denounced by some stupid "teleccomunication comission"
The new gobernment told them that they shouldn't have denounced those villages since they were trying to spread internet's access but well...the point is: we have some law that forbids it
Right running a true isp isnt simple. Im pretty sure even in the US you need keep access logs for all inward and outward connections. Copies of all emails entering/leaving your network, both of these need to be yearly logs. Also you either need to make sure that you are a least trying to stop all forms of illegal activities, or at least making it to its not your fault if you clients do do something illegal.Now you could block all the ports where illegal things go on, but that would mean you needing to block HTTP, which would make you the crappies isp ever. Also this would make you liable, as you would block legal forms of access, like say FTP into a website, or a bittorrent linux download. A better idea is a network traffic disclaimer, inside your TOS, saying that you are not responsable for any data moving accross your network, the user themselves are, you provide the network under the aggreement that they dont do anything illegal on it, and if they do be it on there heads. Running an ISP is alot of bother, and dosnt really make that much money, and with the required expenditure vs your profits in this situation would be a bad idea! When i ran on in the UK, i didnt make any profit for a year, and eventually i sold the company for a marginal profit.
It is possible that various kinds of ISPs do not have liability for copyright infringements committed by their subscribers, even if they don't follow the 17 USC 512 procedures, but that hasn't been litigated adequately and few ISPs want to try.
I just pulled up Slashdot from my relatives' house (I'm up visiting family as I write this)... they have dial-up, but my computer's discovered that their neighbors have an open connection... and this is the first story that comes up. Wierd.
I think that setting up a connection like that should be legal - at home, my neighborhood is filled with wireless connections so I can use my neighbor's wireless and they can use mine and so on, it's not like you can really control something like 802.11.
Creative misinterpretation is your friend.
I think he means other companies selling broadband ie SBC, Verizon, Comcast et.al. at least in my Nieghborhood
They might get jealous, therefore limit his cable services.
What he means is that the CABLE companies might come after him because he is reselling the bandwidth he is getting from his DSL provider.
No no. RTFA. Speakeasy actually allows and encourages you to resell your excess bandwidth to your neighbors. They have a program set up to let savy uses become pico-ISPs for their neighbors. RTFA
1. You don't have to worry about the cable company. The cable company will only get pissed if the local government tries to provide broadband, because it would be unfair competition.
2. Triple check that the AUP for your DSL allows you to share and resell the service. Then check again.
3. If you are reselling, you will probably have to charge for sales tax, check your local tax authority.
4. There are probably FCC rules about the equipment that you can use and the maximum power that it can irradiate. Of course, if you are using turnkey COTS equipment, the odds are that it is FCC legit.
5. Check your neighbors and see what is the interest in this kind of service. If there is too little interest then you are setting yourself for failure, since your location is fixed and there is only so far you can reach.
6. Write your own AUP and make sure the CYA provisions are in bold, plain english a second grader can understand. Then take the AUP to a lawyer to read and see if he can poke holes thru it.
7. Be prepared for the technical support burden, even if most of your customers are geeks.
Pedro
----
The Insomniac Coder
> as long as YOUR allowed to do it by the ISP in question
Do you expect us to believe you're old enough to work for a cable company, and you don't know how to spell "you're?" You even capitalized your spelling error.
The minute you block anything, you are setting youself up. At that point you are no longer a carrier, you are a content provider.
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B - D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0 45 5F E1 04 22 CA 29 C4 93 3F 95 05 2B 79 2A B2
If your neighbors have wireless access, you could become the the neighborhood ISP for the time being. Wireless access also means that the backbone does not have to be by landline. We could do away with the landline ISP and go strictly with wireless. For now, you can make the step possible if you do it right. Move to provide the network connection for free and only charge for the services you provice. At first, you might want to charge for network connection to cover the initial startup fees.
my cable provider has business and home use plans, but if you provide free access then it shouldn't be a problem. My question is, does your provider have a 'fair use' policy? with a number of people leaching MP3s etc, are you going to draw a large amount of traffic through your connection? Our ISP allows about 10GB per months and may restrict bandwidth after that.
There was an unknown error in the submission.
Ok, so its illegal for me to run some coax from my house to my neighbors so he can 'share' my cableTV connection.
Why would it be legal for me to share my bandwidth?
If you have Verizon DSL, read your service contract, it spells out that you cannot share the service. I am sure the other cable providers have a similar provision.
You can't RESELL the bandwidth. But you can "share" it. My friend does this and he called bell sympatico to make sure it's ligit. As long as he is not PROFITING from it then it's alright. Your just splitting the line. But if your selling the line for more then what you pay. Then you have some issues.
:/
That's all I know about it
Solosoft.org - Your Online Resource to Nothing
Go over their house and ask them nicely to stop downloading all that porn during the day.
And get subpoenaed in the divorce proceeding.
And/or get sued for invasion of privacy.
And/or get your car keyed.
And/or get your house burned down.
Why any sane person would want to do this is beyond me. I don't want my neighbors knowing what I do online, nor do I want to know what they do. There's way too much exposure here from a legal and liability point of view to be worth it to anyone, IMHO. The sentiment is admirable, but naive.
