4 January 2009
Neighbors and Wifi - Street Spirit
Posted by Charley under: Life; Thoughts .
I remember pondering the idea of communicating with my neighbors via SSID (wifi network name) in the recent past. It actually may have been way back during Startup Weekend DC (around Oct. 2007) while we were brainstorming new ways to meet the people that share your locale; neighbors in apartment buildings etc. Well yesterday while I was trying to wifi-up a new device in my apartment I noticed a SSID in the list I’d never seen before - StreetSpirit.
the wifi list from my couch in Denver, CO
In seventh grade, the song ‘Street Spirit‘ was my second favorite track off a Radiohead album called the Bends. It closed the record and I’ve had multiple conversations with people agreeing that it was maybe the most mysterious track they had created at that time. To me it was always (musically and chronologically) a lead in to the record that put them on the map - OK Computer. Street Spirit is a classic B-side that Radiohead still plays live.
Anyway, I started to think about how I really don’t know many of my neighbors - I’d like to know more of them. Of course there are a brazillion Radiohead (and Steppenwolf?) fans out there. But that one of my neighbors is potentially such a big Radiohead fan that they’d name their SSID after a B-side - I want to meet them.
After reading this post over at The Next Web, I decided to try and interact with my neighbors via SSID to just experiment. Instead of delivering cookies and shaking hands I was going to create an SSID that would hopefully catch their eye. Unfortunately I don’t share much (that I know of yet) with my local peers. I had to think of something we’ve all encountered or experienced to initially relate to them. Then it hit me, laundry! There are no washer/dryer hookups in the units of my building as it was built in the early 1900’s. Our basement laundry room machines cost $3.25 per load and from my experience that’s pricey for Denver. Am I wrong?
Answer me Kenilworth Court on Downing St. in Denver and let’s start a bulletin board via SSID.
8 Comments so far...
Dan Williams Says:
4 January 2009 at 10:59 pm.
To your point many people try to keep people away with malicious/perverse/disgusting SSID descriptions. You might say they are “entertaining” or simply “whimsical” but the reality is that said owner of “entertaining wireless access point” probably doesn’t want you sucking up their bandwidth or competing with their illegal warez downloads. Most likely this person is hold up in their domicile, and have been for some time, dying for some human interaction — but only the virtual kind. If they did get out — say a local coffee shop — they’d probably realize the intrinsic need for more bandwidth and would realize how infantile their SSID of “stinky p*$$y” actually is — or it’s a warning not to come knocking on her door. Either way, I won’t be getting onto her network …..
Jackson Mercer Says:
21 February 2009 at 1:33 pm.
It costs $2 for a load of laundy here in LA - Denver more expensive than LA? Excellent analysis of last track on Bends. Interesting tid-bit, I knew Steppenwolf’s daughter (who worked for my Dad) - she was about the hottest girl I’d ever seen when I was 14 years old.
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14 October 2009 at 6:26 pm.
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