[josh2600]

You are talking about terrestrial networks; that's not what WISPs are building. In a number of developing countries, the ground networks are owned and regulated, but wireless operators are not regulated in the same way.

In San Francisco we have a TON of small wireless ISPs fulfilling the needs of the companies that do business here, without using the last mile telco access.

I'm not living in a dystopian Ayn Rand reality; I'm suggesting an alternative method of delivery, one which is not subject to the same regulatory hurdles.

Of course you can't go and jack into BT's network and undercut them, but you can probably build a WISP without running afoul of the law.

Please correct me if I'm mistaken :).

[samegreatsleeve]

You may be right about WISPs.

I was referring to cellular networks and wired networks.

I'm guessing the hurdle is still legal/political. I'm gonna look into this, thanks for the insight

[josh2600]

No worries. Check out the meshpotato. If you're really gonna do it, this is the key to service delivery.

http://villagetelco.org/mesh-potato/

Basically it's an Analog Telephone Adapter and a Fixed Wireless receiver built into one, so for a very small price you can deliver bandwidth+telephony to your users.

Cellular and Wired are completely fubarr'd, that's why Africa bypassed them.