The odds are that someone on the 'customer' end of this arrangement is going to be sharing/downloading questionable content at some point after the arrangement is made. The way I see it, one of two things is likely to happen at that point:
1) The "provider" party will notice the traffic somehow, and take steps to prevent it. No matter how this is done, it's likely to ruffle some feathers, if not cause an all out neighbor war. Remember, you have to live next to these people.
2) The "provider" party will not notice the traffic, and $randomlargecompanywithexpensivelawyers will sue them. The MPAA/RIAA/Thought police/etc won't make the effort to determine if it's actually the "provider" user or the "customer" user in this arrangement that is infringing on their copyrights/whatever, their SOP is to sue the user who has paid the ISP for the access. The fact that you've essentially become an ISP will more than likely come out in the proceedings if a lawsuit goes forward, but by that time they've already bankrupted you with legal fees and taken your house.
It's just not worth it.
Never underestimate the power of stupid people in large groups.
Are you new here or something?
My appreciation of Douglas Adams is far deeper than yours.
I have been contemplating a big pipe connection to my apartment building to do the same thing, for like 200 a month I can get a 100 mbit /sec fibre feed to my home and just re-sell bandwith. I figure If I can make enough to pay for the conection and undersell the local providers... =) I can pirate tonns of shit... =)lol
A couple lessons learned:
The DSL connection is shared among 4 apartments, plus my own. Instead of sharing out the bill into monthly payments, I ask the neighbors to pay the entire bill in the round-robin fashion - i.e. they only have to do it once every 5 months.
I operate on an honor system, with a wide-open network. If I notice a new MAC address in the logs (ok, a script does it for me) for more then a week, the next time its user will be presented with a friendly page asking to contribute to the coop and an email address to communicate to me. If no email ensues for a week but the user keeps logging in, the MAC address gets shut off.
This arrangement reasonably handles visitors and temporary users, but restricts freeriding (I've only had to shut off a user once - and then he joined the co-op and now pays his bill on time)
Also, make sure you firewall your private network from the wireless network, and the wireless network from the outside world. People bring in virus-infested laptops onto my wireless net all the time; one NetSky infection was enough for me to go get a second firewall.
Finally, regarding 7am calls to fix the network: all network equipment sits on a UPS and is connected to a little gizmo I picked up on SmartHome.com that lets me turn things on and off from a touch-tone phone. Now if somebody complains of an outage (90% of the time - due to hung DSL modem or primary router - fixed by rebooting), I simply reboot the entire set with my phone and later ping-check it.
I use commodity off-the-shelf routers (Linksys) and access points (D-Link Range Extenders); they are reliable if you don't let them overheat. I usually keep at least 1 spare unit of each kind for a quick replacement (I got 10 D-Links at a fire-sale price, so I'm set for a long long time).
Result: I have a virtually no-headache setup. No moving parts (logs are checked remotely by a linux box), no expensive hardware. I get 4-5 incidents of downtime per year, tops - and most are fixed before I even get a phone call from a user.
Any fool can criticize... And many do.
You may also be breaking local law by trying to pay rates that apply to private persons and residences for something that has use far beyond that.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
It's absolutely amazing how many people don't RTFA or research anything, making statements like "Check your AUP" and things like that. For those people, I say: he is talking about a specific ISP (Speakeasy) that specifically PERMITS sharing, and even has a program set up (NetShare) to handle billing and such for you. Under this particular program, Speakeasy handles all the billing for you, and even gives you an additional IP address to provide to your "customer".
To answer the question, here are some pointers from somebody who is actually doing Speakeasy NetShare.
You do not need to worry (from a layman's viewpoint, IANAL, so check with your family attorney if you are worried) about filtering access. In fact, if you read the fine print of Speakeasy's documentation, you are not really permitted to do so. I was told specifically by a Speakeasy rep NOT to do this, even though I had the ability to.
Since Speakeasy will provide you with an IP address specifically for that customer, it will be easy (should fit hit the shan) to segregate your traffic from theirs. Speakeasy will be billing them seperately, so they will have their address and contact information should the RIAA/MPAA/LE come around. From a legal perspective (again, IANAL), you are no different than your local phone company.. you are only providing a conduit, passively, between the ISP (Speakeasy) and that ISP's customers (your neighbor using NetShare).
Over here, I have three specific ways of getting access. You can be plugged in to my personal LAN (which, BTW, is hardline). You can be accessing a free and open node (which runs NoCat), which is highly filtered and proxied. Or, you can be on the WPAd side of the house, which is the resale network.
Don't hesitate to participate in NetShare. It's an awesome way of reducing your monthly bill AND helping your less tech-savvy neighbors to get off AOL. Both are very worthy causes.
That is a business legal question. Go pay a business lawyer to help you figure that out. With so many people spouting bullshit while trying to hide behind "IANAL" I'd think you'd have a clue. No one here knows what the f*** they're talking about when it comes to law. Hell 90% of the population (including lawyers) don't know the freakin' law.
