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Municipal Wi-Fi - A Promise Unfulfilled?
Posted by
Zonk
on Tue Nov 06, 2007 12:43 PM
from the problematic-adoption dept.
from the problematic-adoption dept.
An anonymous reader writes "Jeff Merron at InformationWeek writes about the problems with municipal Wi-Fi, and how despite the high hopes of cities across the country there hasn't been much success deploying it in reality. He also examines the few successful applications of the technology, and tries to explore why more projects don't make it out of their infancy. 'Thus far, there have been a few true municipal Wi-Fi success stories and several spectacular failures. But more than half of municipal Wi-Fi networks remain only in the planning stages. The broad consensus among analysts and providers is that the only viable business models will be centered around municipal government applications, which appear to be able to provide cities with the ability to provide both better and more cost-efficient services for residents and increase city revenue. This will ensure that providers like EarthLink can recoup their capital costs within a few years.'"
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Submission: Municipal Wi-Fi: A Promise Unfulfilled? by Anonymous Coward
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Upon further research, (Score:2, Funny)
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The project has been basically canceled, or scaled down [mlive.com].
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If you want to provide access to the citizens then Hot Spots at community centers, libraries, and parks will get you 90% of the benefit for 5% of the cost.
I strongly disagree. The difference between access when I bring my laptop to the park or library and access in my home and every other place in the area with a laptop or desktop; is enormous. Free wi-fi can replace existing internet access packages from local duopoly. I currently pay Comcast about $45 a month for internet access and I have to deal with their constant outages, outright blocking of VPN traffic to work (I have to SSH tunnel instead), and poor customer service. They are the most affordable op
802.11 Wasn't Designed for Municipal Services (Score:5, Informative)
802.11 doesn't scale well to large footprint cells or high density deployments with lots of APs and clients. It excels indoors allowing a small number of people to attached wirelessly to a wired network.
The backhaul services are not standardized in 802.11 and so are generally neither interoperable not secure (E.G. UAM at airports).
Compare with 802.16. It is designed for outdoor base stations, large footprints, indoor, outdoor or mobile clients and has a backhaul architecture and protocol set defined by the WiMAX forum.
802.11 Municipal WiFi is a round technology crowbarred into a square application.
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Yes. The CCK and OFDM in 2.4GHz PHYs work we
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Fred e Zone (Score:4, Informative)
Fredericton has had Wi-Fi rolled out for a couple years now. The status is degraded because we just got hit by tropical storm Noel.
It's all about the money... (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:It's all about the money... (Score:5, Interesting)
It's so easy that people deployed it themselves in disaster relief scenarios despite opposition from the government, rebellious little municipalities with practically no budget deployed it themselves, hell, soldiers are able to drop a bunch of little scurrying robots and set up a wireless mesh network in a blasted urban war zone.
The technology renders large amounts of infrastructure obsolete, turns the technology into a piece of infrastructure no different from roads and sewage, and makes some very profitable businesses defunct.
This is why established businesses oppose it and politicians are paid to prevent it. That's pretty much the sum of it.
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Not really-- MuniWiFi has real problems (Score:4, Informative)
1) bad cellular support grid (3 non-interfering channels, making coverage very difficult)
2) competition with other wireless, paid services (UMTS, EVDO, etc)
3) competition from commercial 'hotspot' providers (hotels, paid-hotspots, etc.)
4) poor business models that caved Google, Earthlink, and others
5) the silliness of using a LAN technology (look at the specs as mentioned up-thread) for a MAN/WAN purpose, as the CSMA/CA technology plainly sucks for services that require mulitple concurrent low-latency streams from a single AP)
6) non-existent subnet handoff (all solutions are proprietary, so far), and lack of VLAN wizardry
7) super-dumb security-- as in NONE as there are no encryption schemes, poor to no authentication (too expensive) and no session controls
Plainly, muni-Wifi is a great idea, if WiFi itself worked, and if there were business models to sustain its deployment. It's a misapplication of the technology, politicians aside. We're just not there yet in terms of building meshes that provide excellent or in many cases, just minimally usable coverage.
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Municipal water - promise unfullfilled (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Municipal water - promise unfullfilled (Score:4, Insightful)
This is the idea that I keep getting back to if I think about the ISPs enough: the Internet should be thought of as infrastructure. It's comparable to roads, water, and electricity. For many reasons (including various humanitarian and economic reasons), we want a robust infrastructure in our country that is efficient and maintained well enough that the general citizenry can take it for granted. Yes, there are some people who live out in the middle of nowhere without water, electicity or roads, but most people in most places are able to simply expect that those things will exist and work.
The implimentation is different in different places and for different sorts of infrastructure. I pay a private company for electricity. I don't pay to drive on roads, but I do pay tolls for some bridges. There's still some wiggle-room for how the whole internet thing happens, but it needs to happen in such a way that the gross majority of people receive acceptable access at a reasonable price.
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Funny enough, it's even more comparable to telephone and cable, and yet those aren't considered public utilities.
'course, that's not to say I disagree with you, but your analogy is, I think, far from apt. There are many reasons why one might want to socialize internet access, but it's hardly a vital utility that isn't easily managed by disparate private entities, as is the case with roads, water, and elect
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Of course I'm not sure what the equivalent of a 911 call on the internet is.
