Slashdot Mirror
Wi-Max Deployed in Katrina Disaster Area
Spy Handler writes "In the aftermath of hurricane Katrina's destruction of telecom infrastructure in New Orleans, officials are turning to wireless broadband for use by government workers. Intel, a key backer of WiMax, and Cisco are donating wireless equipment to aid disaster workers. This could be a good opportunity to replace an antiquated system of copper wires with brand-new technology." From the article: "Shakouri and other industry experts contend that the devastation of Hurricane Katrina offers a chance to build the sort of modern network that phone and cable companies have promised for years. Such a network -- whether wireless or fiber-optic -- could deliver movies or medical records at speeds hundreds of times faster than current Internet connections. Telecom executives and analysts, though, aren't so sure it's the right time or place."
They aren't 'donating' per se -- yes, they're giving it away at no cost, but it's VERY good publicity for them.
Just think how good it sounds to have two tech companies donating tech to relief efforts. NOw, if only FEMA would get with the times and realize that not everyone uses windows/IE...
Show this to your friends and family that don't know what a real hacker is
It may not be exactly "the right time and place", but as long as it isn't diverting skills and resources away from more critical, lifesaving activities, surely it can't hurt to have such things available?
$10/month: 120GB bw, SSH, CVS, Rails and 10 years' experience!
*Waits for FEMA to reject this assistance for some BS reason as well.*
Its a good thing there arent solar flares disrupting communications at the moment. Oh wait there are.
My sympathy goes out to the victims.
>>"Telecom executives and analysts, though, aren't so sure it's the right time or place."
Why is it because of the poverty level and they won't have enough clientele? Or because they will lose all the equipment once the next hurricane hits (man vs nature - my bet is on nature but that's another discussion)
Personally, I've heard New Orleans is a big convention city and wouldn't that be a good reason to "hook them up" with this technology.
If the technology is as a good as they are touting, it will draw more people to the area for meetings/conventions would it not?
They had their chance, and handed it to the cable companies by the combined misery of ISDN deployments in the early 90s and DSL deployments in the late 90s. Maybe they can work on correct and complete Caller ID information and shutting down the waves of illegal fax spam until the next communication technology comes around.
Try not. Do or do not, there is no try.
-- Dr. Spock, stardate 2822-3.
"The company considered installing wireless broadband in rebuilding, Smith said, but it found that it could recover most of its fiber network. The technologies will be used eventually. "I'm a big fan of WiMax," he said."
These products operate in the unlicensed 2.4GHz ISM band, or the licensed 2.3 GHz WCS, 2.5/2.6 GHz ITFS/MMDS, and 3.4/3.5 GHz WLL bands. Guess who owns the licensed spectrum - that's right, Bell South....big fan indeed.
Its times like this that the big firms should be congradulated. I dont see microsoft doing things like this *whistles*
OK, so Bill Gates isn't actually Microsoft, per se - but he's personally holding a lot of the stock and cash that has resulted from their growth. I'm sure it pains you to know that he's donated, personally, a fortune to relief and charities. Just one donation (the largest in history) was $5 Billion towards malaria relieft and innoculation of children. The Gates foundation has already donated $1.5 million towards hurricane relief this week (mostly through the red cross).
As for Microsoft itself, you might want to at least spend a couple of moments reading before you assume they're doing nothing. They have already lined up $9 Million in cash and donations in IT systems to help the local governments impacted by the storm. They're matching their employees' donations - and those people have collectively put up over a million as well. They've deployed three satellite communications busses in Baton Rouge and Mississippi, and are working directly with Intel and Cisco on support of Red Cross operations.
There are two predictable things, here. One - that since MS routinely does these things, they are doing it now, too - whether or not the press mentions it. And two - that it would of course never get a posting on slashdot, just on principle.
Don't disappoint your bird dog. Go to the range.
Someone I speak to occasionally works in the communications industry, and after Katrina happened he started to chase up his superiors to see what can be done to deploy wireless communications in the disaster area - he made numerous calls to government officials to be told time after time that he was speaking to the *wrong* person - all the while the government were complaining "if only we had communications" - needless to say he's not been in a very good mood lately...