Verizon backed legislation that would prevent municipalities from setting up for pay broadband services, not free ones!
If you are in the united states, you should be extremely careful not to put yourself in the position of judging the legality of what your neighbors are doing. I have operated several open Internet systems, and the lawyers have specifically instructed me not to filter stuff preemptively, becuase this would vastly increasy my liability for anything I did happen to let through.
It does seem to be okay to do things like rate-limit people, or traffic shape so as to prevent one person from DoSing another, and probably to block forged IP addresses (if your ISP doesn't do that already).
However, I think you're in for a world of pain with the RIAA if you assume responsibility for making sure your neighbors don't violate copyright. Sure, you might be able to block P2P traffic, but who knows what other things they'll go after people for in the future. Maybe your neighbor will put up a web page on how to de-copy-protect CDs, and the RIAA will decide this caused them $500,000,000 of damage. Do you really want to be responsible for that?
Do some google searches for "prodigy case". And definitely don't try to institute any kind of blocking without first consulting a lawyer.
Indeed - with streaming media becoming more and more mature people could, uh, torrent tv shows, movies etc. And for every tracked site the MPAA shuts down, another three pop up. It is a losing proposition and the studios that back the MPAA aren't losing money. But if they continue this bullshit instead of adpating their market to the net economy they are doomed.
"I need to restrict obvious illegal stuff and probably p2p to be safe"
I would cap their bandwidth but don't bother trying to stop them from using p2p. Their own computer is the loser here and as long as you cap their bandwith you wont have to worry about the traffic causing you or other neighbors problems.
Just a thought.
A few things I see here:
neighbors snooping on other's connection. If you just an off the shelf Access Point, anyone in your co-op could just use Ethereal, or any of it's other cheap commerical equivilants and snoop.... way to easy.
Drive by's. This is my personal belief on how the first cyber terrorist-attack, and the future of child pornography will be done. To keep things more obscure these guys will war drive until they find an open network. Then send their spam, pictures of ____, virus, or whatever evil they want... then just drive away. Perhaps mask the MAC address with one of the many utilities out there.
I'm convinced that's already done on a routine basis. And I'm convinced that will become more popular. Most WiFi Access Points have no security. It's easy for anyone to approach a neighborhood and do that.
Personally, I'd convince everyone to pitch in and go hardwired. At least then everyone is responsible for their own jack. They can get a WiFi AP if they want, or keep it wired. (Also get better performance as most WiFi AP's are 11Mbps *shared*... not 11Mbps per connection). Would be a bit more secure.
Not to mention the ever so popular "your mantaining this thing... help me get connected... etc etc.". Your going to become their tech support. Viruses, spam, etc. etc... it's all going to you.
It's a fantastic deal- for them.
Despite the fact that they're speakeasy's customers- they'll probably still come to you first. That means less calls for "oh, wait, the cord popped out". $.
They only have to run one circuit to service multiple customers; so less money to Verizon/whoever, more to them. $$.
They don't have to run wires, buy equipment, install any of it. $$$.
I also highly doubt it's a 'linear' discount, either...and even a linear discount wouldn't be 'fair' given how much money they're saving.
Please help metamoderate.
Have you read the contract he signed? Thought not.
So shut the fuck up already, asshat.
so you are not liable for their crimes. There is no way for you to compose some magic AI that can detect illegal pornography, so all you can do is make sure everything is in writing with their signatures.
-- "Makes Little Debbie look like a pile of puke!" - Moe Szyslak
How do you intend to profit from this? Are you willing to offer 24/7 tech support? If no then you can't expect to charge very much for the service. Who will monitor the service when you are at work? Are you willing to have neighbors knock on your door at 11pm to help them with a problem? How much money is your time and effort worth to you? I don't see how you can compete with Speakeasy without offering substandard service and losing a lot of your time. This sounds like a money loser to me.
Keeping logs cuts both ways: if you're the ISP, logs are what will pull your ass out of the fire. If the FBI shows up at your office with proof that child porn has entered your network, logs are about the only way you can shift the blame to someone else.
(Which is stupid, since logs can be easily faked, but they seem to really impress people.)
All's true that is mistrusted
It's a sad day whenever someone has to worry about what their competitor is going to do when they open up a new business.
I'm not talking about the "Will I be able to compete?" worries, or the "What if they run negative ads against me?" worries. This guy is honestly afraid that one of his competitors could squash him in court, take down his service, or break his legs JUST for providing a competing service.
It doesn't matter that they really don't have the power to stop you from competing before you begin (hooray for the bit of capitalism still in America), but just think about it for a minute. This guy, who sounds like a smart, tech-oriented person, thinks that the cable companies have a legal monopoly, and can shut him down just for providing a service that is an alternative to their own.
The cable companies have already won. I hate to sound like a anti-business zealot, but if people start thinking that corporations are more powerful than they actually are, then they will eventually get those powers legally.
Ten years from now, you will never look back and wish you had done this; if you do it you will have learned a lot of great lessons about human nature and technology, but its unlikely you will be happy about it.
