Cantenna: Wireless Broadband from a Mile (Or More) Away

A GEEK IN A PARK

The other day I was sitting at a park bench, a goodly half-mile or more from anywhere in particular, away especially from houses and people. This wasn't to say I needed to be entirely away from humankind and technology. No. I was laboriously hammering the keyboard, writing another article for my space on Associated Content.

Again, I was pretty far away from any one house. But I was enjoying full-speed broadband, able to check email, and cruise the web on a whim. No, I didn't have a wireless phone card. No, I didn't have a "tethered modem" cell phone (high-speed internet via USB connection with an internet-enabled cell phone).

Nope.

I was getting my internet for free from some house about a half-mile away... Somewhere over there...I don't know which house...

This gizmo allows me to do this. And I tote this gizmo with me whenever I go out - even when I take Mr. Fuzzy-Head with me to go terrorize law enforcement officers.

WHAZZAT, BUSTER?

After a while a pedestrian walked by and noticed Chico s(h)itting on my shoulder. She stopped and looked at the pretty bird for a while, and then she looked down at the park bench top - a frown of terror steadily growing on her face. After a moment, she pointed and asked...

"What's that thing?"

Terror had completely rent her otherwise pristine character asunder. She was pointing at the coffee can innocently laying on the bench-top. But the can had a wire sticking out of its side, and it looked like something you saw in a cheap 1950's sci-fi horror flick.

Mind you, this is no ordinary coffee can. It has made a transmutation into something higher, a more elevated confabulation that "can" offer more to a human than just a mindlessly transitory role of transporting fresh coffee grinds.

No.

This, my friends, is a contraption called a cantenna.

GEEK-NOLOGY

I explained the coffee can to the nice lady, and she walked away shaking her head. It was all Greek to her: geek technology she either failed to understand or appreciate - or perhaps both. Anyway...

Have a lookey at the pictures. All five of 'em...