We are living through a critical juncture in telecommunications history -- an era where fundamental changes in how we communicate are radically transforming civil society. Broadcast and spectrum regulations are often decades out of date with current technologies and decision-makers are woefully ignorant of the capabilities (or even existence) of better alternatives. Corporations utilize proprietary technologies to capture markets and lock consumers into expensive path dependencies. Telecommunications companies build centralized network architectures for command and control -- networks which function to create artificial scarcities and exorbitant prices.

This talk provides a glimpse into the world of open source, open architecture wireless technologies and discusses the ramifications for future telecommunications deployments.