Monday, January 02, 2006
Poaching
I moved into my current house about four and a half years ago. At the time, both my East and West neighbors appeared to be owner-occupants. Within two years of my arrival, however, both houses became rentals. The East house was sold and then stood vacant for many months, but finally became sporadically occupied in August. The new renters came and went, never staying for too long. It appeared that a group of college guys had preemptively rented out the house for the school year. Until school started, they were using the place as a party house and occasional crash pad. In September, a few weeks after they actually moved in, a Cox cable guy came 'round, apparently installing cable TV. I noted this in the back of my mind somewhere as I had a series of thoughts: Cox cable... college guys... they'll have high-speed internet... it's a 4-bedroom house (I think)... installing wiring is a pain... since they don't own the house they'll likely go wireless... and something like 90% of wireless routers and not secured... probably 99.9% of college kid's wireless routers...
I should say at this point that I do without an internet connection at home. Two summers ago I got a cell phone and ditched my land line, severing the possibility of dial-up or DSL. I've never had cable or dish... too expensive for a one-person household, and way too much of a distraction for an already-distracted grad student with a known weakness for shows such as Junkyard Wars and Chop Shop, not to mention History Channel WWII specials of any kind. When I need the internet, I either travel the 3.5 miles to my office or I walk the 3.5 blocks to the public library near my house.
This brings us to one night in early October, when I sat at my desk in my room working on my laptop. Actually, I was probably either writing a blog entry or playing the heroin-like computer game Civilization III. Earlier that day I had carried my laptop to work and used it at the local coffee shop to surf the web while drinking my Illy double Espressicano (my name for an Americano with so little water, it's closer to espresso). After surfing, I neglected to disable the wireless radio on my laptop. Back at home that evening, the radio was still on, and *viola!*, it picked up a wireless signal. Barely. The signal was very weak, and I didn't have time to even check my email before it kicked me off due to a weak signal. I unplugged my laptop and moved onto my bed, next to the window, which is about 15 feet from my neighbor's house. Now I had moved from "Very very weak signal" territory into "Low signal" territory. Now I could pop onto Pine to check my email.
This is technically poaching. But is it stealing? My neighbors have failed to secure their wireless router, which is very easy to do. But that's like saying it's ok to rob someone's house if they don't lock the front door. I'm not systematically downloading music or large image files (ahem). But I'm still using a service they pay for. Right now, this problem is pretty low on my list of ethical dilemmas. If my neighbors didn't wake me once or twice a week at 3 am with car alarms and yelling in their front yard, and if they didn't toss beer cans and cigarette butts into my yard, I might feel a little bit bad. But the way it is, I don't.
On a related (wireless) note: I'm now picking up a full-signal wireless network called "Free Public WiFi" at my house. This started just a few days ago. However, it doesn't actually work. If I start up a web browser or SSH (to use Pine), I get nuthin. A web search doesn't show any city-wide WiFi in Tucson. Only hotspots here and there. By the way, I'm all for citywide wireless, but it shouldn't be a city-funded utility. Let it be run by competing providers! Let them use any business model they like: free with advertising, or a subscription service or whatever. Don't make it a city utility and make everybody pay for it regardless of it they use it and regardless of the quality of the service. I don't understand arguments to make *any* services into municipal monopolies, besides police services. Fire, ambulance, garbage, water, sewer, phone, and WiFi -- they should all be privately offered services.
I should say at this point that I do without an internet connection at home. Two summers ago I got a cell phone and ditched my land line, severing the possibility of dial-up or DSL. I've never had cable or dish... too expensive for a one-person household, and way too much of a distraction for an already-distracted grad student with a known weakness for shows such as Junkyard Wars and Chop Shop, not to mention History Channel WWII specials of any kind. When I need the internet, I either travel the 3.5 miles to my office or I walk the 3.5 blocks to the public library near my house.
This brings us to one night in early October, when I sat at my desk in my room working on my laptop. Actually, I was probably either writing a blog entry or playing the heroin-like computer game Civilization III. Earlier that day I had carried my laptop to work and used it at the local coffee shop to surf the web while drinking my Illy double Espressicano (my name for an Americano with so little water, it's closer to espresso). After surfing, I neglected to disable the wireless radio on my laptop. Back at home that evening, the radio was still on, and *viola!*, it picked up a wireless signal. Barely. The signal was very weak, and I didn't have time to even check my email before it kicked me off due to a weak signal. I unplugged my laptop and moved onto my bed, next to the window, which is about 15 feet from my neighbor's house. Now I had moved from "Very very weak signal" territory into "Low signal" territory. Now I could pop onto Pine to check my email.
This is technically poaching. But is it stealing? My neighbors have failed to secure their wireless router, which is very easy to do. But that's like saying it's ok to rob someone's house if they don't lock the front door. I'm not systematically downloading music or large image files (ahem). But I'm still using a service they pay for. Right now, this problem is pretty low on my list of ethical dilemmas. If my neighbors didn't wake me once or twice a week at 3 am with car alarms and yelling in their front yard, and if they didn't toss beer cans and cigarette butts into my yard, I might feel a little bit bad. But the way it is, I don't.
On a related (wireless) note: I'm now picking up a full-signal wireless network called "Free Public WiFi" at my house. This started just a few days ago. However, it doesn't actually work. If I start up a web browser or SSH (to use Pine), I get nuthin. A web search doesn't show any city-wide WiFi in Tucson. Only hotspots here and there. By the way, I'm all for citywide wireless, but it shouldn't be a city-funded utility. Let it be run by competing providers! Let them use any business model they like: free with advertising, or a subscription service or whatever. Don't make it a city utility and make everybody pay for it regardless of it they use it and regardless of the quality of the service. I don't understand arguments to make *any* services into municipal monopolies, besides police services. Fire, ambulance, garbage, water, sewer, phone, and WiFi -- they should all be privately offered services.
# posted by stratovolcano @ 12:21 PM 