What about it is to regret? Well, I can list a few things, but you will just poo poo it and tell yourself you can deal with it. Well maybe you can, but I guarantee its not going to be worth it.
Others have pointed out that money in the mix changes things, and believe me I have stepped right into it enough to confirm that relationships change when obligation and money come into the picture. It can be disappointing and downright unpleasant to be in the power position.
With all the downsides pointed out by so many here, what exactly are the upsides?
Don't be that guy who remembers back to the internet poster who said don't do it and you should have listened! Save yourself!
You'll be expected to clean up the resulting mess.
The legal problems aren't bad; you may have to get a business license, and you'll have to report business income. But you get to deduct your costs.
The cable company can't do anything to you. They don't have a legal monopoly. All they have is a franchise to run wires on poles on public streets.
My neighbor has paid half my DSL bill for the last 3 years by way of ethernet twisted pair. SWB has in the fine print that my service is ONLY for my address. My lawyer says that SWB will only disconnect me if they found out.
Big deal, thinking of going to cable anyway.
By the way, if my neighbor suddenly became computer savvy and got a slashdot account, I would discontinue the arrangement.
I am submitting this anonymously for obvious reasons.
Verizon will probably have a new state law passed preventing you from doing this.
Can anybody spare me a parabolic antenna for my wireless network?
People who don't already have their own broadband connection are unlikely to be computer iterate and will keep you busy long after you set them up. You will have to become a Microsoft Certified Jackass to explain all the shit that happens to them.
If you block peer-to-peer, you are acknowledging that we are all consumer drones in a corporate-owned world. P2P technology continues the Internet's original egalitarian architecture trends.
Architecture is politics.
If you start blocking services, you're going to turn Internet into TV(the sequel), with the only difference being more personalized commercials.
Resist the temptation to block protocols that allow people to share their information and their creativity. Resist the temptation to block protocols that allow people to co-ooperate in a less hierarchical and more global way.
Namaste
Where are we going and why are we in a handbasket?
In the case of tv , you are paying for CONTENT, that is copyrighted materials; copyright holder gets some cash flow through agreements. For bandwidth, you are only paying for the SERVICE of so many bits transferred. If you chose to share some of those bits with others rather than yourself, that's your business. BIG DIFFERENCE. If you ran an extension cord to your neighors for a light, you still pay your electric bill, there is no cause for complaint. Let your neighbor come over and make a phone call. Same thing, no problem. Bandwidth is a UTILITY.
That's why.
Now it's a different issue that the typical ISP assumes and counts on the fact that hardly anyone will use the full bandwidth they paid for, so the ISP buys a big incoming bandwidth, and resells to many more customers. But the customers aren't all maxing out. So they can get away with this. Little different from other wholesale/retail sellers.
With bandwidth or phone service or electricity you are not paying for the PREVILEGE of using it. For cable tv , you are.
That's the differnce.
(Slashdot, please make your textinput box wider.)
Unless your reselling violated state, federal, or local law, or violated an exclusive franchise agreement another company had, you should be OK. In theory.
The only direct complaint your cable company might have is if you are laying wire in a way that interferes with their franchise agreement. For example, if you lay coax cable between you and your neighbors's house, particularly if it crosses a cable-company easement, it could be a problem.
If you are doing it wireless using unregulated spectrum, the only way they could shut you down is to get the city to go after you for violating domestic-business laws. This is particularly true if you advertise your business.
Another tack they might try is to get with the RIAA or MPAA and harrass you for copyright infringement every time your neighbors download a song illegally. After you get swamped with enough subpeonas, you may say "this isn't worth the hassle."
PS: Don't forget to comply with IRS rules on business and self-employment taxes.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
Can they legally cut off someone's cable TV just because he's an IP-reseller?
I can see them refusing to sell him IP connectivity but he doesn't use Comcast for internet anyways, so that's a "big whoop-de-doo."
If they can legally do it and try, can they stand the pressure once the local and national newspapers and slashdot get wind of it? I bet satellite TV operators would be lining up for his business just for the publicity.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
A few years ago an apartment resident (iirc) did something similar. I don't remember the details, just that he shared some service with his neighbors.
His landlord came down on him hard. A local company had an exclusive contract on providing that service and they demanded that the apartment complex deal with it. IIRC he was threatened with eviction unless he dropped the service. The story made the "legal issues" segment of the local news broadcast, and the lawyer told him he didn't have any options. He may have even been forced to drop his personal service even if he didn't share it with neighbors.
I'm showing my age here but I remember when it took a federal law to invalidate absolute restrictions on small satellite dishes. Exclusive arrangements on cable tv service were common and widely enforced.
The law changed the environment, but you should still check your particulars. E.g., I can easily imagine an apartment or condo complex banning wireless stations because 1) they wish to minimize interference between neighboring units and 2) they wish to retain the option of providing wireless service throughout the complex as a benefit of renting there. That's less likely with detached housing HOAs, but not impossible.
For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong. -- H L Mencken
Some ISP contracts prohibit bandwidth-sharing with people "outside your household" but they usually don't try to enforce it if you take your laptop across the street.
