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Comment by grahamburger | Hacker News Reader

I've been doing stuff like this for a long time. I've thought about trying to build a web app to help with estimating the costs of doing exactly this. Would that be useful to you? I wouldn't charge for it, but it would help me get motivated to do it if I knew someone might use it!

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At @tomcam's suggestion I put together a quick spreadsheet outlining some of the costs associated with building a wireless Internet network, feel free to check it out:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1jjUYOQMuZ4cRyTv1M5X8...

Also I started a Matrix chatroom for discussion around this topic, I'll hang out there and answer any questions that I can:

https://riot.im/app/#/room/#startyourownisp:matrix.org

That would certainly be interesting. At present, I don't know squat about any of this, except to imagine that I'd have to pay for some sort of super high speed cable to the building, run it up to the roof, build some sort of radio station up there.

Maintenance would be a chore, as mentioned in one of the other posts.

But an app that lets people begin to think about how this stuff works -- for instance what the pieces consist of, might hit pay dirt if the whole net neutrality thing gets nasty.

I've also thought about the idea of what people could do if they set up some kind of mesh network in a higher density urban area -- for instance if they could use it to bypass the ISP's while maybe also improving their security and privacy.

Well y'all have me convinced! I'll get started and be sure to post here when I have something presentable. In the meantime anyone interested drop me a line at my email in my profile and I'll keep you posted. Would love to have some outside perspective on what's important to include.

eager to see how it's doing, best of luck to all

sending good vibes !

P.S. Any reason not to knock this out in a couple minutes using Google Sheets? They can be shared to the public.

Great idea! Here's a link to a Google spreadsheet:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1jjUYOQMuZ4cRyTv1M5X8...

Also I started a Matrix chatroom for discussion around this topic, I'll try to watch it and answer any questions that I can:

https://riot.im/app/#/room/#startyourownisp:matrix.org

Please do. I'd pay real money for a book or subscription site.

I'd love to see this if you decide to make it.

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