Piratebox 1.0: anonymous, go-anywhere wireless file-sharing

boing
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Originally published at: https://boingboing.net/2014/06/02/piratebox-1-0-anonymous-go-a.html

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It’s a shame they had to call it a piratebox. BBC in a can sounds less arrest-worthy and more fun. I’d fill it with old text adventures and rogue-likes to share. Maybe some ascii art?

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Perhaps they are devout followers of the Flying Spaghetti Monster.
Perhaps they are tweaking their nose at those who think all sharing must be piracy.
Perhaps they are embracing the hacking culture, I mean it runs on itty bitty routers that are hacked to run it.
Perhaps it is a nose tweak to those who think that free software has to have been stolen.

You could always change up the files yourself to remove the mentions of pirate, or run librarybox…
But then you’d be taking the advice of someone who deliberately assumed a name and avatar just to mess with peoples perceptions.

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Wow… make one in an innocuous coke can… or to fit behind a lightswitch plate cover.

Or in a re purposed smoke detector.

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See it’s the same thing with the Pirate Party. They have some really good ideas and values and I would definitely get out there and vote for them (I haven’t voted in years). But your average Joe Public hears the word “Pirate” and immediately thinks illegitimate or unsavoury.

Using that word is detrimental to all the intelligence and effort behind these initiatives.

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It could be an empty box, if you’re arrested for file sharing, it will be called a pirate box or worse by the press.

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It’s a shame they had to call it a piratebox.

Which is odd, because the Geek Community is usually so good with naming things:

Git - source control. Named after an insult
Gimp - image editing
Pentaho - ???
Bloodshed Dev - it’s a compiler!

Then there’s the fictional parasitenet. I (foolishly?) use it as my home network, and Every. Single. Relative expresses concern over the name.

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Or The Pirate Bay. AAAARGH!

Sure, you can say “There’s no such thing as bad publicity” but you’ll never convince my mom with that name.

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