Thoughts and ideas of a dyslexic designer/developer
Simple and fun thing to do. Take everything out of your bag place them on a table or floor and then take a picture and upload it to flickr. I got the idea from some blog but I forgot where sorry, Found it – Boingboing. But its important that you tag your photos using whatsinyourbag or whatsinmybag. Once your done its a good idea to make some notes for others to read and then watch as you get some really silly comments back… yes knock yourselves out guys…
I was listening to a IT Conversations a while ago and some guy talked about services at the access point which made me think but I was doing the washing up so kinda of forgot about it. Then I saw Project placesite via http://www.cheesebikini.com. I honestly I couldnt find the IT conversations talk I was listening to but if I do I will update this entry. I'm also sure slashdot had a thread about this a while ago which I will need to find also.
It makes so much sense to do this, at the moment when you connect to a public access point you get some crap half baked tabled driven page from the company which runs it. The best one I have used is the Sony wireless network node in the Sony Centre in Potaplatz, Berlin. That node provide you with information about the area, how to book a viewing for the consumer flats and general Sony stuff. I guess the question is if people will actually stick around on such a screen if theres bandwidth? I certainly dont but then again I've not come across a access point sporting a range of services like the ones suggested by Placesite.
The ability to see who else is using the access point is a great idea, and leads on to great uses of mDNS. I mean iTunes with rendezvous at a open access point is fantastic when your after something a little different from the Starbucks lounge music. But going deeper into community and mesh networks, you could offer so many services at the access point. From Webdav for temp storing of digital camera pictures to radio streaming using icecast or something else. So to the question asked by placesite can we use these technologies to strengthen local community?
I would say yes you can with carefully picked services and applications picked for there location and people connected. Placesite is a good step forward, and honestly I would actually fill in quite a bit of the optional information if asked on a open access point. I look forward to placesite in the UK soon…
If you have not yet seen http://cebit.150.dk then i highly suggest you check it out plus the comments on Slashdot. A guy walks around Cebit with a camera on his head and stores the footage on his Archos multimedia jukebox. Awesome stuff, and just the kind of thing I thought the Panasonic SDAV series of Mpeg4 cameras would be perfect for along time ago.
Theres a couple of things I would suggest to the guy whos doing this or anyone who tries this next time. First thing, get in touch with legal torrents and ask them to help you out. Dont worry I've wrote them a email on behalf of the guy already. Second, upload your stuff to Archive.org if possible. I know it takes a while but it will much more accessable to people later, plus you can place a licence on it if you like. Third, provide RSS feeds with Bit Torrent enclosures for people who use Azureus and the TV Torrents plug-in. That would easily take some load off your site because not everyone will be hammering it for new stuff everyday.
Even though its very tempting to do this for Xtech 2005, I may not. Maybe just images and audio will be good enough. But not taking anything from Charbax, this was clever and great to watch on the way into work today.