I'm guessing that some allow you to share bandwidth as long as you don't get any compensation. Others may allow you to charge up to a certain amount, and still others may not care.
Technically, it's hard for them to tell for sure unless they drive by with a wifi sniffer. However, they can do traffic-analysis for "suspicious patterns." If you've got people doing web access at all hours of the day and night and it looks "human" rather than robotic, and they know it's just you living at your house, well, that's pretty suspicious. They just might send a guy over with a sniffer.
Of course, this is off the main topic, as the person asking the question has explicit permission from his isp to share/resell bandwidth.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
I run cat5e out my window to the basement. It was a shortcut.
One day during a storm, the static charge in the air killed all of the 3com cards on the network. All of the intel cards survived.
The cable is still there and now all the cards are intel. But, I still wouldn't recommend it. I wouldn't do it again but I don't plan on living home much longer so it stays.
If you're going to run cable outside, I recommend optical.
Spoon not. Fork, or fork not. There is no spoon.
Doesn't anyone screen these posts?
Of course not - that's why it's such a great place to advertise a lame product.
Of course the poster has no financial interest in Speakeasy. Yeah right!
On what logical basis did you come to that conclusion?
I blame this headline on a failed american educational system.
"I fixed another friend of a friends' kids PS2, and he (a plumber) came over and helped me replace a hot water heater."
Why do you heat your hot water?
Money was developed because there becomes too many items for barter to be efficient. That being said, trade barter is still efficient in many situations.
The leatherworker might not need anything from the potter at the moment. But the potter needs something from the leatherworker. With money, the potter can purchase what's needed, and the leatherworker heads over to, say the baker, and gets what he needs.
I don't read AC A human right
Cookie!?
Hell, my neighbors just brought me a fifth of Macallan Cask Strength single-malt! I guess all that simple tinkering and virus-blocking and malware-removing and trivial firewall-installing and (minor)troubleshooting I did last year paid off.
No offense intended, but "Cookies my *ss". Your skills are worth more than that - or should be - even to your nice, friendly neighbors.
Meanwhile, I will be offline for a few days...
Cloned foods give the statement "We had that last week!" a whole new meaning.
I still fail to see how the cable company could do anything if I am selling my dsl. That would be like Aquafina trying to sue me for selling tap water.
As long as I didn't try to imply I was part of the cable company or interfere with their hardware, either intentionally or unintentionally, and the dsl company is ok with it, as in the case of Speakeasy, then the cable company can't do anything to me (unless they hire a lobyist and get some new laws passed).
http://www.popularculturegaming.com -- my blog about the culture of videogame players
The main reason I say don't do it is because the hassle of collecting money from people is just not worth it. When you set it up, you'll need to set a fee schedule. You'll have people trying to debate with you that "you are making money at their expense", or that they don't think the service is worth it..even if they have already used a month worth of service already. Or someone that just doesn't feel like paying you that month. The time you spend chasing people to pay money can become very onerous. Think of this in addition to getting roped into doing tech support (aka "Why should I pay for something which doesn't work"...even if the doesn't work part is because their computer doesn't work or is not set up right or they mucked with thier computer). For these reasons, I would not do it. It isn't worth it. I resold/shared a internet connection in a house when I was in College - it was a nightmare and a termendous time sink.
and it has value in the business world. Don't rule out giving away the access for free... you never know what you might get in return (and try not to expect too much... some people are leeches by nature).
An example from my own experience. My "day job" is as an emergency physician... and that's what pays the bills. However, computers have been a life-long interest of mine, and I am fairly adept with them. It's a great hobby.
As a side benefit, my hobby gives me something to trade... my nurses and ancillary personnel are forever bringing me broken/virus-ridden computers that I fix for them for nothing. (sometimes it's as simple as dropping in a knoppix CD and running a virus scan). You get unexpected bennies for doing such things... I've received cookies, gift certificates, other food, computer hardware, etc, etc... all for doing something that I enjoy anyway.
This not only works for my staff, but also for business associates ( for instance, drug reps who I've helped out seem to bring me samples more often, which is very helpful for my indigent patients). I've set up networks and wireless hotspots for other physicians, and I'm also the unofficial IT go-to guy for them. Keeping the medical staff happy takes us back to "good will," and has a direct effect on my job security (if the CEO of the hospital decides to replace the ER group, which includes me, a hue-and-cry from the other physicians can save my job).
It's all about making yourself valuable to other people... it creates "good will," which can pay off in all sorts of unexpected ways. Don't go into it expecting a big return, because people can often sense false altruism... but never underestimate what that good will can do.
Even if a man chops off your hand with a sword, you still have two nice, sharp bones to stick in his eyes.
The University of Texas at Dallas tried to ban WAPs in their non-dormitory housing. They caved when their lawyers told them the FCC would come down on THEM.
Basically, a contract that attempts to regulate what is the FCC's exclusive jurisdiction is probably unenforceable.
Here's what a greedy ISP CAN do:
If an wire-based ISP has a sweetheart deal with an apartment building and they want to lock out WAPs, they can jam those frequencies. It's deregulated and AFAIK there's nothing that can stop them as long as they keep the power level down.
