Future of Wi-Fi

An anonymous reader writes "BusinessWeek looks at the The high hurdles facing Wi-Fi. Sure it's got promise but if overcrowded spectrum isn't destined to crimp its growth, it'll need better technology and regulatory help from the FCC."

Comments

Reading too much in to Wi-Fi.

[laserjet]

I think this article reads too much into current Wi-Fi. All these people say that this and this needs to be done for Wi-Fi for it to grow, but it is growing at a furious pace already.

I think they overestimate what the current Wi-Fi is for. It is so limited, than market demand will certainly open up new avenues for wireless networking. This is how the tech industry is. Don't expect to be buying the same ol' 802.11b technology that you use today in three years - it won't happen. We always have new stuff.

That's what I hate about articles like this - they always state all the things wrong with a technology that we already know about, and they forget that when the demand rises for high-scalability and secure networks, then something will come to the rescue. If we can't get more bandwidth from the FCC, then they will have to figure out someway to get more out of the bandwidth.

I use Wi-Fi for what it is made for TODAY: medium to small networks where security is not paramount and mobility is.

And I, for one, will watch the great economy work and create new solutions as people are willing and needing to buy them.

why are we securing it this way?

[Raleel]

I will probably get beaten down for this, but it seems to me that integrating encryption directly into the media is probably not the right approach for this. There _are_ systems that do work rather well. Let's take, for instance, a system like they have in hotels, where you have to log into a web page before you are even routed. Combine this with the simple rule of "never put your wireless net behind your main firewall" and you can sleep a little better at night.

Design a system that has protections beyond something built into the media. The medias function is _not_ to provide security, but rather to communicate.

WiFi

[Jacer]

I recently drove to ohio from the minneapolis, long drive, with me and several of my friends, well, I brought my laptop and a fairly decent sized antena (omni 8) when we got near a city, it'd connect and i'd check my email every few hours, and have maybe 10-20 minutes of uninterupped internet access. from the hotel, i could use an access point either in the hotel, or from the business acrossed the street (the business had a bigger pipe) and the same scenario on the way home... This is a step closer to uninteruppted access, however the spectrum is fairly clogged, and you get a lot of interference, and many people like me who want free net access. After these bugs are worked out, the only thing we have to worry about is me watching divx while driving... "Oh I love this par...*screech ka-boom*"

No Silver Bullet

[Detritus]

The author of the article seems to be seriously confused about radio technology. Spread spectrum is not a magic wand that creates more spectrum. Wireless LANs already use spread spectrum.

This isn't a contest between the evil corporate overlords, their minions at the FCC, and the freedom loving 802.11 users. Lots of people use the radio spectrum, for business, government, military, public safety, research and personal uses. One of the roles of the FCC is to coordinate and allocate the RF spectrum to the many competing uses in the public interest. The RF spectrum is a shared resource. That means that you can't expect the FCC to give you big chunks of unshared spectrum just because you want them.