David Gerard wrote:
Your post actually started me thinking on this. A Freenet (for encryption and to avoid a [[:en:trusted client]] problem) or BitTorrent (for convenient distribution with a program lots of people have) method of distributing Wikipedia. A peer-to-peer network with WMF as the only body supplying content files.
Erik Garrison (CC'd) looked into this in detail (and I think even worked on a prototype) for a class project. He'd be the person to talk to about details, downsides, and so forth.