Yesterday, I linked to a TorrentFreak article which showed a video of an elegant aerial ballet performed by wi-fi-emiting file-sharing fly-bots. Beautiful, as well as a functional method of un-censorable, un-regulatable, distributed wi-fi network.
Today, I came across a response to this for a much less elegant, but perhaps more practical solution: instead of aerial bots, create rat-bots.
‘In the city, you are never more than three metres away from a rat. They’re spectacularly successful. We’ve built them a wonderful habitat replete with high-speed autoroutes — storm drains and sewers — and convenience stores to snack from in the shape of dumpsters and trash. And ground level is where most of us wifi users happen to be, most of the time.
Small ground-traversing robots would not be subject to the same weight penalties as airborn drones. The wifi range would be shorter, but their power consumption would be lower and they’d be far more concealable — it’s quite easy to imagine a ratbot that is, literally, no larger than a real rat.’
The author goes on to evaluate the operational advantages, from power consumption to range, and suggest practical evasion and re-fuelling techniques, including charging mats and, perhaps, including bio-fuel conversion and primitive hunting/foraging programming…
And inspiring…
Xanthippa's Chamberpot 
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