There would be technical and regulatory issues with what you are suggesting.
You can't use amateur frequencies for anything you want. Not even with a license. The amateur radio license is specifically prohibited from being used for commercial purposes. If you only call and e-mail friends, never shop or bank on-line, I suppose this might work. We have autopatches on repeaters that allow us to make phone calls from our cars or from portable radios we carry with us, but I can't really use that for work. It is illegal for an amateur radio operator to charge for their services as such. HF (low frequency) is VERY narrow bandwidth. We do use it for teletype, and even e-mail, but checking e-mail at 300 baud is only good for text, (although it is pretty cool to have e-mail in the middle of the ocean for next to nothing). If you were interested in setting up a community mesh network like you described, you can do something similar with amateur radio, but you would want to do things with UHF and microwave frequencies to get any useful bandwidth. Interestingly enough, one of the 802.11b channels falls into the amateur band, where amateur is designated as the primary user. That means that a licensed amateur can legally increase the output power of an 802.11b WiFi transceiver and do some REALLY cool things with it. Using directional antennas, a community wireless network is possible. The catch is what you use it for. Games, OK. Phone between other users, OK. Phone to PSTN, sort of okay, as long as you adhere to the non-commercial clause. TV is out of the question, except for amateur TV (which could be a lot of fun). You couldn't transmit a commercial TV station, but you could launch your own TV station and transmit it over the amateur bands (anyone can receive it, licensed or not). Currently, I have a laptop installed in my car that shows me and all other amateur APRS users in the area on a map. I can send text messages to any of these users, one of which is my wife on the computer at home. I can also radio these same people. Working through a repeater, I can talk to people on the other side of town, or the other side of the world (repeaters can be linked together using VoIP technology) from a portable radio that fits in my pocket. There are things we can do with amateur radio that make ordinary tech geeks drool. It's a very cool hobby, but it has to be exactly that. You can't make money off of it. Having said that, you can do many of the same things for commercial purposes. You just need to apply to Industry Canada for a license. It's not hard, and it's not expensive. We use two-way radio within our business, and have it connected to our IP phone system. One day I will probably set up a mobile data system as well. I think this is getting long, so please ask questions, or contact me off-list if you want to know more. -Tim, VA3TSP On Thursday 12 July 2007 22:35, Shidan wrote: > Are there any experts in the wireless world here from the > commercial/regulatory side? > If so maybe you can help with my question. I have been told that if > one gets certified as an advanced amateur radio operator you can use > really low frequencies with fairly high power for pretty much anything > you want. So what is to stop a group of certified operators from > offering wireless mesh services for free as a co-operative, with their > obvious frequency and power benefits, and using this network for last > mile delivery of various commercial services such as pstn, internet, > tv, etc ? > > ---- > Shidan > > --------------------------------------------------------------------- > To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] -- Tim St. Pierre IP telephony specialist sip://[EMAIL PROTECTED] Toronto: 647 722 6930 Toll-Free 1 888 488 6940 [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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