MEET APPLE'S 'SKYNET' – THE iOS 7 FEATURE THAT COULD 'CHANGE EVERYTHING': Apple's mundane-sounding Multipeer Connectivity Framework attracted little attention during its quiet rollout for iOS 7. But following the recent release of the quirky FireChat app, which uses the Framework to connect users who don't have direct access to Wi-Fi or a data connection, the feature's significant disruption potential is beginning to raise eyebrows.
The technology is called mesh networking. "It's going to change everything," Mike Elgan writes for Cult of Mac, comparing the technology's potential impact to "the Internet itself."
Here's how it works: Using the same inter-device connections that power Air Drop file transfers, Apple devices within range can connect to each other, acting as relay nodes in a device network running separately from the Internet. Apps like FireChat use the mesh network to relay data from device to device, until they find a device with Internet connectivity to bridge the gap.
"Apple is a leader here with its Multipeer Connectivity Framework," notes Elgan. "But it appears that Google is also going big with consumer-level mesh networking."
Eighty-five percent of Apple's mobile devices currently run iOS7. (Cult of Mac, Wired)