Related Slashdot stories:
University Bans Wireless Access Points Sept. 09, 2004
UTD Lifts Ban On WiFi Equipment Sept. 18, 2004
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
If you are going to block any port, limit port 25 to your upstream ISP's mail server and maybe popular spam-protected third-party mail servers like Yahoo's. Make exceptions on a case-by-case basis.
The last thing you want is for one of your non-tech-savvy downsteam customers to get a virus, get you labeled a spammer, AND choke everyone's bandwidth.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
I heard good things about them and then I thought I'd try it. After 3 months they still hadn't been able to get a working install. To make it worse they kept trying to bill my account for service after several times of calling back and being assured everything was corrected. It was a harsh experience wasting a lot of my time. They were a friendly but painful company to deal with. I'd reccomend staying far away from speakeasy.
In most cities, cable companies have an "exclusive franchise agreement."
This means that they can sue anyone who sends television signals over a wire that uses the right-of-way.
At least this is how things used to work. I suspect that as phone companies desire to offer tv over their own wires, cities may not renew the "exclusive" part of these franchise agreements. In may cities, this may already be the case.
Unless you are planning on running wires though, it's irrelevant.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
If you say "I provide port 80 and 443 connectivity and nothing else" and do not block any traffic on those ports, it sounds like you are a carrier, not a contect provider.
My ISP blocks several ports, yet it keeps its carrier status.
I can P2P or whatever all I want as long as I use ports 80 and the other ports it provides and my ISP won't care. The RIAA might, but not my ISP.
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
It is 100% free, he sets the price, Speakeasy bills the neighbors. Speakeasy gets more subscribers for the same bandwidth, the primary subscriber gets money off his bill. That's all there is to this. The person essentially becomes a PoP for the ISP at this point.
"Perl 6 gives you the big knob" -- Larry Wall
At least here in Australia if you provide communication services which cross a property boundary then you have to be a licensed telecommunications carrier.
If I set up a yodling service to relay messages across town and don't register, that's illegal? Woah!
How about semaphore flags?
Knowledge is how to play a game, intelligence is how to win, wisdom is knowing what game to play.
They shouldn't come after you as your ISP is selling a product that allows you to share your connection. In fact they are encouraging you to share it by offering discounts. Why should anyone then come after you. Unless you share it out to a businees and your T&Cs expressly prohibit this. The only problem i see is if you sign up too many neighbours and the average connection degrades. It's then up to you to upgrade the main connection or possibly risk being taken to court by your neighbours. Although your ISP may be liable to their main provider but then again would they offer this deal if they hadn't already worked everything out with _their_ provider.
To create a usable secure service is going to cost you at least $5k. Do the math. How long will it take at market access rates for you to make that back with the number of subscribers you think you'll get in the best case. After you do that you will change your mind in a heartbeat. If that doesn't scare you, wait until one of your customers sues you for something and you find out none of your various insurance policies cover it. Or if you're even hardened enough to get past that. Do a bit more math and figure out how many concurent users an aDSL line will handle. Refer to the result of your first math forey (see above) then if you are still not scared then you are stupid. In that case, by all means go for it!
No, it's a policy limitation. Because cable modems are connected with other cable modems in the same neighborhood, what they transmit is received by those other cable modems. Thus transmissions by cable modems must be limited to avoid interference with other things on the cable line, like downstream traffic to another user or TV channels. So the cable company dedicates a (usually smaller) chunk of bandwidth for these transmissions.
It has nothing to do with coax per se. Think about the other things that use coax - 10mbps ethernet, 45mbps T3's, 802.11 antenna feeds, etc.
my homies would like to share their fiddy cent music.
No no. RTFA. What he means is that the CABLE companies might come after him because he is reselling the bandwidth he is getting from his DSL provider. RTFA I don't see any reason why the cable companies would be coming after you for making use of a service that your ISP offers. So long as you comply with all relevant business laws, and don't interfere with any cables belonging to competing companies (both of which points have been raised elsewhere) then I don't see why you should encounter any problems. After all, how should the cable companies know what you're getting up to? So long as you don't advertise too blatantly, that is. It might be an idea to approach your neighbours personally and see what they say, rather that poster spamming.
Santa's suicide mission go!
The offer by Speakeasy is AWESOME!
Gizmos Gagets For Ninjas
I thought about looking into reselling my DSL service under Speakeasy's terms but decided against it. My interpretation of the terms is that I am liable for the misuse of my connection and I really don't want deal with ramifications of some kid in the townhouse complex swapping movies or MP3s.
I came to the conclusion that if I wanted to share the service with a few trustworthy neighbors I should just do that.
Why do you heat your hot water?
Do you have any idea how long it takes to heat cold water?
RTAFI (read the appropriate f*ing info:):
http://www.speakeasy.net/netshare/learnmore/
I think the biggest downside would having to be a big brother to all the P2P-like stuff.