Though, I believed the lines and content should be provided by two different companies and the company that owns the lines be a well regulated non-profit company devoted to giving everyone the ability to have internet. If they want it, they'll have to pay for it between competing content providers etc etc.
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The well-digging companies are coining money. But they are doing it in places where there is a shortage of water.
Municipal WiFi is a Scam (Score:3, Informative)
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I am curious about your problems. I admit that public wi-fi is a YMMV kinda think, but I have had no real problems. It's faster than my EVDO Phone (which I can bridge to my laptop). Find a place to sit, connect, and I am in.
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And the last thing I want when I dial 911 is for that WiFi system to be in the loop. May as well drive to the ER. (or shoot the intruder, lol) I am unable to connect much of the time and I am right in the heart of the system. Plus it won't start up with Firefox. I can only get it to work with IE. I'm not certain what or if a
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http://www.brooklinewireless.com/ [brooklinewireless.com]
FON (Score:2)
I agree, it's a scam (Score:2, Interesting)
Our city tried so that it could attract high-tech workers. They were gunning for a "revolutionary" wireless deployment using IP6 so they could do multicast groups w
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At the very best, you help another deployment avoid the same mistake. At worst, someone is embarrassed (big deal.. that shouldn't trump the truth).
My hometown Nashua NH was supposed to do downtown wifi. I think it was killed when Verizon cried to
Here's a good reason for them to fail... (Score:4, Interesting)
As my sainted grandmother would say, "Bad cess to them!"
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Moral Statute Machine: Your repeated violation of the Verbal Morality Statute, code 777, has caused me to notify the San Angeles^W^W Westminster Police Department. Please remain where you are for your reprimand.
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The current system is based on random luck. You don't feed the meter and maybe you're lucky, or maybe you aren't and you have a ticket. If you change to a system where every violator always pays, you're back to a fair system (especially if police aren't allowed to undo tickets for their friends). And with all this new revenue, you can decrease the fines so they don't become an unfair burden
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A huge increase in the sales of Wi-Fi jammers.
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Get this:
The Gov't can't even put free Wi Fi in airports (Score:2)
broadband access (Score:5, Interesting)
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Municipal != Free (Score:5, Insightful)
Municipal Energy isn't free.
Municipal Waste Disposal isn't free.
Municipal Newtwork Service... where did anyone get the idea it should be free?
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Free as in Beer.
Free as in Speech.
Free as in Taxpayer-Subsidized.
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Actually, if you live in Philadelphia you already pay an income tax whether you like it or not. At least trash pickup is free. Water is cheap as well as gas and electric companies are well regulated enough to keep their prices down.
The thing about those industries is that there are physical quantities of matter being moved and cost money each time to deliver. With internet connectivity the majority of the cost is the initial infrastructure and as long
Minneapolis Wifi (Score:4, Informative)
http://blog.tmcnet.com/wireless-mobility/wifi-network-helped-minneapolis-deal-with-bridge-collapse.asp [tmcnet.com]
They're not all failures (Score:5, Informative)
- It is not free -- but half the price of other ISP providers in the area so it is a great bargain.
- It is a based on a Municipal Services model, where the city will be the biggest customer of the network. So even if no one signs up, the network provider will still make a profit.
I expect future muni wifis will use a Municipal Services-based model as well.
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Making a profit doesn't actually happen until the huge initial up front capital investment is recouped from service subscriptions, which may take several years.
Similar to this story (Score:2)
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We should tear out our water and sewer lines, fire all of our police and firemen, and let corporate America run all of these things. I'm sure they will do a much better job.
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There is a difference between maintaining a current infrastructure and building a new one.
Police and Fire Departments are not part of physical infrastructure, They have cars, trucks, horses, or feet to get them where they are needed. If they find that they need more firemen at location A then they Move to Location A. Unlike Wi-Fi where you put a wireless hub and keep it at that location and then you will need to find a way to make sure it doesn't walk away and keep it running. Police and
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So you are saying that because Internet usage is not metered, therefore it should be run privately? What if they metered your Internet usage, like, say, Comcast does? One could very well meter Internet usage and charge for it. Poof goes your argument.
You've put yourself on a slippery slope and even provided your own grease. Your argument about wasteful government is unsubstantiat
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Putting your faith in big corporations is crazy. They will screw you over every time, and not because of any particular person but a "good" corporation is built to screw its partners, suppliers, and customers out of every penny possible.
I actually don't condone putting your faith in the government or the private sector. In any case you have to get involved and keep a watchful eye. People tend to be inefficient, lazy, ineffective, and generally bad at getting things done. It really doesn't matter which t
Re:Putting faith in the governemt. (Score:4, Insightful)
The problem is that a lot of big companies get to a certain size and power when they can afford to abuse their own customers because they are able to ensure that their customers have no choice. They form little cartels and engage in anti-competitive practices. They use their immense resources to brainwash the public and destroy any competing company, especially if that competing company offers a better product.
When you hit that point, these companies are worse than the government. They have just as little need to be efficient as "the government", and they really don't have to please their customers anymore. The big difference between themselves and the government at that point is that the government has at least the pretense of "the public good" as a goal, whereas corporations only have "maximizing shareholder investment".
Yes, you can choose another corporation, and you can choose another government too. But in neither case to revolutions come easy.
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