Editing Ends and Means (section)

==Strategic Roadmap==
A stragetic roadmap for the development of technologies that support material peer-to-peer and the deployment of fractal mesh infrastructure. An exploration of how humanity can achieve co-ownership of network infrastructure, utilizing existing routes where possible, and provisioning new ones when necessary.

===Sovereign Computing===
The path to network freedom begins with the advent of sovereign computing. Nodal platforms will allow any user to host their own network services, perhaps without even fully understanding that they are doing so. It will just work, because it has to, in order to be adopted. We term such usage [[sovereign computing]], because it allows users to maintain control of their identities and their data.


The nodal server will assist in the transition from centralized and unsecured communications to ones that are distributed, encrypted, and logically peer-to-peer. There is no question that this represents a major improvement from the ''status quo''. Yet, the long-term evolution of the network demands a more radical approach, and the nodal platform presents the perfect opportunity for such a departure.


A communications platform incorporating publishing, messaging, status updates and telephony will be an attractive prospect to early adopters. A streamlined user interface and high reliability will drive wider adoption.

===The Neighborhood Network===
Long-term planning at the present juncture will pay dividends when sovereign computing becomes widespread. Including three [[802.11|b/g/n radios]] in the nodes will ensure that neighbors can find each other and establish robust and reliable routes of communication. An integrated software stack means that user communications will automatically be routed locally, whenever it is possible. The [[economies of scale]] dictate that users will pool their resources, and purchase Internet access collectively. This will drive further adoption.


While it will be possible to engage in bandwidth sharing using nodes alone, larger scale cooperatives will want to invest in a FreedomTower containing powerful radios capable of communicating with mobile devices, nodes, and other towers. Community-owned towers, in addition to serving as a logical connection point for communal outbound connectivity, will allow neighborhoods to communicate directly with adjacent neighborhoods, and in so doing extend the reach of material peer-to-peer connectivity.


Neighborhood Networks will purchase access from Tier 3 and Tier 2 network providers in a manner similar to what small and medium sized businesses do today. The price on a per-node basis could be as much as an order of magnitude below current residential levels.

===Autonomous Systems===
Just as the adoption of FreedomNodes will drive the adoption of FreedomTowers, the adoption of FreedomTowers will ultimately give rise to regional FreedomLinks, and just as the construction of a neighborhood tower will drive the adoption of nodes, the adoption of a link will drive the adoption of towers. These links will sit in Internet Exchanges and Colocation centers, participating in the regional radio mesh, and in the global network of networks as a peer, rather than a client.


The population served by a single link will be quite large - perhaps as many as a million individual nodes. These regional networks will still have to buy upstream connectivity from an Internet Service Provider, but they will finally be able to do so in the same way that a Tier 3 network purchases transit from a larger network.


In operational terms, these regional networks will constitute Autonomous Systems. They will be able to peer with other networks, driving down the cost of connectivity even farther. It is at this stage that the constituents of the regional mesh truly become their own Internet Service Provider.

===Backbones of our Own===
Still, regional Autonomous Systems will be localized, and radio frequency communications are not capable of serving as ISP-grade backbone links. FreedomLinks will initially be connected to one another via upstream fiber networks, so stopping at this point would leave our ability to communicate with one another in the hands of a few for-profit entities, whose [[terms of service]] may not be agreeable.


In order to achieve true freedom, regional networks will have to either build their own fiber lines to neighboring links, or purchase existing lines outright from established providers. As these lines are procured, existing pockets of material peer-to-peer will grow together, and larger federations of free networks will emerge. These federations will grow in size and operational disposition from Tier 3 to Tier 2, and eventually to Tier 1 networks. That is to say that when the federated networks grow large enough, they will be able to provide transit to other networks, and eventually engage in settlement-free peering on a wide scale.  


To the far stretches of the federation, a user would be able to send information using infrastructure of which they themself would be a stakeholder, a participant, an owner.

===A Human Right===
Our freedom alone is not enough. The constuction of a global Free Network is not the end of our struggle. The end of our stuggle is to ensure that every member of humanity is afforded access to such fundamentally transformational technology. Once we have built our networks, it would be wise to help others build their own.