Well, I'd be bugged if you did that. Unless all your access points are sitting in exactly the same spot, you'd get better results with 1,4,8, and 11. Power around the sides of a channel is not spread uniformily; and power decreases with distance - so some frequency overlap from channels 1-4 or 4-8 or 8-11 is not bad if they are separated physically.
I would add that if you block anything, you are not providing Internet access, but some subset of it. You would need to make that clear to users if you are charging them for it.
------DO NOT WRITE BELOW THIS LINE------
I don't think so. My mother got totally disallusioned by "learning" about sales tax laws in our state, it's just a real pain.
I don't think sales tax is required of a pure service. Any object or service that you are reselling is already being taxed when sold to you, so in spirit the government has no right to tax again.
If you're going for the whole sales tax hassel, I'd look into getting some of your service taxes dropped (by claiming that you are a reseller.)
"And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the World"
1 John 4:14
sounds like you've been looking in the bottom of a tar barrel.
I've lent friends things and money that's never been returned, but then I didn't expect to get it back. I've stayed round peoples houses for months when I've had difficulty finding anywhere else. I don't think I have a single friend who would do something (even lend you some money) and expect anything in return (like the money back before you die).
as for the condo, I hate people who own second homes, it just pushes the price of houses and rent up to $500 a month. The renter should think themselfs lucky that they've made a bit of cash for next to nothing.
thank God the internet isn't a human right.
I've been doing this for two years now, sharing my dsl line with five neighbors. We split the cost six ways, as I view it more as a cooperative effort. They all get cheap access, I get higher speed access than I could afford on my own. None of them are technical, so they're all just grateful to have high speed access for $17/month. I collect the money from them: some pay month by month, some pay six months at a time. It's not that hard, and contrary to what others have said, my neighbors don't bug me with their computer problems any more than if we weren't sharing a connection.
Anyone ever wonder if these guys convey secret
messages in their ramblings? This is a great
idea for clandestine operations. Who actually
pays attention to this shit? unless you surf
at -1, you wont see it, and normaly when I see
it I just ignore it. But this one caught my
eye, reminded me of an encrypted message.
Think about it, 75% of slashdot would not see
it, and the other 25% would just ignore it,
unless they were specificly looking for it.
Looks like an idea to me.
-William
God is everything science has yet to explain.
I bought a D-link DI-624(108 MB wifi router) lately, I just discover that you can block certain words or allow certain IP. One thing to keep in mind is to write down an agreement that specified certain restriction to the DLS usage don't forget to specified in this agreement that the user activity are logged ;-)
Dude, you did not *even* come close to RTFA.
i am not sure about the US laws but down here in india, it works fine. all you have got to do is get a commercial licence for your business and buy the appropriate package from the provider stating clearly how many connections you have.
TANGO ALPHA BRAVO. He is on to us. Repeat
cover is blown. TANGO ALPHA BRAVO.
Believe me, Speakeasy suing you is the least of your worries. Really, what can they do? Sue for damages? Maybe you made them lose $40 a month off of 12 people for a year? It's definitely a bite in the ass, but it's nothing to lose your house over.
However, you DO have much, much more to worry about. I wouldn't bet on your ISP sending hitmen to your house, but that's more than can be said for the MPAA or RIAA. All it takes is a couple people uploading a couple gigs worth of movies and music. If you can't track 'em down (and prove exactly who it is), your are F*CKED, my friend.
Of course, you would probably keep good records of who's using how much bandwidth, etc, but keep in mind you're a civilian, not a government agency or even a lawyer. Tracking down information of specific computers without any search warrants can be VERY difficult, and if you can't come up with them, chances are you're going to be writing a VERY LARGE check to a nasty 4-letter acronym.
Partial Credit: The Engineer's Best friend
"Well, the bridge didn't fall all the way down!"
did you even READ the summary?
From the second sentence - that's right, that's the one straight after the first full stop -
"Speakeasy even has a plan to allow this."
He wasn't asking about whether or not speakeasy allowed it, he already knew that they did - he was wanting to know if some other company would get pissed off at him, and I echo the sentiments of the original poster - what on earth would lead anyone to even think that sharing a 6Mb/s DSL line over wireless was going to cause any provider to even so much as lift a pen in his direction?
If they were to go after anyone, it'd be Speakeasy for offering a plan that allowed it.
Advanced users are users too!
Just a question... How extactly does this work for you? One public IP and everything else private (your neibours)? ay potential illegal activity (from anyone within your LAN) will point to *your* IP. Is that right? Then that would mean keeping excellent logs, etc etc. No?
If you aren't astute enough to configure your own network to avoid the things that bother you... then you probably aren't going to be too hot at managing other users.
I lived for a few years in an appartment in the UK where 5 very net-heavy users shared a 1024/256 connection. At one point i clocked 23 devices on our lan with over two hundred tcp sessions open, yet it very rarely felt slow.
Shape your overall connection so nothing is ever buffered on the cable modem. Then you can play games on your outbound queue.
SSH, VoIP and Game traffic can go straight to the front of the queue.
Web traffic probably comes next
P2P comes in about here
SMTP/POP/FTP can sit below that
Then you should be able to structure any remote backup tasks even lower...
