Scaling Up, Spreading, eduroam, Guts and Digital Sovereignty

📆 The Digital Tuesday → #eduroam the best thing since sliced bread.

Did you know that…in 112 countries you can safely access the internet with your own eduroam account?

With eduroam, you can use 1️⃣ personal account to access Wi-Fi at 40,000 locations where eduroam is broadcasted. No more sticking passwords on walls for (unsecure) Wi-Fi networks or requesting an account when you're visiting somewhere.

⚡ Ease of use and how it works
Step 1. Check if there’s eduroam nearby.
Step 2. Enter your account once.
Step 3. SURF the internet!
Once you've done this once, you only ever need to follow step 3 again! Open your laptop or grab your mobile device and go! (and stop doomscrolling!)

✅ But how, how can this flawless, relatively (extremely) cheap, super handy AND privacy-by-design Digital Tuesday Thing even exist?! What kind of sorcery is this?!

🛜 For that, let me take you into a paraphrased conversation with Klaas Wierenga (the inventor of eduroam.. and yes… I’ll allow myself a little national pride here: eduroam and Klaas are both from the Netherlands 🇳🇱‼️)

👦🏻 Wladi: Klaas, isn’t it insane that eduroam exists in 112 countries?
🧔‍♂️ Klaas: Absolutely. According to traditional business model textbooks it should never have worked, not by non-profits, education, research, or even by big tech companies.
👦🏻 Wladi: But how?!
🧔‍♂️ Klaas: Open standards, start small, reach critical mass, and courage.
👦🏻 Wladi: Courage for what?
🧔‍♂️ Klaas: The courage to learn by doing, and the courage for organizations across the world to collectively open up their networks to unknown users... and by doing so actually give back privacy, security, and ease of use.
👦🏻 Wladi: #love2eduroam

⚠️ ⚠️ ⚠️ ⚠️ ⚠️
From here on, only for the true enthusiasts.
⚠️ ⚠️ ⚠️ ⚠️ ⚠️

🎯 What is it an alternative for?
Open and poorly secured Wi-Fi + having to request Wi-Fi access too often.

👥 Can everyone in the Netherlands use it?
No, unfortunately not...

👩‍🎓 Who can?
All students, learners, researchers and staff of institutions affiliated with SURF and Kennisnet. Or with the “SURF” equivalents in those 111 other countries... which, by the way, don’t go by the name SURF but have great names like RENATER, NORDUnet of ZAMREN.

🌐 What about digital sovereignty, autonomy and other public values?
✅ Fully based on open standards.
✅ Governance: full control and trust through GÉANT.
✅ Technology runs on SURF’s own infrastructure for NL.
✅ There's a geteduroam app (geteduroam.app) used by millions for simple one-time logins.
✅ Can others adopt or organize this too? Yep! For example: govroam (eduroam for government), cityRoam (Japan), Publicroam, and OpenRoaming (International).

My Conclusion

⚖️ "Scaling up" by "spreading"
Not one mega-provider for 112 countries, but a federated model that works as a unified whole, without undesirable dependencies. It’s an essential difference in governance and technology.

🛠️ What normally sounds like a job for thousands of Big Tech engineers, is here carried by collaboration, open standards, and a sense of ownership by education and research institutions worldwide.... who, together with SMEs, are perfectly capable of providing the hardware, knowledge, maintenance, and support locally, without falling into the trap of: "this can only work if a few 🇺🇸 Big Tech vendors do it for us."

No 🤠 clichés like: “go big or go home,” but: 👉 Go big together and stay in control.

As far as I’m concerned, eduroam is both an inspiration and a lesson for cloud, AI, and identity challenges… and for the decisions currently on the table in 🇪🇺. There are more options than just scaling up to (Big) EuroTech, waving around the Draghi report, or assuming we’re back to an IT admin with a server under their desk❗️

❤️ Finally…the most beautiful place ever with eduroam…
👑 Let’s switch to Paul Dekkers, who, alongside Klaas and others, stood at the cradle of eduroam. From South Africa to Schin op Geul... he’s seen, done, and fixed it all. But eduroam on the ⛴️ ferry to the Wadden Islands remains his favorite moment (see photo)‼️

🫵❓Have you also ever had a favorite or surprising eduroam moment? Feel free to share it in the comments?!