A Discomforting Precedent For WiFi "Hot Spots"

rob.sharp writes: "The BBC have some history lessons for wireless networks ...", pointing to an article about a wireless phone service called Rabbit, which relied on access areas similar in concept to the WiFi "hot spots" ISPs and business are experimenting with around the globe right now. ("Subscribers to the service, backed by Hutchison Whampoa, could make mobile calls when they were within 100 metres of a Rabbit transmitter.") Rabbit didn't work out well, though, and the article questions whether 802.11 access providers can do any better.

Comments

Rabbit didn't fail because it was hotspotted

[blowdart]

Rabbit, et al, were implemented as CT2 technology at the end of the 1980s. Four operators were licensed to operate phonepoint (or equivalent) systems. When a user wanted to make a call from a mobile phone, they would lock onto the nearest low-power transmitter; with the aim to place transmitters would be in shops, tube stations, and so on and there would be few gaps in coverage in urban areas.

There was no mobility, as once a call had been set up through one base station it could not be transferred to another, also you could not take incoming calls (unless you were at home, where it worked like a cordless phone).

Rabbit failed because "proper" mobiles (albeit analogue) were taking off and moving from the brick car phone models, and they allowed incoming calls, and movement from cell to cell.