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The revolution needs plumbers

Last Notes

2026-04-27 11:25:00 UTC

A project called Disaster Radio had an idea that didn't get enough attention. Instead of making people install an app to use the mesh, the node created a local WiFi network. Walk within range, connect your phone, open a browser. Static HTML page (PWA) served from the node. Read and write to the mesh without installing anything.
MeshCore now has real coverage in multiple cities. LoRa range is measured in kilometers. Hardware is cheap. Which raises a practical question: what would it look like to do what Disaster Radio imagined, but with MeshCore's actual infrastructure behind it?
A solar-powered public node in a park. You connect to the WiFi, open a browser, and there are channel messages collected from the mesh while you were walking. You write something back.
The identity design has a few directions. Shared identity for all hotspot users, config locked so visitors can only read and write - nobody can touch the node name, network settings, or channels. Or: the browser generates a fresh keypair per session, multitenancy in firmware, your messages tied to your browser session via websocket. Or the simplest version: no keys at all, just a name you type, channel messages only (they don't need a per user key).
Or run the meshcore-bitchat bridge and let people connect via Bitchat.
Put this in a park with a poster explaining that the mesh exists, how to get the app, why it matters. Same idea as a little free library, except the infrastructure is invisible and radio-based. Someone walks by, connects for a few minutes, discovers the mesh is real and reachable.

2026-04-23 13:24:00 UTC

Most people try Bitchat once, think it's cool, and never open it again. Waiting for the apocalypse.
The mesh network effect is brutal in a specific way: if your friends aren't running it in the background, you open the app and see nobody. So you close it. The next person opens it and sees nobody. So they close it.
Keep it running. When the notification shows someone's on the mesh, write to them. Not because you have something urgent to say. Because that's how networks get built.
Before sharing something with a friend - a link, a thought, whatever - ask: "Is your Bitchat on?" Make it a reflex, at least among the people who actually care about this stuff. Make the mesh appear where you are - it should shine from your device, enrich the space around you.
The mesh doesn't become useful in a crisis. It becomes useful before one, by already being how you communicate in physical spaces. Crises just reveal whether the infrastructure existed or not.
Install it, keep it running, use it.

2026-04-03 10:45:00 UTC

One of the primary benefits of money is that you don't have to know your customer. Money's secret sauce: anonymity at scale. No customer dossiers needed. Pre-coin era? Trade jerky for future grain, stare into their soul, gauge if they'll ghost you when blight hits. (Spoiler: they might.)
With money, all this disappears. Meat<->money, exchanging names and life stories becomes an optional pleasantry.
Now compare with current KYC-madness.

2026-03-12 09:21:00 UTC

Seeing a lot of MeshCore discourse lately. Been running mesh for a while now: Don't be religious, use whatever works where you live. Give nodes into the hands of whoever you'd want to reach when the infrastructure goes dark. Just spend some time and money onboarding people. And hope it will be just a fun project that you'll never need.

2026-02-12 12:39:00 UTC

People often build mesh networks by just adding nodes randomly. Then they wonder why throughput tanks and it does not work. MeshCore nailed it: 80% of those are airtime vampires. Swap 'em for one fat repeater (high-gain omnis, solar-powered) perched on a ridge with LOS to the valley. Rest is just pruning the mesh till it breathes.