Still any connection sharing is far better among people who realize that it's not your job. Sharing a connection with a non-tech-literate friend is usually a safe bet. You'd have to educate them about worms and p2p anyway, so having them running web + email through your connection is no biggie.
They might make you dinner once in a while.
And with spam increasingly having a portion with random sentences in it (to poison the spam filter), you could hide almost anything there and have it delivered to almost anyone without raising any suspicions.
"No, sir, I don't have the key to this message; but Mr. Ralsky is propably the sender, so he should have."
Pass secret messages and have a spammer take the blame; what a sweet idea :).
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.
Rule No 1: They won't cause you any trouble if they don't get caught.
Give them a good lesson in anonymity and privacy. Give them all necessary software (VPN, encrypted messengers, PGP plugins for e-mail, software for anonymous remailers, disk encryption software, PGP-phone, FreeNet, PeerGuardian, firewalls, some steganography tools, etc., etc.). Explain that THEY are watching. Suggest caution.
Rule No 2: If there is no evidence, noone can cause you any troubles.
Either give users optional dynamic IPs or install an anonymizer proxy. Don't keep logs or delete them after a few hours automatically.
Rule No 3: Honesty is the best policy.
Be upfront with your customers. Explain that when MPAA comes with a court order, you would need to cooperate. Explain that when FBI comes (even without a court order), you would need to cooperate. State in your terms of use very clearly that you are not monitoring the use of the connection and are in no way responsible for it, it's the sole responsibility of the user.
Hope this helps.
Future Wiki -- If you don't think about the future, you cannot have one.
Look at LocustWorld http://www.locustworld.com/, a freely downloadable, open source solution that addresses all of these concerns. These open source guys have already solved all of your problems, you can get your 6Mb/s DSL line and you are in business.
Better yet, I bet everyone of these neighbors / potential clients have an old PC stuffed in a closet somewhere. Stick a WiFi card in each one of them, load the software on the PC, and create a WiFi "Hotzone" in your neighborhood for little to nothing invested.
Congratulations for setting new standards for "stupid" on /. Only through trailblazers such as you can we calibrate our ideas of just how stupid people can get.
I don't know about Speakeasy, but Verizon lets you do it. I have a computer store in town here, and I resell my 3 meg connection. I have many other users connected through 802.11g, with a linux box doing radius and tables. I shut off the broadcasting, and it seems to work out rather nicely. Of course, most of these businesses are surfing or chatting, and if it were different I would have to bump up to the 7 meg. I charge $45.00 a month, and it helps recover the costs of my expensive phone bill. Plus, if they need help, they come to me!
DISCLAIMER:
I don't believe what I write, and neither should you.
Aha mr smarty.
Because the conventional hot water heater is set at 78 degrees, (and mine is a scooch lower because of the presence of little hands dextrous enough to turn a faucet, and are easily scalded.) But you want it much hotter than that to wash dishes. So my dishwasher has a seperate inline heater to make the water even hotter.
See, I do heat hot water.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
In order to mitigate your legal liability, it might be a good idea to form an LLC (or other corporation), and not just run this business as a sole propietorship.
What a wild notion. Would you have predetermined phrases to search on? Or use the data at the bottom to embed the next communication date and key phrases to search for, encrypted of course.
Wow.
-- sb
OmG yeah.. looool ooomg!
I was just commenting on this on Blogalicious (http://www.panix.com/~damron). When I travel with the S.O. or friends, we're all connecting to wireless and paying for each computer that connects. A nice solution would be a wireless router that allows one pay-for wireless connection to be re-sold/re-distributed to your friends. Then you can pay once instead of paying for each computer. If you travel with multiple machines, this is kind economics.
Steven Damron - Check out Blogalicious http://www.panix.com/~damron
My phone company blocks 900/976 numbers dialed from my phone at my request. Does this make them a content provider? I don't think so.
I do not have cable. I have DirecTV satellite. I was only asking about the cable company from the standpoint of them possibly coming after me as a competitor, maybe citing some obscure law that I'm not aware of that would prevent me from taking advantage of Speakeasy's reseller plan. Also I have no connection or financial interest whatsoever with Speakeasy. An thanks for all the comments so far. Very enlightening.
I know in Ireland you have to be registered as an ISP and the is a yearly fee., it's a few K can't remember the exacted price.a tures/2003/ThreeRock/Dsc02616.html/ into a Field off an aerial on a Tower rented from a farmer, and down into a Aerial on a Mt near Blessington.
Know a guy who lived in Blessington, which is way out from anywhere.., And not Eircom (are AT&T) or NTL (cable comp.) are planning on rolling out Broadband is the next 10 years is ever.
He owned a PC shop in the locale town, which is on a hill on an enclosed lake, rented ~2MB line off an ISP, got it bounced from ISP on Three Rock Mt http://www.redbrick.dcu.ie/~hiking/photo_files/fe
Then offered Wireless Net access to the Area...,
Sorry about the long story but..,>
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"Clutch my testes, bloody squirrel humpers!!" -Happy Noodle Boy