Are Wireless Cities Flawed
According to an interesting article on Mobile Tech Today the concept of wireless cities is flawed. “I am not convinced that a sufficient market exists, it is difficult to get people to pay for Wi-Fi because they have Internet access at home and outdoor coverage is patchy,” said Elliott Mueller, chief executive of Manchester’s Metronet Wi-Fi network.
Certiainly his point about flaky coverage inside can be generally taken correct. (See our post here.) But that’s not really what it’s about and a worrying and strange comment from an executive of a WiFi company. (Not dissimilar to the 1991 faux-pas by Gerald Ratner the jewellery boss, who famously said that his high street shops are successful because they sold “total crap”.)
The biggest thing we’re missing is that WiFi in the streets is not just for Internet access. In fact, in our opinion, public access makes up only about 10% of what these mesh networks are designed for. We only need to look around the world to see what others are doing - whilst this country is falling behind, everyone else is devising new and interesting uses for the technologies.
It may be a while before people dump their broadband for a wireless service. Irritating as it is having to install a BT line when all you need that for is Internet, we’re still not able to totally do without fixed lines. Someday our cities will be totally wireless and we’re involved with a couple of projects currently pushing things this way. When you look at it, a wireless mesh is no different to a fixed system of telephone lines, only more powerful as you can roam throughout…
Technology sometimes moves too quickly for us to keep up and it’s often a good idea to stand back as assess really what’s going on before jumping to conclusions. Is WiFi mature yet? Probably not but without experimentation and implementation it never will be. Just like the mobile phone wasn’t a hit from day one, we all have one in our pockets now.
Simon Morley @ June 22, 2007