On 5/20/09 10:07 PM, mike havens wrote:
> Could I go out and purchase a modem, hook it up to a coax connected to
> the cable system (which is being paid for), and then have free internet

No.  DNS is simply a way of associating (harder to remember) IP 
addresses with (easier to remember) names.  It has nothing to do with 
actually obtaining an IP address and Internet connectivity in the first 
place.

Perhaps an analogy is in order.  Say you want to call John Smith.  You 
pick up your phone book and search for "Smith, John" and see his phone 
number alongside it.  You then pick up your phone to call... but have no 
dial tone.  Just because you have the phone book and now know the number 
doesn't mean that you automatically have phone service.

DNS is like the phone book.  It just gives you a way of finding a number 
given a name.

To actually access the Internet, you'll need to be able to connect to 
some entity that is already connected.  There are Freenets (not as many 
as there used to be) that may allow you to do so over a phone modem. 
Typically, though, you will have to pay some company to connect to their 
Internet connected servers.

Mind you, once you *are* connected, you are free to use whatever DNS 
server you want (assuming that your ISP doesn't block outgoing DNS 
ports).  That's akin to getting phone service through one company but 
using another phone book.
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