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New Orleans to Deploy Free Wi-Fi City Wide
Lawrence_Bird writes "The Washington Post is reporting that New Orleans will deploy a city wide wi-fi network with free public access. Much of the equipment has been donated, but New Orleans will own and operate the network. Interestingly, they are only able to do this while a state of emergency remains in place as technically their planned 512Kbps service violates state law prohibiting municipalities from offering access at speeds in excess of 144Kbps, a restriction the city plans on fighting even though they will eventually outsource the whole operation."
Will this be the first case of never-ending SOE similar to the never-ending Beta?
This way consumers get to use the service first, and companies get to roll out their services without having to abide strict regulations and/or an actual committment.
Rock that crushes, Paper & Scissors that don't matter.
Free WiFi while significant portions of their population are still displaced and / or homeless.
Perhaps their priorities are a bit backward?
This is my opinion. To make sure you don't steal it, it's covered by the DMCA.
As long as I consider the Library a government responsibility, I have to say the same about internet access.
There is no fundamental difference to me, and universal access to information is the kind of thing I would be proud to pay taxes for.
How pathetic are you that you follow me from topic to topic and waste all your mod points at once modding me down?
Not only have they lost customers and equipment...now they have to compete with the Gov't...so much for free enterprise
Most of the city still doesn't have phone service. Getting enough WiFi up that people can use VoIP and get some basic web services will be a big help.
That money would produce a safer city with more jobs if it was left to the citizens.
Last I checked, in this country, the government is composed of -- gasp -- citizens, not space aliens from Uranus. At what point did Americans forget the "of, by, and for the people" routine? Why should a state or federal authority be telling the citizens of a town that they can't do whatever they blinking well please as far as public works projects? So the _citizens_ get together and say, golly, we can all chip in ten bucks and we'll have a wonderful benefit for our community that is worth far more than ten bucks to each citizen.
What's next? Gee, sorry Podunksville, you can't build a public park with a toilet. You need to sell the land off to a private developer so you can have the privilege of paying to sit on the grass or take a leak.
I don't see how this is any different.
Say what you want about "universal access to information", but government-funded free wifi isn't necessarily a good thing. Keep in mind that this could severely hurt ISP that were already devastated by the hurricane. If you can get wifi for free, then why pay for a service that is offered by company X? Having a bandwidth limitation seems to me a good solution, as people who can't afford access can still get it, but just not at the speeds they could if they paid for it. To take your library analogy to the next level, the library only lets you have n number of books at a time, and you have to return them. You have to pay a bookstore to have books at a "higher bandwidth", which in turn helps the economy.
This is the same New Orleans that had over 30% of its PD leave or actively engage in the unlawful activities plaguing it post-Katrina. This is the same New Orleans which is legendary for its corrupt local government and in a state that is almost synonymous with bad government to most southerners.
Yet it's going to do a "good job" running WiFi. One of these days, the starry-eyed true believers will come to the painful realization that "democracy" has no proven track record on keeping governments working for the people and that local governments are one of the last groups you'd want to trust to run your communication network.
Besides, let's just go ahead and put telescreens in our homes. It just blows my mind how anyone can in one breath whole-heartedly support government operation and/or ownership of the com. network and then complain about the Bush administration wiretapping us all a la 1984. Why not go ahead and put your toddler in a locked room with a dingo and then get self-righteously pissed off when your toddler gets mauled and eaten? Afterall, it's THEIR fault, right?
Bullshit. You give the government control over the com. network on that scale and when your precious civil liberties go out the window, you'll be one of the few victims of bad government to legitimately laughed at by succeeding generations. The government will assert its sovereignty and say, "it's our network, use it our way or get off." Then you'll look around and there won't be any competition because your tax dollars subsidize the network to the point that the private sector cannot compete.
All in the name of giving "poor" people (our poor are middle class by African standards) access to a network that all too often their volunary refusal to make use of their socialized education opportunities have rendered them incapable of exploiting.
Click here or a puppy gets stomped!
Yes, because the digital divide is chock-full of people who are able to afford a laptop/desktop with a wi-fi card, but can't afford basic dial-up service. And as you can imagine, that's a large, large group.
/. Because we all know elected officials never want to block the citizens they represent from information....
...
And slightly OT, but I'm going to laugh very hard and very long when the first "Municipal Wi-Fi blocking content" story hits
well, with kids yeah. We have to protect the kids. And you know how irresposible some parents can be. So lets put a huge filter on porn coming down the pipe. Tax dollars shouldn't pay for porn anyway.
Oh, and smoking. Bad. Very bad. Lets ban any site that promotes smoking. Promotion of all things smoking over publicly financed wi-fi? I think not! You might as well just shove smokes in babies mouths.
What? This site offends the sensiblities of [fill in religious group/cult of choice]? Block them too. We're all fine, upstanding [christians, jews, muslims, hindis, scientologists] and there's no way our community should have to see this.
What? People are going to RELIGIOUS sites? Hasn't anyone heard of the seperation of church and state? If someone wants to cyber-pray let them pay for their own access.
