[MLB-WIRELESS] Public internet access

[David Ashburner]

hmm, what would a ballpark for cost look like?

capital equipment say 20 nodes at 1K / node
carrier license say 2K + 1K / year
bulk bandwidth ?? I have no idea
some hosting for the onramp equipment
there's probably about 50k of startup cost at least.

well that's all kind of OK  but where your costs go through the roof 
are staffing. You have to assume if you are a carrier you have service 
levels to guarantee
so even if you only have one technician to install, test, maintain and 
monitor you nodes there's another 50K + 25K on costs ( I think I'm 
being cheap here)
add in some administration, accounting, legal, marketing ( who's going 
to tell people about you fantastic ISP ) and web admin.

uh, so your free service has a cost of something in the order of 
100-150K a year. Now that's a lot of donations.

Even if the existing MW membership ( 350 odd people) all ditched their 
existing ISP contracts and switched over you would probably not get 
enough to seed it.
350 * $50 month * 12 months =  210K

my guess is the uptake would be 2-3% not 100%


>
> Ok, the awkward part is that the wireless infrastructure has to be
> owned by Melb Wireless. But think of this - you could get Melb
> Wireless to pay for all of your wireless setup. Donations pay for the
> equipment and you provide the time to set it up and run it. So
> basically other people pay for your hobby. Sounds ok to me...

um, no. some company uses your premises and power to run their network. 
Do you think that a business with service obligations to meet would let 
you tinker with their kit? Unless every node operator is an employee 
and therefore has some accountability you wouldn't be letting them 
touch it - oh, then you have to pay them ......