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Project Rainbow - 802.11 Across the U.S.
rakerman writes "IBM, Intel and a number of wireless services operators are considering building a wireless data network across the U.S., according to the New York Times."
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...I'll finally be able to surf for pr0n and read slashdot in traffic? Now all I need are tinted windows....
Who did what now?
Damn, I'm going to have to buy a whole assload of chalk now!!
id like my phone to work everywhere first!
if they cant do that how are they ever going to do this?
I want 2D games back.
Sure it would be cool to have the long promised everywhere, everywhen connectivity. But aside from the technical issues (e.g. what version of the standard), it's difficult to see us getting anywhere close to the point where enough people are willing to plop down the requisite amount of monthly $$'s to make this viable.
Pick a number: $50/month, $100/month? How much are you willing to pony up for patchy wireless internet connectivity primarily in relatively heavily populated areas? Consider that even broadband penetration seems to have plateaued to a large degree in the areas where it is available. Not everyone's willing to pay $40-$50/month for better computer access.
Good...
They should be worried about getting a real 3G cell network off the ground first.
Then we can do all those things with more flexibility than what is mentioned in that very short "article."
802.11, 11b and 11g are 2.4 GHz. 11a is 5 GHz.
"I have opinions of my own, strong opinions, but I don't always agree with them." -- George H. W. Bush
Across the WHOLE US? Or across major metro areas?
I've got some users that could really USE true border to border access (petroleum tank inspectors) but since live access= digital cellphone coverage, there's a BUNCH of the state that's unreachable via cellphone.
Meaning we've got to add a LOT of logic to the custom apps to handle dead zones.
Now, if coverage were limited to cities with more than 60 people (and could be, at $100 per basestation) that'd be a Very Good Thing.
"Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus."
But it has to be done:
Never confuse volume with power.
My Slashdot account is old enough to drink...
Most of the posts here seem to assume this means wireless connectivety everywhere. Such is *not* the case. The article states that the players in this network will put access points in airports and other public spaces and will not try to provide access to peoples homes.
In fact this doesn't seem to be so much a 'Wireless Network' as a bunch of access points connected to the Internet. Not what I was hoping for when I saw the subject line.
What I want is a nationwide variant of the Ricochet network. Anyone remember them? They used light-pole mounted units that acted as wireless routers, letting them provide access anywhere by routing the packets through the air to the closest wired router. It worked pretty damn well (if slow). I used it here in Seattle for a couple of years and being able to check my email while stuck in traffic alone made it worth the cost. The fact that I had Internet connectivety pretty much everywhere else was just gravy.
A similar scheme can work with 802.11 devices, given cheap hardware and proper software. Many groups are already working on this. Here in Seattle there is even a group trying to set up a non-profit community network this way -- http://www.seattlewireless.org
If such home-brewed networks were to spread across the country we could tie them together via the Internet, or even via leased lines between cities. Now that sounds like the kind of thing I would like to see! No way anyone could ever control that...
Jack William Bell
- -
Are you an SF Fan? Are you a Tru-Fan?
The article: The companies involved -- which also include AT&T Wireless Services, Verizon Communications, and Cingular Wireless -- would build access points in public places such as airports but would not try to supply access to people's homes, according to the report.
It's a bummer.
Can I bum a sig?
What kind of recipes do your parents have that need a firewall to keep safe?
For any Tinfoil hat types out there worried about the NYT registration I will gladly summarise the "article" for you
From the New York Times:
Earlier this month a bunch of really important advertisers in our newspaper had a meeting. According to several people close to the talks, these companies have now invented a new wireless standard called "802.11" The big companies are very proud of their invention, calling it "the next really really big thing (tm)"
While they realize there are many compatitibility issues that need to be worked out, executives from all the major advertisers agree that by Q4 of 2009 they will be rolling out preliminary test programs in Bumfark, South Dakota and the 'Pendelton Hills' Starbucks in Pendelton Oregon. This test program will only allow for compatibility with 3 brands of cell phones and one PDA, but all of the companies suspect that they will be able to offer service to their propriatary hardware within several years of a sucessful test program.
When asked if the meeting attendees had ever heard of a grassroots open source movement around 802.11, the spokesperson said: "huh?"
Thank you, I'll be here all week....
.....
Just think, put a web site in the trunk of a Porsche and whenever the MPAA or RIAA come to shut you down, take off down the road.
:)
Then you can watch yourself live on Worlds Wildest Police Chases via your wireless connection while serving up countless bootleg MP3s & DVDs
As a rock-in-roll Physicist once said, No matter where you go, there you are.
802.11 networks are springing up for free, from Maine to Seattle. Well, free as a few hundred bucks per node.
So, inevitably, someone's figuring out how to make us pay 50-100 bucks a month for something we could have for free.
Q: will this wonderful pay network interfere with the free radio nets?
It makes me rather sad. I was hoping an alternative internet would be born in the airwaves without busybodies charging for it and guvmint trying to control it.
Can't we have anything that big business players and government will keep their damned hands off?
soon manufacturers will start producing pager, cell phones, and laptops with no way to turn them off
:-)
If someone does, be sure to let us know. In my cell phone the batteries have an infuriating habit of running dry in a couple of days.
"I have opinions of my own, strong opinions, but I don't always agree with them." -- George H. W. Bush
Pringles is experiancing a sudden upsurge in orders.
Need help treating your acne? Come here!
Oh crap, new article. Must post!!! No need to drive, I can type and drive at the same .... (CRASH)..
Tibbon
tibbon.com
Anyone care to come up with an estimate on how many base stations would be needed to cover all the US? I bet it's a lot!
US Surface Area 3,618,770 square miles
1 square mile = 27878400 square feet
802.11b radius 300 yards (outside) or 900 feet
Area of circle = pi r^2
Area of base station coverage = pi *(900^2) = 2544615
base stations per square mile asuming perfect coverage = square mile in feet / area covered by base station = 27878400 / 2544615 10.955+, or for all practical purposes 11.
That means we need 11 * 3,618,770 or 39,806,470 base stations for 802.11b coverage.
If you assume that each base station, including required infrastructure to support it (minimum requirements solar cells, storage batteries, built in routing software/hardware) were $100 (in the volumes we are talking here I think we can get some discounts...) you are looking at the stray 3.9 billion that worldcom misplaced in it's accounting records.
The perfect coverage assumption is based upon the assumption that there is neither overlap, nor dead space. With circular coverage patterns you can not get that kind of coverage. You will always have some of one or the other. However this calculation does provide an estimate for an average overlap and blind spots.
Oh, source of surface area information was a 1991 copy of the World Almanac, and the area does include a lot of water surface that could be partially eliminated.
-Rusty
You never know...