Municipal Wi-Fi Networks In Trouble

imamac writes "According to an AP story, municipal Wi-Fi is going nowhere fast. A think tank research director quipped, 'They are the monorails of this decade: the wrong technology, totally overpromised and completely undelivered.' Subscriptions to the services are much lower than expected and lawmakers are concerned that millions of dollars will have gone to waste that could have been better spent on roads or crime-fighting. Satisfaction with the quality of service has also been low, which give some insight into the low adoption rate. Is municipal Wi-Fi just a bad idea, has it been poorly implemented, or is the technology just not there to support such an endeavor?"

Comments

A think tank research director quipped

[Ice Station Zebra]

"I'll say anything if you give me money."

At the risk of being repetative

[zappepcs]

Let me say this, Metropolitan networks, whether Wi-Fi or otherwise need one thing to make them both competitive and financially viable; the metropolitan network needs to be owned by that cooperative body within the municipality's control. That means every last 'last mile' connection.

When the city/county (whatever) owns all the last mile physical plant/infrastructure and ISP's simply rent connectivity to end users the municipality will be functional and profitable. Yes, that is how we would see big bandwidth to every home, and each home would have the choice of ISP services. It is possible to do this and would instantly flatten the cost of entry as well as the rules of engagement.

Then, if you ad Wi-Fi support to parts of the city that is subscribed to by users who already pay... well, it's not such a stretch to support financially.

Does anyone see any downsides to this?

Re:At the risk of being repetative

[davygrvy]

zappepcs has it right. I am 100% for the success of municipal fiber networks. Financial payback comes from renting access to the service providers, which results in competition for the end user. Slap on some wifi access points on some poles where the fiber trunks are located, and poof, wifi, too. The end user has choices and price per Mb goes way down to Japan/Korea pricing (Why aren't you jealous?). The USA still has the highest $ per Mb of broadband in the world for no good reason except that us silly consumers expect the private sector to solve it.

Like bridge and road construction, its up to the local communities to solve their "last mile" problem.

The major issue

[Shaman]

The major issue has been that they have given the contracts to implementors that are paid for the number of radios that they install and by gosh they will install more radios than anyone every imagined. But, see, the 2.4Ghz bands were already polluted BEFORE they started and installing 2.4G radios on every block for several square miles when each mesh radio has a practical range (line of sight) of around 20 miles is really not helping things. And just as bad, the backhaul of the mesh radios is almost always 5.2Ghz or 5.8Ghz, which have only a few channels each to choose from (5.8Ghz has more, but still...)

Don't believe this could happen? Ask anyone that has tried to use the Toronto mesh network downtown. It's flat ugly.

Anecdote

[99BottlesOfBeerInMyF]

Subscriptions to the services are much lower than expected and lawmakers are concerned that millions of dollars will have gone to waste that could have been better spent on roads or crime-fighting. Satisfaction with the quality of service has also been low, which give some insight into the low adoption rate. Is municipal Wi-Fi just a bad idea, has it been poorly implemented, or is the technology just not there to support such an endeavor?

Internet as a utility needs time to develop if it is ever going to be adopted. Take a look at my situation. I pay for a cable modem and not for a municipal wi-fi connection. Why? Well, because I occasionally like to watch television and television service is bundled with internet service. If I buy them separately I'm paying a whole lot of extra cash. What would make me change my mind? Well, if I could rent legal TV episodes over IP for a very, very low price akin to that portion of what it costs to see them on cable TV. Until that time, however, why should I pay extra?

It's the marketing

[L. VeGas]

When the internet was taking off, we had great catch-phrases like "Information Superhighway"." Now that's a name I can get behind.

"Municipal Wi-Fi", in contrast, sounds so lackluster, like "Deparment of Leisure Services". Proponents use lame slogans like "Wi-Fi? Wi-Not?" and "Just because you can't see it, doesn't mean it's not useful."

We need something that will make folks excited, like "Naked Bimbos Everywhere".

Re:Harry Browne said it best...

[XxtraLarGe]

I like being called a socialist. Anarchosocialist, anyways. There is nothing wrong with caring about the important rights: the right to food, clothing, shelter, and medicine. Without those rights, all others are meaningless. Libertarians want the right to economically enslave others. When all resources are privately owned, all non-owners are defacto slaves, and it is this goal that libertarians work towards: the enslavement of the poor, worldwide. 1984 called, it wants its Newspeak back. We have a right to medicine? Suppose all the pharmaceutical companies closed their doors tomorrow. Where would your right to medicine come from then? The only way people can have a right to any good or service is if the government can FORCE somebody else to provide it through taxation. When you are forced to work to support others involuntarily, that is the definition of slavery.

Re:Harry Browne said it best...

[SillyNickName4me]

You should really think about differentiating between "rights" like (life, speech, etc), and consumer products.

Good call.

Given that life at least requires food, and according to many, also clothing and shelter. having a right to life implies having a right to those things as well.

That sets them apart from whatever_you_want

Hence. maybe you should follow your own advice before starting to sound like a fanatical non-thinker.

Re:Harry Browne said it best...to sell his book

[trianglman]

This is far from flamebait. When it comes to something that needs to help the public in general, the government can be trusted to do it much better than any corporate entity. Roads, parks and military are three good examples. Just because the government can screw up doesn't mean it always has or always will. Municipal Wi-Fi is a good idea, but it was farmed out, in most cases, to groups that have a lot to lose from it doing well, or to groups that didn't have and weren't given the resources they needed. This is an instance of "Crap in, crap out." not government deficiencies.