The most recent one I remember is a group of people in Red Hook building an open WiFi mesh network for free/low-cost to give internet access to people in poverty.
I can understand. I like to think that technology and hacker types can be idealistic and passionate. For a lot of hacker and tech types the salary isn't the main driving force. So if you've been stuck in a corporate IT/Dev environment I could understand.
Have you ever been to a hackerspace? If you're looking to meet these types of individuals this is a great place for it. I remember the first time I went to one I talked with a guy who works at a local family oriented science centre and he just loves micro-controllers and playing with them. We had a great conversation for a good two hours. It was very uplifting to see someone love something so niche.
Weirdly enough, I'm not in a corporate environment... I think maybe I'm just a bit burned out from a) leaping into a PhD straight after school with a job in the few weeks between; and b) all the bad tech-related news lately.
Hackerspaces are awesome indeed! Thanks for reminding me to head down to my local one more often. Maybe I'll swing by there tonight...
The most recent one I remember is a group of people in Red Hook building an open WiFi mesh network for free/low-cost to give internet access to people in poverty.
http://rhicenter.org/redhookwifi/
This isn't the article I remember reading. I can't find the one that I read, but this explains it well enough I think.
A few others were stories, which I can't find either, about networking schools in Africa to each other and building networking within them.