Better late than never I suppose, but this could have been so much more useful had it been set up earlier...
Here's the "first post" on it right here in slashdot. Of course many simply flamed.
"Now would be a fantastic opportunity to install a citywide Wi-Fi network. If the ILEC was ever going to do it and get good press for it, now is the time. Could Intel use another test bed for Wi-Max?"
I suppose there never is a good time to install a technology that will cannibalize its bottom line.
According to TFA, "[BellSouth] expects to spend as much as $600 million to restore service on nearly half its 4.9 million lines in the gulf region and to 24 central offices, where local lines connect to the public phone network."
That's what, some $240+ per line? Thank god they're using wireless to cut costs in some instances!
Somehow I can't help but think that the price/performance comparison favours wireless...
Information: "I want to be anthropomorphized"
My kingdom for some mod points.
Mod point free since 2001
Hey, I don't like Microsoft either, but the truth is that they have donated resources:
http://katrinasafe.org/
and I know personally they have been donating their expertise via conference calls and software licenses for PCs for shelters. And possibly in other ways as well; I've been too busy lately to keep dibs on Microsoft.
I live in the affected area and I am a volunteer for the Red Cross.
Very much so , A hurricane could literally rip up the existing infrastructure causing immeasurable damage over a wide area .(think tens of thousands of broken lines and switch boxes) ,plus it would be a hell of a lot cheaper .(think the man-hours , the cost of the street and cable repairs etc. Vs. the cost of a few servers and a few antennas )
Even if it destroys every Wi-Max antenna in the area it would only take a matter of hours to replace them
The only things certain in war are Propaganda and Death. You can never be sure which is which though
I think its also fair to bring to attention a post made by scoble [http://radio.weblogs.com/0001011] on channel9 publishing an internal ms letter [http://channel9.msdn.com/ShowPost.aspx?PostID=112 438#112438] which lists some of the efforts of employees into the hurricane relief.
I think fresh water, food and a place to sleep are way more important. You'd better donate something more usefull
See pictures of tits
There are lots of Katrina victims that are going to have to be permanently relocated. FEMA in its continuing bungling of the Katrina disaster seems to be overlooking that.
The American Voice has a solution that could be used to relocate some of the Katrina victims that are willing to work for what they get. The Katrina victims would be given free farms in the Western U. S. Not a bad idea imo. It gives the victims both a place to live and a way to earn a living. The farms are small family farms rather than big commercial operations. Nothing that would make anybody rich. But enough to have a nice wholesome life.
The article is Relocating the Victims of the 8/29 2005 Katrina Catastrophe. There are pros and cons to this plan. But at least someone has offered a plan that could work to relocate some of the Katrina victims.
I guess.
Yes, I suppose when a major U.S. city is destroyed, that is an excellent time to follow Africa's paradoxically late "lead" and just pass over copper and even fiber in some cases.
Why would they try and make this infastructure? So it can also be taken down when this shit happens again? I would not invest ANYTHING in any kind of infastructure down there until local and federal officials decide on a course of action for rebuilding the town in such a way that this won't happen again. If they can't do that, it's time to go elsewhere.
Well it is a good situation to update the infrastructure (although being one of the poorer areas of the US, I'd doubt they'd go too far due to a lack of major corporate backing). On that note, why would they avoid good old copper or other great technologies? The potential of copper (10-gigabit is the latest 'consumer' technology) is faster, more reliable, and more secure than any WiFi they can throw at it.
C'mon- WiFi is fun and all to save you running wires to your basement, or giving you e-mail while you check your coffee, but lets be realistic. It's a security issue. It's a reliability issue (interference, signal issues in certain areas, 'jamming'). And the spectrum only has so much room in it. Just run a few wires and call it a day.
-M
when you see the word 'Linux', drink!
It looks like some folks have started using Mesh infrastructure (that Linux based stuff from http://locustworld.net/ which will use low cost/obsolete hardware. See
http://www.the-bains.us/
*NOT* The place, and probably not the time.
