I don't see that as a reason not to try.
The banishment of net neutrality has prompted me (perhaps irrelevantly) to finally get around to researching mesh networking. This, in turn, has made me want to try out #tincan, though my smartphone is too smart to let me test it out in a mobile context. More to the point, I can't seem to find it on the interwebs. Has it been called home to the hangar? Is there a newer version, or a recommended alternative?
Of course, people would click on that headline less. :/ I am confident that articles like this won't keep people from trying. Long-distance communication will continue to be more mundane and ubiquitous. As control becomes less feasible, and profit from it less justified, it's reasonable that it move into the public domain.
I'm not saying it's not important to try, but I do think we should realize the very real hurdles we face. Surely mesh networks aren't the only way to go, or even the best way to go. The technology needed to make a viable "peoples' network" might not have been invented yet.
That's likely. But they are likely to be found by people that need them to solve a problem. The problem that meshnetworks try to solve is one that could use more minds on it. IMO this article has an unnecessarily defeatist attitude.
I know that that doesn't have the same romantic charm as a network that is completely owned and operated by everyday people, but ultimately it may be more effective. After all, a government agency could just as easily tap into an open mesh network and monitor traffic in a manner that's probably easier than it is for them to do now.
Ok, that might actually be deserved, but you get the point. That said, SOPA wouldn't block IPs. So, if you typed 173.255.237.82, you'd still get here. But, I agree, mesh networks might not be the solution. Maybe the best solution is a hybrid where your computer searches for the server over multiple networks. As long as the US government acts like it does, we need to keep trying.
(As a side note, it's a bit sad that we must resort to "sneaking around" in order to do completely legal things due to bogus laws.)