What is the Outernet?
The Outernet is an Internet streaming service that provides a limited receive only Internet to remote areas with ZERO Internet as well as 99% of locations on Earth for FREE! It does this by beaming up selected content to three Satellites which provide coverage to 99% of the planet. Users with receivers then download daily content.
Outernet started its service with its first Satellite broadcast August 11th 2014. Outernet encourages the self building of software defined radio receivers which comprise an SDR, LNB and small amplifier with instructions provided on their website/forums. They (Outernet) are also in the design and building phase of offering ready built units to receive the 20MB or so daily broadcasts.
What can I download?
There is a strong focus of Community Project content as well as Educational, Emergency communications, Messaging, News and Weather.
The idea is that the device is connected to a large Hard Drive which then acts like a growing library of knowledge.
The Future of The Outernet
The team at The Outernet have previously stated their desire to launch multiple mini CubeSats to increase coverage and reliability. Certainly the addition of a low speed transmit feature would make for a fully fledged albeit slow Internet for those areas in the world not currently served by Internet, be that Sea, Polar or developing Countries. Further to this the natural progression of Blockchain Internet will no doubt play its part.
Current Developments
Being a licensed Amateur Radio operator I thought that the Outernet may benefit from our radio infrastructure to make some two way communications via The Outernet. So a few years ago I contacted Bob Bruninga W4APR the inventor of the Amateur Radio APRS system and discussed the possibilities with him and the guys at The Outernet. I am pleased to say that Outernet now supports APRS messaging, meaning that anywhere on Earth we can get a message through via HF APRS or Via Satellite communications relays, out on the network and parsed back into the Outernet system for reception anywhere on Earth. Therefore Emergency communications for areas with damaged infrastructure or none at all are now catered for. For those interested HAM's just place OUTNET in the APRS message to enable the feature.
More about the APRS Outernet features and capability here : http://aprs.org/outnet.html
The team are working on the third or forth iteration of an all in one design which should be for sale shortly.
To take a further interest in The OUTERNET project or join the Forum please visit the project here : https://store.outernet.is
Having played with this tech for a while I can wholeheartedly say that this project is of major significance in delivering Educational or Emergency information in areas or at times of no other means of communication. Its also just plain fun to collect and view the data from a Satellite even when you have broadband!
Projects for FREE community benefit in tech' excite me, if they do you, please follow me and UPVOTE to ensure more people become aware of this great project.