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Wi-Fi Spreading Fast But Lacks Profits
clapton_fan writes "The New York Times has a story that details the spread of wireless networks but says the concept has been short on profits thus far. Its growth is mainly attributable to homes and small businesses. Corporations are reluctant to embrace them because of security concerns.
Meanwhile, Intel is planning to have every device that uses an Intel chip Wi-Fi enabled which will make it difficult for companies that sell Wi-Fi as an accessory to prosper."
Before this is considered a Utility? Everyone in the city will pay a monthly wi-fi bill, right along with gas, water and electric?
I give it...twelve years.
I hope Intel does not gain a position from which it can push its own wifi standards. Compatibility is nice, but I would hate to see the large number of wifi gear manufacturers reduced to two or three, as is the case with cpu's.
I don't think that the government has yet classified the use of 802.11 as terrorism, rather they have claimed that anyone running 802.11 without encryption or building devices capable of this are enabling terrorism. Which is in itself rather chilling and idiotic, but we should at least stick to being terrified of what the government is actually doing.
Kill Trolls Dead. Here's
So, let me get this straight: because Intel packs wi-fi onto each intel chip, wi-fi won't sell as an accessory? Ah, yes, I see...just like how motherboard venders include sound and video, and as such, the video card and sound card industries flail in lack of funds.
Oh wait, that's right...
The gain from a chip and antennae embedded on a chip isn't going to be that great. Intel's mainly doing it for internal purposes. If you want any sort of range, add-ons and accessories are the only way to go, and I foresee absolutely no change in that.
We now have confirmed reports from an informed Orange County minister that Ethel is still an active communist.
Ask Titanium owners what it means to have a wireless device built deep into a metal-case pc... obviously the signal is less powerful and reliable. So who really wants a good wi-fi net will buy other hardware anyway.
;)
802.11 isn't ethernet
-- Let's go Viridian.
They didn't even claim that.
/. embellished it to 'enabling terrorism'.
Wired added the word terrorism,
They see the proliferation of completely insecure network infrastructures as a future source of problems.
So does anyone who knows how the shit works.
They're looking into what kind of minimum competence standard could be mandated to protect such systems.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
Speaking from the perspective as an Intel contractor who does product development/QA on wireless gear....I would NOT buy an Intel wireless device.
They often develop gear in a joint venture with GemTek of Taiwan.
Most slashdotters probably know that nearly all the wirless cracking/sniffing/snooping tools require the Prism chipset. Intersil/Prism makes some of the best 802.11 gear, and that is what is used by Cisco Aironet, and Orinoco (Lucent) gear. If Intel starts using a better wireless chipset...I would see this as a good thing.
Until they do..i repeat. I WILL NOT buy the gear my own employer develops.
Convenience.
It doesn't matter that it may lead to a lower quality end product, the fact is consumers *love* convenience, and are willing to trade off all sorts of other sources of value to get it.
Of course cat5 is better. Everyone knows that. I use it. But it could take countless hours to put it in the walls, install wall plates, cut the patch cables to length, set up the hubs and routers in the basement.... and with WiFi all you need is one or two access points and an uplink and you'e all set. No assembly required.
My hope is that the adoption of wi-fi happens quick enough that attempts to outlawing it as a terrorist threat are thwarted by wide-spread common sense.
Planet P - Liberation with Technology.
www.enthea.org
If all WiFi clients were also repeaters/bridges, the network would be supported and built by the users.
The wired internet was not a for profit system.
Why do people insist that WiFi must be for profit?
public open WPOPs should be all over the place. The more a pop is used, and the more pops/users there are, the more the infrastructure supporting it will grow.
By virtue of using the system you would add to it's range and capacity.
Just think if all cars had a WiFi repeater installed in them. the Highway becomes a true information highway. Packets jumping from car to car to get from anywhere to anywhere.
A previous slashdot article talked about doing this with Cell Phones. The logic is sound. There just has to be enough supporting users.
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