Burning Man’s Open Source Cell Network
Daily Wireless reports on a neat low-power-consumption, open source cell phone network installed at Burning Man, the yearly festival in Black Rock City, Nevada, that serves some 50,000 people.
The system is only “as big as a shoebox,” Edens says, and requires a mere 50 watts of power “instead of a couple of thousand” so it is easily supported by solar or wind power, or batteries. It performs as well as any other GSM base station which has a maximum range of 35 kilometers and a typical range of 20 kilometers.
The OpenBTS-based cellular network at Burning Man has the power to change the world, says Network World. The super low-cost, solar or wind powered base station, provide free cellular service to anyone with an ordinary GSM cell phone.
This is the third year that the low-cost, open source cellular network has offered free cell phone service to the 50,000-ish attendees at Burning Man, which began August 30, in Black Rock City, Nevada.
“We make GSM look like a wireless access point”, says one of the project’s three founders, Glenn Edens.
It costs pennies on the dollar and it’s completely legal, explains their FAQ
See full report on Daily Wireless
September 20th, 2010 at 6:10 pm
Hmmm… I was at burning man and tested every day with my iphone and had signal but couldnt either call or receive. The people I checked with didn´t either. Many received a text message and didnt know what to do with it.