I similar technology has been discussed before, and I believe it is still a viable option: RFCs 1149 and 2549, Avian Carriers. While avian carriers do present problems, (flapping, unpredictable delay, queuing issues, and buggy implementations (specifically lice and mites)), I believe they are a better option than IP via Balloon. Balloons offer higher bandwidth (practically any payload size can be accommodated with a larger envelope), but the connection is much slower and less predictable than avian carrier. Balloon carrier retransmits are very expensive and the TTL is affected by the cost of propane and the general wind direction.
As an alternative, perhaps we should consider IP via dirigible. A properly sized airship loaded with a high speed DVD-rw library comprising (tens of ) thousands of discs providing a very high bandwidth, high latency, low loss (if helium is used instead of hydrogen) carrier might be an option. -e -----Original Message----- From: Petri Helenius [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Friday, August 15, 2003 4:50 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; Rich Casto Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: East Coast outage? > > subsidize) local power generation via renewable energy sources (e.g. > > solar, wind, hydro) it would go a long way towards solving this problem. > > Rubbish. > > If in order to make it viable such energy needs to be subsidized then it is > not "affordable". > And solar nor wind are good for base energy production so we´re stuck with other methods unless you want to move IP packets only when it´s windy. Maybe we could attach the packets to hot air balloons and send them with the wind? Pete
