Slashdot Mirror
Mobile WiMAX to Succeed Where Muni WiFi Failed?
WiNot writes "WiMAX's supporters are positioning Mobile WiMAX as an alternative to municipal WiFi networks in the wake of recent cancellation or postponement of muni WiFi projects in Chicago and San Francisco. 'There's no business case for municipal WiFi ... With many municipal WiFi deployments in a holding pattern, it may be Sprint's Xohm WiMAX network will be up and running before muni WiFi can get its act together.' From what Ars saw during its Motorola-sponsored cruise on the Chicago River earlier this week, WiMAX has the potential to deliver the goods in terms of speed, latency, and reliability. If Sprint hits its goal of blanketing metropolitan areas with WiMAX in a timely fashion and prices the service attractively, the kind of expansive municipal WiFi networks once envisioned in Chicago, Houston, and San Francisco could go the way of Pets.com and Flooz."
Here are the two biggest problems.
1) Where can I buy a WiMAX wireless adapter? Hint: AFAICS, you can't. Do a search on Pricewatch or Froogle, or even go to Sprint's Web page. OTOH, every laptop being produced today comes with support for 802.11a, b, g, and/or n.
2) WiMAX uses licensed spectrum. Cities looking to provide WiMAX service need an FCC license to do anything.
My blog
The article oversimplifies a little when it says that WiFi uses unlicensed spectrum and WiMax used licenses spectrum; in theory WiMax can operate in the unlicensed 3.8GHz band, but equipment that actually supports that band is scarce and performance will be worse in 5.8GHz than in licensed 2.5GHz. Also, it's not clear that municipalities could get 2.5GHz licenses even if they wanted them; AFAIK the licenses have virtually all been bought by Sprint and Clearwire, who presumably have no desire to divest them. Given these factors, cities appear to have a choice between 2.4GHz WiFi, 5.8GHz WiFi, and 5.8GHz WiMax; it's not clear to me that one has a decisive advantage.
Does anyone truly think that Sprint, a mobile phone company, is not going to try to limit ports and nickel and dime the consumer to death. I foresee VOIP blocks, huge limitations on what you can use the bandwidth for, and maybe even per minute or bandwidth charges. Why would they lose buisness in one market to support another. This is why we need an independent third option.
Here's a roundup of Wimax products featured at Wimax World, where the Sprint demo took place. Scarcity of Wimax products will not be a problem.
I've been intrigued by Eric Schmidt's comment at the keynote introduction of the iPhone. "Wimax is coming," he said, without elaborating. Googling that phrase shows that almost no journalists have considered it an important remark, even though in the next breath he coined the term "applegoog" to describe how closely Google would be collaborating with Apple. "To merge without merging," as he put it. Later, Google announced its 700MHz interests, announced a collaboration with Sprint, which has announced its partnership with Clearwire (the two big Wimax telcos) and journalists still aren't paying attention.
So, yeah, Wimax could become the next munifi. It could also turn into serious headaches for AT&T, Verizon, and any company without a Wimax investment.
It blows both EDGE and GPRS away in terms of bandwith and latency, and has a much wider coverage than WiFi and WiMax could ever hope for, it's only drawback could be a higher battery drain, but research focus has recently shifted towards maximizing power for portable devices.
I think WiFi is better suited towards local networking just as Bluetooth is useful to eliminate the need for wires, I don't see how WiMax can make that much of an impact unless they use an incredibly competitive pricing scheme...
"No business case [for municipal WiFi]..."
It seems to me that there is no business case for public parks, either.
Not everything has to be about turning a profit for someone.
-- Terry
Bingo. But, since we've bought into the "free market fixes everything" idea 100% in the US, we're gonna be boned. Even tho every example of telecom rollout has screwed us over to the tune of tens of billions of wasted bucks, we keep handing them the keys to the cash register.
Figure out how much muni WiFi would have cost, total. Then add up all the future private company bills for service. Yup. We're screwed. I've always said that the real cost is the TOTAL charge for every customer since the inception of service, added up. It's fun to figure out how much a taxpayer-paid nationalized internet would have cost, and then add up every wireless, cable, telephone and DSL bill since the beginning of private service. Ans: we've been massively overcharged.
Do we pay for roads like this? Airports? Harbors? Altho it's interesting to note that embedded GPS and cell systems have led to a pilot project for a state to charge your car per mile driven. So we'll get it both coming and going, first taxes and bonds, then a usage charge.
The ultimate question is: where is the money going? Who's making billions unfettered by regulation?