Doesn't anyone realize that Mississippi and Louisiana are one of the two poorest states in the country? Who excactly would a next gen internet and cable be marketed to? There is also income data here and here. Let's not put our next gen tech. in an area that can't support it economically.
When a tropical cyclone (like a hurricane but spins clockwise) hit and distroyed Darwin, NT on Christmas day 1974, all of the copper was ripped up, but the microwave telephone link remained operational. I'm not sure if this is really the same thing, since those microwave stations are a hell of a lot bigger than anything to do with wimax, but wireless does tend to survive huge natural disasters fairly well.
When Argumentum ad Hominem falls short, try Argumentum ad Matrem
I agree that relocation is going to be necessary for many of the victims of Katrina... and providing them the option to take over a free farm is a nice idea. It's not a bad idea, as long as it is not forced upon folks.
Expensive WiMax equipment was stolen from the near lawless city of New Orleans.
Instead of blindly trashing the telephone companies. Maybe we should remember their priority and mandate is to get basic telephone service back up for THEIR customers.
Grandma betty and Aunt Sue dont need a fancy wireless internet connection they need a phone line back up so they can call their other family and tell them they not dead.
quoting the article
"The best thing for us economically and the quickest thing from a customer service view is, if the lines are just down, put them back up," he said.
(DUH!)
"The company considered installing wireless broadband in rebuilding, Smith said, but it found that it could recover most of its fiber network. The technologies will be used eventually. "I'm a big fan of WiMax," he said."
(Clue for the clueless: Fiber is still better than wireless)
Bellsouth is a BIG company they think strategically not tactically. The most economical thing for them right now is simply restore their phone lines and their fiber networks. when they roll something out they do it en mass. They will be deploying 25mpbs service to all their customers within 3 years to provide both tv, phone service, and DSL over the same line.
As someone who made it through Hurricane Frances and Jean last year, Im glad bellsouth is on the job. I never lost my DSL service even though I lost my cable for 12 days and many of my neighbors lost power for 2 weeks.
First they brought you "broadcast".
...although it occurs to me that satellite broadcast has been doing this for decades...
Then they put your broadcast stations on your "cable".
Now they want to put your cable on a broadcast channel, including the original broadcast stations, but not on their original broadcast channels...
Maybe once in a while the hidden hand of Adam Smith draws back a bloody stump, and the socialists -- in the name of altruism, justice, mercy and common sense -- win one. Right on! Community broadband forever! Just because it's possible to act like a dog in a manger, doesn't mean it's right to act like a dog in a manger.
``Tension, apprehension & dissension have begun!'' - Duffy Wyg&, in Alfred Bester's _The Demolished Man_
I am sitting on a street in Hattiesburg, MS looking at downed cable and telephone wires, no one is hanging them up. I would like to see them do it. 25-65 megs with television and telephone with advanced services would be smart. It would help my small linux company. I am in a third world of communications down here. My dsl stayed steady minus the DNS losing power for two days, but will go down soon as my phone lines are crushed. They are clustered before all apartment entrances down the street and are being constanly smashed by SUVs.
Wireless Internet! Yay!
Oh, we forgot... Most of the communications infrastructure comprising the critical backhauls that carry all the traffic of the wireless endpoints have been disrupted. Entire phone company central offices are under water in some places or were. Co-location facilities have been disrupted or destroyed outright. Aerial fiber and copper have been severed all over the place.
Oh, we also forgot that people are in need of drinking water and food to eat and medical supplies to deal with everyday things that they can't deal with everyday and so those issues are mounting. Women need sanitary female supplies. Babies need diapers. Pets need food. There's a lack of electricity all over the place and fetid stinking contaminated water and mud.
Their computers have been waterlogged, their laptops blown to the next state, their PDAs lost someplace in the muck, but we have high speed wireless Internet being deployed. Yay!
(INSERT ROLLING EYES EMOTICON HERE)
If my grammar and spelling are off, I am [distracted/tired/careless] (take your pick)