%% You should probably cite draft-irtf-gaia-alternative-network-deployments instead of this I-D. @techreport{manyfolks-gaia-community-networks-00, number = {draft-manyfolks-gaia-community-networks-00}, type = {Internet-Draft}, institution = {Internet Engineering Task Force}, publisher = {Internet Engineering Task Force}, note = {Work in Progress}, url = {https://datatracker.ietf.org/doc/draft-manyfolks-gaia-community-networks/00/}, author = {Jose Saldana and Andres Arcia-Moret and Bart Braem and Leandro Navarro and Ermanno Pietrosemoli and Carlos Rey-Moreno and Arjuna Sathiaseelan and Marco Zennaro}, title = {{Community Networks. Definition and taxonomy}}, pagetotal = 23, year = 2014, month = jun, day = 18, abstract = {Several communities have developed initiatives to build large scale, self-organized and decentralized community wireless networks that use wireless technologies (including long distance) due to the reduced cost of using the unlicensed spectrum. This can be motivated by different causes: Sometimes the reluctance, or the impossibility, of network operators to provide wired and cellular infrastructures to rural/remote areas has motivated the rise of these networks. Some other times, they are built as a complement and an alternative to wired Internet access. These community wireless networks have self sustainable business models that provide more localised communication services as well as providing Internet backhaul support through peering agreements with traditional network operators who see such community led networks as a way to extend their reach to rural/remote areas at lower cost. This document defines these networks, summarizes their technological characteristics and classifies them, also talking about their socio- economic sustainability models. There exist other networks, also based on sharing wireless resources of the users, but not built upon the initiative of the users themselves, nor owned by them. The characterization of these networks is not the objective of this document.}, }