VPN services still put us on the run, so to speak. As an optional, externalized behavior, those who choose to employ VPN tunneling will enjoy an additional layer that buys them some time, for some of their activity.

But if one were trying to suggest that “it’s time to put mesh networks in play as this newer model, to assert greater control” then I’d like to see a technology that solves certain problems, instead of the same technology as ever, with all it’s existing, known problems, except now distributed and peer-oriented.

I want to see the real problems solved, before I give everything away to peers. Otherwise unsophisticated peers can cause problems for me, just like an ISP. The difference being, most peers will be unprepared to exploit each other for a short amount of time, but then, as utilization saturates, and expertise grows, we’re back to square one.

Thank you for posting that. Unlike the top-linked article and the LibreMesh docs, the Althea site does a pretty good job of communicating what it intends to provide, making the useful distinction between user nodes, intermediate nodes, and gateway nodes and their different responsibilities.

I'm dubious about the effectiveness of their plan to use escrowed cryptocoins to pay for bandwidth, but I was intrigued enough to sign up for email updates.