The Outernet

Bob Bruninga has recently posted info to the AMSAT community about an interesting, free, public satellite project:

There is one other GEO  (possible AMSAT related) project going on.  That
is the OUTERNET satellites.  These are 6 GEO birds covering the entire
globe that anyone can build a downlink-only receiver using a Rasberry-PI,
a 1m dish, an LNB and a DSP dongle to receive the free content.  Their
mission is to deliver WEB content (one way) to anyplace on Earth.  Their
satellites exist and are working...

The news is that the content provider is willing to carry ham radio
content too..

We are proposing to make the "system" two-way for hams by having the
OUTERNET content provider tap into the APRS-Internet system and look for
amateur radio related OUTERNET traffic.  This way, any ham radio operator
on earth can originate traffic into the APRS-IS system marked-for OUTERNET
either by any of the existing APRS digipeater birds, or terrestrial
IGates, or HF Igates and that traffic will get into the system and into
the OUTERNET downlink.

Hence, a 2-way system for hams and ham-wannabees.

All the pieces are there... we are just trying to see how it could be
used...  Again, the remote-user can only originate single packet like
content due to the extremely small APRS input pipe. But the remote user
can Recceive the entire GLOBAL feed of APRS internet traffic...  SO how to
use that very unbalanced 2-way pipe is the area that is ripe for
exploration.

Here are the thoughts so far.. http://aprs.org/outnet.html

Bob, WB4APR