Patent ID: 7515560

Claim:
A method for establishing and maintaining a wireless network comprising: providing a plurality of network communication devices corresponding to a plurality of users, the network communication devices continuously broadcasting network participation packets to other network communication devices within a first predetermined interval, with each network participation packet comprising a unique user identifier corresponding to each user; establishing the wireless network through receipt and processing of the network participation packets by the network communication devices; establishing a database within the network communication devices, the database comprising the unique user identifiers for the users within the wireless network; providing a plurality of remote user status variables, each variable associated with one of the unique user identifiers; determining whether the network participation packets, associated with each user listed within the database, are being received within a second predetermined interval; adjusting the remote user status variable according to whether the network participation packets are being received within the second predetermined interval; and sending at least one status request to the network communication device of each user whose remote status variable has reached a predetermined threshold.