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Internet traffic bumming a ride on the wheels.

 Worlds slowest internet connection for the rural population in developing countries.
  (+6, -3)
(+6, -3) 		  [vote for,
against]

Internet connection for rural areas that don't have telephone connections. The idea is to have some wireless (bluetooth) devices planted on the vehicles that go to these remote villages (maybe once a day) and the only computer there quickly exchanges data and when the vehicle goes near another vehicle that is on its way to the nearest city it quickly exchanges data again. Finally the data swims to a hub and hence to the internet.

Maybe they cant do online shopping. But e-mails and news are possible. Who knows with a bit of cache'ing technology even interactive forms are posible.

—my2cents, Apr 18 2002

No Phones http://wschronicle....?NewsID=5963&sID=34
"Seventy-seven percent of the households on the Navajo reservation have no phone service." And that is in the US. [bristolz, Apr 18 2002, last modified Oct 04 2004]

AutomobileNet http://www.halfbake.../idea/AutomobileNet
[phoenix, Apr 18 2002, last modified Oct 04 2004]

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       Hmmm. This is an interesting idea. Maybe the device would continuously broadcast the data so that people throughout the country side could pick up their stuff everytime the train went by. Maybe a satellite antennae on the train could allow the broadcast device to be updated frequently.
—bristolz, Apr 18 2002
   

       Where is this rural population that doesn't have phone lines? Some aborigine tribe or something? They might be short on bluetooth laptops, can you do a portal function if they carve their message on a yam maybe?
—spartanica, Apr 18 2002
   

       I've helped a little trying to get email service to a Central American rural coffee-growing town - the school would benefit from it, the medical clinic probably would, the coffee-growers would be very pleased to negotiate their own prices instead of paying middlemen, and there's clearly a tourist opportunity. Five minutes after we got the link up, a German backpacker poked her head in and said "I hear you have email, yes?" Five minutes, in the middle of nowhere. (Unfortunately the link didn't stay up.)   

       My current theory is that handing addressed floppies to backpackers would be surprisingly effective, but I like this idea too.   

       We came up with a disk-swapping protocol for the buses - jitneynet! - but satellite coverage is getting cheaper, and bluetooth would be interestingly automatic.
—hello_c, Apr 18 2002
   

       HalfBaked. (link)
—phoenix, Apr 18 2002
   

       Cannot imagine a realistic community which has computers, but no telephone...   

       I
—Inspector Z, Mar 22 2003
   

       Brilliant Idea actually.   

       As for lack of computers, the vehicles themselves can carry computers to these villages.   

       I think more than anything this will allow rural residents to understand the concept of the internet and of the global village; and of the various advantages and disadvantages related.
—joker_of_the_deck, Mar 23 2003
   


 

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