Slashdot Mirror
Philadelphia Considers Free Citywide Wireless Access
The Associated Press is running an story about Philadelphia's city goverment seriously considering creating the world's largest hotspot.
"For about $10 million, city officials believe they can turn all 135 square miles of Philadelphia into the world's largest wireless Internet hot spot....the city would likely offer the service either for free, or at costs far lower than the $35 to $60 a month charged by commercial providers"
Better tell the cops so they don't rough-up anyone with a laptop.
"I am not a number! I am a free man!"-- The Prisoner
"Phillidelphia City has been served a class action lawsuit by parents of the recent spurt of two-headed babies being born in the city. Scientists believe all the genetic anomolies are the result of the city's huge Wifi network and the microwave radiation it emits". ;-)
-psy
Hey! I read water meters for a living, you insensitive clod!
Seriously, I think that's probably the biggest stumbling block to remote meter reading! All those unionized meter readers who would suddenly be out of work.
Best Buy can have you arrested
At $10,000,000, that would be a nice contract to have.
What do you bet that someone with really good connections gets the contract?
This is what Philly needs... Unfortunately the city is a bit stagnant in certain areas and always feeling overshadowed by Washington D.C. or New York City (for non-USians, those cities are about 2 hours away from each).
Knowing the history of Philadelphia, this will come out 5 years after Longhorn and/or Duke Nukem and cost $3.5 billion New World Dollars (the currency established in 2045).
Small potatoes make the steak look bigger.
... once all necessary wire-tapping capabilities are installed, of course.
As long as you are inside the city limits, you should be ok. However, will they have to enclose Philadelphia in a Faraday's cage in order to prevent the signal from leaking across administrative boundaries, or cite the federal law against signal theft to anybody trespassing on urban WiFi spectrum in a nearby forest, especially after the city has closed for the night?
And I won't even discuss the legal ramifications of accidentally providing WiFi access across a state or national boundary...
If that's the case, I'm sure the Homeland Security Dept will enforce a cap of about 5bps ;)
I think it's been about two years since I've used one. Much less since I've seen one.
The eighteen-year-old sitting next to me knows how.
Oh, yeah. And we can be just like Japan where they hire people to sit on street corners with hand clickers to count the number of cars passing each hour.
And then we can ban all cars and hire people to carry us around on litters. Or, better yet, we can just follow moveonplease.org's advice and create a federal bureaucracy so large it has to hire everyone in the country. Then we'll have full employment and no one will ever lose his job for anything other than unacceptable efficiency.
You can tell a great deal about the character of a man by observing those who hate him.
Graduate 1: "Where should we take our Carnegie Mellon degrees and enjoy life as young prfessionals?"
Graduate 2: "San Francisco is nice. Lots of tech there. Great weather. Lots of tech in northern Virginia. Or maybe Austin?"
Graduate 1: "Philly! Let's be successful bachelors in Philly!"
Graduate 2: "Um, dude, Philly is dirty. Auto insurance rates are sky high. It's been voted as the fattest city in the country. Summers are hot and humid, winters are cold and crappy. Their sports teams can't ever seem to get to the big game. The people are a bit rude...they even throw snowballs at Santa Clause."
Graduate 1: "They have WiFi"
Graduate 2: "I'm there!"
The previous dialog has been provided as a reality check for bright-eyed and bushy-tailed graduates and professionals. WiFi will not increase the quality of life in a city and draw people to it.
"He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lampposts...for support rather than illumination." - Andrew Lang
Seriously, I think that's probably the biggest stumbling block to remote meter reading! All those unionized meter readers who would suddenly be out of work.
Better keep the meter readers un-ionized, I for one wouldn't want any negative substances in my drinking water...
Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.