Meeting #7: Friday, November 21 6:30pm
Location: The Foundry, 298 Northampton Street, Buffalo.
Dial-in Information: (605) 562-0020 Meeting ID: 128-389-999

In Attendance: Matt L?, Michael N

1.  Action Items

• TBD

Due to low attendance (one party being new to the organization) this meeting deviated from the usual format and was mostly ad-hoc.

Here are some brief notes about the conversations that ensued (in no particular order):

1.1  Services on the mesh

1. Internet
   1. This would be very important in attracting non-technical and “standard” users
   2. This would also be a complicated service to provide
   3. Providing internet access becomes a large on-going cost
   4. Providing internet also causes the organization to become a possible target of legal action (subpoenas) and SLA obligations
   5. Possibly provided by a 3rd party organization via VPN gateways
2. Local media
   1. Possibly working with local news and media organization to provide content directly to the mesh
   2. Would have the benefit of providing content of local interest in the same geographic area that unites this meshlocal
3. User provided content and services
   1. Encourage mirrored content (such as local Wikimedia and FLOSS software mirrors)
   2. Federated-type application would also be beneficial (federated wiki, federated social networks, etc.)

1.2  Hardware discussion

1. Ubiquity equipment
   1. Powerbeam/Nanobeam series provides affordable long-distance PtP links. Mike as recently received a Powerbeam M5 AC which he is evaluating
   2. Matt has been evaluating a Loco M5 as an omni-directional, outdoor solution
2. Consumer equipment
   1. Mike is attempting to port Commotion to a 802.11N(300mbps) mini router from Vonets. For only $17 it would make an interesting low-end node. Biggest downside is internal antennas
   2. Matt is currently attempting to port Commotion to a low-end TP-link router also

1.3  General discussion

1. We should have nodes in the air before attempting to contact media
2. Would also be better to have usable services before attempting to attract non-technical audiences
3. Commotion is looking like the firmware of choice
4. CJDNS is interesting for a security standpoint since it is end-to-end encrypted.
   1. This could solve the problem of ensuring security while leaving nodes unencrypted at the 802.11 level
   2. CJDNS may be able to be run on top of OSLR(later research showed this may in-fact not be possible)
5. PittMesh is also using Commotion as a base and would be a great source of inspiration