Hate speech. Who doesnt' hate hate speech? Of course! Its gone. ("by the way, what is hate speech?" "Ah.. the devil's in the details")
Wal Mart? Do we really want our citizens helping keep that community killing, baby eating, spawn of satan corperation in business by allowing them to purchase cheap shit over our wi-fi? I think not! If you want to destroy mom and pop shops do it on your own nickel.
When I was involved in a week long power outage in Norfolk are after hurricane Isabel (2003) I found battery powered AM radio to be the best source of information. The announcers worked overtime and did a great job of letting us know what was going one. NOLA has WWl which can be picked up over much of the US - I listen to it to get first hand info on whats happening there. It's simple, cheap, and works.
try { do() || do_not(); } catch (JediException err) { yoda(err); }
Why the hell is there a 144Kbps restriction?
Duh! It's because someone was paid a nice chunk of change to put it there.
Be a real patriot: Question authority. Think for yourself. Formulate your own conclusions.
I'd rather see privated completely deregulated electrical service as well.
When will you anarcho-capitalists actually take economics 100.
Given
A) A service that has a near zero elasticity of demand in relation to price
B) Is infrastructure
(Things Fitting A&B: Roads, Water, Sewer, Power, phone, cable, electricity, gas)
You CANNOT deregulate, you CANNOT expect the "Free market" to ensure quality and low price.
Infrastructure doesn't follow the normal rules because it's something that should not be duplicated concurrently - imagine having two roads systems, or two seperate water systems, power etc - there isn't the space to do it and the costs are prohibitive. This prevents normal competitive practices of the free-market and favors large intrenched monopolies
Have you not been paying attention? power was deregulated in some areas - it resulted in artificially created roving blackouts to give the impression that demand exceeded supply so that price-gouging could occur.
Adam Smith himself said that capitalism needs enforced rules to keep all parties treating each other fairly - why can you not recognize this?
If you cannot keep politics out of your moderation remove yourself from the Mod Lottery.. NOW!
It seems to me they have more important goals than providing free wifi at this point. I can think of several:
-schools
-police
-electricity
-water
-sewage
I could go on, but you get the point.
-Ncik
"A plan fiendishly clever in its intricacies"- Homer Simpson
My understanding is that it is already deployed in the French Quarter, and will be citiwide in a year. But at 512kbps now, and 128kbps in a year (after the state of emergency is over) - seems rather slow. But not bad for free service while roaming around town. :) In fact here is the entire article from CNN to save you a click: http://www.cnn.com/2005/TECH/internet/11/29/wirele ss.neworleans.ap/index.html
Tuesday, November 29, 2005; Posted: 2:40 p.m. EST (19:40 GMT)
NEW ORLEANS, Louisiana (AP) -- Hurricane-ravaged New Orleans is starting the nation's first free wireless Internet network owned and run by a major city, a move aimed at boosting the city's stalled economy.
Mayor Ray Nagin made the announcement at a late morning news conference.
Similar projects elsewhere have been stalled by stiff opposition from telephone and cable television companies aimed at discouraging competition from public agencies.
Nagin said the system started operation Tuesday in the central Business District and the French Quarter. It is to be available throughout the city in about a year.
The system uses hardware mounted on street lights to cover the city.
Most of the equipment was donated by three companies: Intel Corp., Tropos Networks and Pronto Networks.
The system will operate at 512 kilobits per second as long as the city remains under a state of emergency.
That will be slowed once the state of emergency is over -- that date has not been determined -- to 128 kps in accordance with state law, which restricts government-owned Internet service.
Horns are really just a broken halo.
Dude, your people control all three branches of government in the U.S. Sooner or later, you're gonna have to stop complaining about being oppressed by "arrogant, progressive . . . nerd[s]". You're not being hassled by the Man, you are the Man, now.
I am not a crackpot.
Not in New Orleans. Phone service is still out in a lot of the city, as is power. My mother could have moved back into her old apartment - it was structurally sound, the water only went halfway up the first floor and she was on the second - but there's no power, no gas, no water, no sewage, no phone there.
egypt urnash minimal art.
Actually demand for electricity SHOULD be directly affected by the price. I know when my electric bill is high one month, I notice for a new months when I leave my lights on, my TV on, and even cut back a little on other electrical usage (my projector, etc). The same is true for my natural gas and all that.
I give almost $100 extra a month in tithes to my church to be put into a fund marked for poor families at my church so they can have basic utilities (including a Christian ISP). Guess what? Recently, a guy who used the benevolence fund was found to be using crack -- AGAIN. He's getting cut out of the fund until he seeks help (which we will pay for). I'd rather see the really poor and disturbed get help from a charity that can monitor their progress than a government that wants to keep them poor.
Many of you can't/won't give to charity because you're spending 50% of your income at taxes of every level so some government official can keep doling out welfare. If they solved the problems of the poor and unforunate, we wouldn't need government. Better to keep them stuck.
Yeah. With only largely affluent white folks left in NOLA, the are now getting presents like community WiFi.
"Speaking the Truth in times of universal deceit is a revolutionary act." -- George Orwell
Um, simple. Not everyone has a computer. Worse, those who don't have a computer are likely to be poor. So, the poor are paying more taxes with no benefit.
Wait, I know what you're going to say: not everyone has a car, either. Right, but effective transportation does DIRECTLY lower the cost of consumption for everyone.
I'm having trouble making a similar argument for free wi-fi.