So, like, texting?
No. This is tech we are talking about. Gotta be more creative in making guesses here.
A startup’s software will let iPhone apps connect phones without the Internet. Yes. FireChat- you’re gonna wanna sit down for this guys; is going to let you connect via messaging with no cell phone reception.
FireChat makes use of a feature Apple introduced in the latest version of its iOS mobile software, iOS7, called multipeer connectivity. This feature allows phones to connect to one another directly using Bluetooth or Wi-Fi as an alternative to the Internet. If you’re using FireChat, its “nearby” chat room lets you exchange messages with other users within 100 feet without sending data via your cellular provider.
The new feature of iOS7 currently only supports data moving directly from one device to another, and from one device to several others. However, Open Garden’s forthcoming software will extend the feature so that data can hop between two iPhones out of range of one another via intermediary devices. That approach, known as mesh networking, is at the heart of several existing projects to create disaster-proof or community-controlled communications networks.
Apps built to exploit such device-to-device schemes can offer security and privacy benefits over those that rely on the Internet. For example, messages sent using FireChat to nearby devices don’t pass through any systems operated by either Open Garden or a wireless carrier (although they are broadcast to all FireChat users nearby).
Peer-to-peer mobile communications and mesh networks could prove especially important in countries with minimal communications infrastructure. “You can see Google spending billions on fiber and balloons, but this is not going to solve the problem of ubiquitous mobile connectivity,” Micha Benoliel, of Open Garden- the developers of FireChat, says. He argues that the spread of cheap Android phones across the world will make mesh networking feasible. “We need to create small Internets that can function on their own and [then] connect them to the big Internet.”
Don’t we love the 21st century tech. Lets go crazy now shall we? 😀