Bristol Wireless Wiki - Venue: Totally Wireless

Venue : Totally Wireless Press Release

Easton CLAN is setting up a network that gives local residents access to the internet via the airwaves. Eugene Byrne logs on.

"I don't think that fast internet access is that spectacular personally. It's the media that can come across it which is much more interesting. So if we build our own supported network we can put on our own entertainment locally and with a high-speed server so we really can do media-rich content. It's what the internet should be."

When you use expressions like "high-speed, local wireless computer network", most people look blank, or assume that you're talking about a radio station, but Richard Higgs means nothing of the sort. If the plans of Richard and others come to fruition, Easton will be one of the first communities in the UK where residents will be able to get internet access via the airwaves rather than down a wire. Not only will Eastonians be able to get online much more cheaply than with current internet service providers, but that access will be faster than normal broadband connections.

Big deal, says you. So I'll be able to order stuff from Amazon a little quicker and download enough MP3s to fill up my hard disk in 20 minutes.

Well yes, but a network like this would also permit a community internet radio station, or live TV broadcasts, all manner of community, cultural or artistic ventures, not to mention the huge possibilities such a system has for education.

After Easton, says Richard, it would hopefully be possible to set up a whole string of wireless computer networks in communities all across Bristol. The Easton CLAN (Community Local Area Network) is partly the brainchild of Richard Higgs, an IT specialist who's getting himself back into work while recovering from being injured in a road accident. His partners in the project include Psand.net, a computer consultancy that specialises in 'open source' operating systems and applications, i.e. software that's free of corporate control and developed by its users (and which doesn't require you to pay vast amounts of money to Bill Gates). Bristol IT Co-Operative, who provide computer support to voluntary groups and social economy groups in Bristol, is also involved.

The CLAN wireless system is now up and running, with three subscribers. You need a specialist network card in your computer, a bit of cable running from computer to the antenna on your roof, and that's it. The server is based at Easton Community Centre. The antenna is one of those tins that some bottles of whisky come in. Extensive trialing has established that J&B Whisky provides the best aerials. Pringles tins were no good at all. It has to be whisky.

CLAN is big on recycling. Richard says that for him the idea originated with seeing all the computers that were being thrown out. "I took a step backwards and thought, well, all of this machinery is being left outside people's gates and going to waste. There must be something we can do with it. We need to give them a new lease of life. The computer you have on your desktop nowadays is far more powerful than is actually necessary. So one modern computer can act as a server for 20 satellite computers and all of the software. We can support that one computer without having to support the 20 computers that are connected to it."

CLAN says that "The equipment needed to run the network will be sourced from old or obsolete computers that companies regularly discard. It is no longer acceptable for us as a society to keep burying them in landfill sites; there has to be another way of dealing with what is wrongly being called waste." In a curiously ironic twist, there are plenty of companies and organisations who are happy to donate new computers to the project. It's finding funding to pay people wages that's the challenge. Having got a working system up and running, Richard is now starting to look for money. If anyone with a big budget is reading this, please cough up. This is a good cause.

As a CLAN statement puts it, "This project is radical in every aspect. We aim to provide our diverse community, of which we are so proud, with a uniquely pioneering local area network that would open a window to education in IT skills for each member. Allowing the people of Easton to communicate and access information and entertainment quickly, reliably and at low-cost. And all this achieved through a system that operates on a non-profit basis that is built out of re-used equipment by the people of the community whose design it is to serve."

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