Your best bet would be a WRT based router running OpenWRT, DD-WRT or
some other open source firmware. The router runs around $50 and has all
the functions you'll ever need.

The problem with anything in the US is that unless you have prior
licensing, you are limited by Article 15 to a maximum broadcasting
distance of 300 feet (if i remember correctly). The workaround for this
is getting an amateur radio license. Amateur band allotment for the 2.4
ghz range corresponds with that of the wifi bands, allowing you to bump
up the power and build your own antennas.

If you want to go any distance with that, you'll find yourself in the
world of directional antennas. Wonderful stuff, like bi-quad fed
satellite dishes (27 dB of gain!), waveguide antennas, and more. if you
are interested in that, I can go on at length (as this is one of my
other hobbies...)

As for Power over Ethernet... I'm not sure what you are talking about,
and I'm pretty big into this sort of thing. Power over ethernet
generally refers to using one pair of the 8 wires in Cat5 to pass along
the voltage for the device to run, say 5 volts, not anything to do with
the actually network. You might be talking about BPL, or broadband over
powerlines. This tech works by using the powerlines to both send
ethernet signals and act as a rudimentary wifi antenna. This is bad
technology. It sounds good on the surface, but is really destructive to
any radio activity around it, since it saturates the spectrum with
noise. This isn't something an individual can do, but is a large scale,
city run thing.

If you want to just basic host some local TV/Radio/FreeInternet, just
buy a router, set it up with no password, and change the SSID to
"FreeLinuxHotspot" or something kooky like that. There are several ways
to set up a hotspot, and some are built into the WRT firmware. (I
haven't personally messed with it, but it appears simple to set up and
run, just config a welcome webpage and such) Then you can spread
whatever you want to your neighbors or whatever. A lot of people are big
into operating public access points in their neighborhoods.



stomfisite wrote:
> Adrian Garner wrote:
>
>> Hi,
>>
>> I'm just wondering... you can set up a wireless network and with
>> antennas, repeaters etc you can make it a wide area network.
>> Traditionally then you would start talking about providing web access
>> over that network. But you could also set up intranet sites to serve
>> video, audio, VOIP at crazy high speeds right? A youtube/democracyTV
>> service without the need for as much compression?
>> Bristol has one... http://psand.net/clan/ but they don't talk about any
>> services running within it.
>>
>> Naturally I'm gonna take this to far (just trying to get a response
>> though): a linux distribution that acts as a broad casting station slash
>> node in a free telecommunications framework - does it exist? What are
>> the issues and limitations? What should the priorities be?
>>
>> --
>> www.adrian.com.au <http://www.adrian.com.au>
>>
>> Peats Ridge Festival (29th dec - 1st Jan)
>> - http://peatsridgefestival.com.au/
>> Neutralise your car's greenhouse emissions - http://www.greenfleet.com.au/
>> How the system works (or doesn't) - http://www.corporations.org/system/
>> <http://www.corporations.org/system/>
>>
>>
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
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>>
>
> I think this is a good place to start looking.
> http://www.freenetworks.org/
>
> You can start a local community effort with an embedded Power Over
> Ethernet (POE) system in a weather proof box which fits on roofs or
> balconies, gets its power from your PC Ethernet port, and does peer
> sharing back to friendly wired unlimited access node(s). Sometimes
> these are local businesses letting you in after hours.
>
> Have fun.
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>