A hundred years ago on irc someone from Russia was describing their internet connection, which was ethernet, while I had only ever heard of dial up outside of large companies.
It was just people had set up their own hubs and switches in their appartment buildings and strung cables between buildings.
This blew my mind. They just ran themselves ethernet and everyone got a drop from a switch in their building.
It wasn't clear how it got from a neighborgood level upstream.
But just the idea that they could all just decide to give themselves internet, and ethernet no less, string ethernet outside the walls of their own appartments to other appartments, and outside the building from one building to another? Unimaginable in the US. I was boggled and jealous.
It was just people had set up their own hubs and switches in their appartment buildings and strung cables between buildings.
This blew my mind. They just ran themselves ethernet and everyone got a drop from a switch in their building.
It wasn't clear how it got from a neighborgood level upstream.
But just the idea that they could all just decide to give themselves internet, and ethernet no less, string ethernet outside the walls of their own appartments to other appartments, and outside the building from one building to another? Unimaginable in the US. I was boggled and jealous.