Hi Bob.  I believe you can go to irlp.net and get a farely good
explimation of how irlp works.  You can also see a list of nodes and
there status at the time.

In brief, for the user, there is no special equipment required.  Many of
the repeaters that have Irlp nodes on them charge a membership fee to
help finance it, but not all.

Irlp runs on Linux   and all those who wish to put up nodes are asked to
follow the guide lines that have been set up.  A node is the internet
connection between to stations.  A gateway is simular  to a node, but can
support many connects at one time.  This means that you can either
connect the node you are using to another node or to a gateway whare
there may be several other nodes connected.

Hope this helps:
73, John