A player of mine once took the Hobo Net as a contact. We ridiculed him for thinking linking together a bunch of crazy hobos would yield positive results.

...


And then this happened

Before the "Transmit your SIN or we bust your hoop!" areas of the city problem hit, a network of homeless and beggars would have been a great group contact!

Still damned fine for the Barrens!

Lol, that's messed up, interesting but messed up.

Sounds like the world in general to me...

I wonder how long it'll take someone to steal all the homeless and charge for access to them.

I give it a week.

I can just imagine it. Someone sliding up to a homeless person, grabbing them, and running off. While onlookers complain about losing their internet all the sudden.

And Anonymous DDOS attacking the FBI because of the silencing the freedom of speech for the homeless people.

It really shows how far down the pecking order they are, being reduced to 4G hubs. Not even full wifi, just 4G.

I think this is an awesome bit of dystopia that could easily be worked into a SR game. Instead of pan handling or offering to wash your car windows, the bums in static zones could have a (semi-)secure meshed network that they sell access to. Could even involve street kids with retrans units that act as "runners" to connect parts of the network to the greater Martix via some archaic pre-Crash infrastructure.

Imagine a filthy street urchin riding a beat-up bicycle, strapped with a retrans unit and talking on an archaic flip-phone: "Whats that? We need to extend the network to that northern fiberoptic hub? I'm on my way..."

I like it.

You know, that actually sounds cool.

So would these people be getting special clothing with the hardware built-in or more like a utility belt or back-pack full of electronics?

Particularly if there is a generator on the bicycle to power the unit so it gets weaker when they go uphill.

So will I get better bandwidth as I move into seedier parts of town?

Depends. Less people leeching off the 4G/Wireless Matrix, but the Tech and support is cruder, so there's less to leech.

Better to find an old Hardlined Jackpoint and use that.

Those still exist?!

Of course.
Basically everywhere.
The old Infrastructure doesn't just up and vanish, you know? O.o
The whole wifi crap was just tacked onto it on top of it . .
The cables are still there, and without cables the whole mesh network would not work very well . .

Yes.With new lines laid down. The Crash Worm of 2.0 wasn't as damaging to equipment as the Crash Virus of 1.0, so you don't even need to change the equipment at major and minor nodes, just upgrade it to the new Matrix protocols.

The Wireless Matrix works much like the Wireless Internet works today, only more-so. You walk around in areas that have lots of open security wireless routers everywhere (Like what I understand McDonalds has), or ones that you need a subscription to (Like high-end coffee shops.). Now have the city/megas pony up the cash to keep up the wireless infrastructure to any place that has a decent enough population. Then make the hardware CHEAP. So that even a podunk town that can't afford a cell phone network today can set up a Wireless System that gets even to Widow Jenkins house near the county line (Admittedly only to the point that she can watch 'Trid and make Voice calls, but still.).

Hardwired Backbones are still the major transmitters, with SatLinks doing long-distance communications (Like, Australia-to-England.).

John Stewart was pretty brutal on this last night.

Oh? Care to enlighten us who can't watch the video clips due to being outside of the USA?

(Hint: It's the INTERNATIONAL NETWORK, people! Quit jamming things for people outside of the US!)

Hmmm...might try using an US-based anonymizer service, like Anonymizer.com - bet it would let you in then. I know there are other IP-redirect tools out there as well. Heck, don't we *make* an internet-in-the-box package for dissidents in 3rd-world countries? I forget if it's the State Dept or the CIA who distributes that one...

Great, I trust the US State Department and the CIA less than I trust CSIS.

*Waves at the nice FBI men who I don't mind at all, because they don't cross my damned border without the RCMP riding along side, and say "Hello" to the US Marshals Office for me!*

Ok, then start here. There's a list of non-govt software packages about halfway down the page.

I guess we can start with helping Canadians escape oppressive American censorship.

1. i got the mental vision of kids on the roof handling directional antenna, a bit like those pringles cantennas people play around with for wifi, trying to route a network connection around.

2. your bit about the flip phone conversation had this flashing before my eyes:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x3XzPhdBx9g

(especially the latter part with the world wide conference call)

And i STILL say that a mix between THAT and TRON should be how the MAATRIX looks and works <.<