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Flat-Rate Wireless Where The Sun Don't Shine (Much)
Tantus writes: "Something I've been drooling for for years has finally started to see the light of day... and it's not even close to where I am! I work for a company that does help desk outsourcing for a small startup in the ND, SD, and MN area called Monet Mobile http://www.monetmobile.com, which hopefully will hopefully start a wireless trend that will spread beyond Fargo, ND... Up to twice modem speeds and a $49 flat fee for your laptop or home. Sigh ..." This service sounds much like Ricochet's, for those lucky enough to live in range. Nice to see a wireless option starting up rather than shutting down
[boast]
;-)
Just got it installed this week:
My Internet Connection
I got tired of my cable modem losing signal everytime it rained, and DirecTV-DSL (Telocity) was dissapointing, so I got me a dedicated 1.54Mb microwave wireless connection from MCI Worldcomm about 2 hops off UUNets's backbone.
Ok, so its about $340.00 a month, but I can write it off
While I'm bragging, also check out my Tower O' Power
[/boast]
http://www.wirelessinitiative.net/
In Duluth, my friend used to work for Superior Broadband, where fixed wireless is available throughout the city and neighboring towns.
I registered my hate for Jon Katz
If you're thinking wireless, and you're considering college, check out Virginia Tech. They just bought four OC-12's, and are supposedly putting up wireless thru the entire campus this winter, or spring. Its already available in some parts of campus. I don't go there, but I've heard good things. Georgie Tech and Bucknell also are pursuing (and using, to some extent) 802.11b.
If you celebrate Xmas, befriend me (538
Well, there's hope of it, anyhow --4 .
http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=01/11/05/22920
It would be a shame for all that infrastructure to go to waste -- 128Kbps, flat rate, is really all I need for the most part. Sure, I like cable modems, DSL, and faster things when I have them to use, but on a day-t'-day basis, 128 wireless and flat-rate would be not bad. However, this stuff is so far still too localized for me to buy a Honda Goldwing and roam the country with an always-connected laptop. Low-Earth-Orbit Satellites are what I'm looking for.
Cheers,
timothy
jrnl: http://tinyurl.com/c2l8yr / foes: http://tinyurl.com/ckjno5
My ISP offers shared bandwidth up to full T1 speeds, with minimal 128k for $49.95/mo. We meter how much you use, you get 10GB of xfer for the 49.95 base price.
Japan has 3G if you consider a small part of Tokyo Japan. Japan is very high-tech when it comes to cell phones, but in the dark ages when it comes to pricing. For example, I have a JSH-03 cell phone. It has a built in digital camera which I can use to take and send pictures to my friends. This is a fun feature, especially in a cell phone that only cost me 50 bucks US. However, paying for the cell phone is a pain in the ass. I was on a plan that cost 5600 yen a month and gave me 2600 yen in free calls at the cost of 30 yen a minute. So esentially I got 86 minutes. But it also cost me 2 yen for each message I sent with my phone, and more money for using the phone to view websites. I was also charged for a full minute if I only used the phone for a fraction of a minute. For a country that has a population density greater than just about everywhere in the world, why should I be paying so much money to use my phone. When I lived in America I had 250 minutes for 30 bucks a month. I didn't even have to worry about running out of free minutes, and if I ever were to run out of minutes I could spend another 10 bucks and get a whole bunch more minutes. The thing that bothers me most is that 3G is going to be a failure, and the cost of that failure is going to be passed on to the users of regular cell phones. What cell phone companies should do is incorporate 802.11b into their phones and allow people to use their own private networks as well as public(In train stations/convinience stores and the like) base stations to download videos/music on to their cell phones to be viewed whenever they feel like it. Although the idea of having a fast internet connection on the go seems like a great idea, the idea of paying for every packet you send/recieve is a very painful idea.
The midwest is a wireless imlementor's dream. There's no hills, no trees, no mountains, and few cities. Any line-of-sight wireless system will thrive there because initially when the customer base is small, they can still cover a large service area with a small number of towers, and then ass they fill up decrease transmitter power and increase density of towers.
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Play Six Pack Man. I
Check out the Faq, first. They are not using 802.11. They are using cdma (cell Phone technology). Do note they are on somebody elses spectrum as they are at 1.9GHz. They will suffer the same problems as CellPhone.
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While they don't describe the data rate, it should be 128K.
They do mention that login is 6-10 secs. What is interesting is that you will suffer the same problems that Cellphones users suffer. That is, if not enough towers with low power, then it will quickly saturate. But in doing so, they will limit what they cover.
http://www.monetmobile.com/support/displayFaqCa
I'm using Xtratyme wireless in Minnesota. Their strategy is to partner with local businesses (mosty farm co-ops and grain elevators) to provide service. For the most part, their access points are located on grain elevators and water towers in small towns. Here is a coverage map. I'm paying $39.99 a month, I'm allowed to run servers (if I'm respectful of bandwidth), and I'm getting a /29 network routed to me.