What's Behind the Epidemic of Municipal Wi-Fi Failures?
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With a rash of muni Wi-Fi projects collapsing, companies and cities realize their initial approaches to providing ubiquitous, free network connectivity aren't working. The problem is Wi-Fi is too expensive to deploy, and there's not enough user demand.
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A new study led by a former government official says that municipal Wi-Fi projects could stifle competition in some areas.
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'tis the season to be disconnected A new study from AirMagnet has demonstrated that Wi-Fi signal strength can drop by up to 25 per cent when seasonal decorations are in place.â¦
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Backers of a Philadelphia Wi-Fi project are worried that a bill going through the state legislature would spike a plan to blanket the city with free or inexpensive wireless access. [Broadband Blog]
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(InfoWorld) - Silicon Valley's municipal wireless project is one of the most ambitious ever attempted, but good things take time -- more than proponents thought, in this case. Organizers signed a letter of intent with a group of vendors, including CiscoÂ and IBM, last year to build a 1,500-square-mile network. At the time, the group expected a rollout beginning in January or February of this year. The fact that not even a pair of test networks is on the ground yet is a testament to the scale and complexity of the plan, according to Seth Fearey, vice president and CEO of Joint Venture: Silicon Valley Network, which is pushing the plan. If the system takes shape as planned, it will let travelers stay connected throughout a trip from San Francisco's southern city limits to Gilroy, south of San Jose. Wi-Fi may be just one of eight technologies used in the project. The high-tech region is reaching high while municipal wireless is going through a reality check. Last year, a vendor dropped out of a project in Sacramento after expressing concern over a free ad-supported economic model, and in April,Â EarthLink scaled back its municipal wireless activityÂ to focus on existing cities and major opportunities. A high-profile plan for nearby San Francisco is embroiled in a political fight because some leaders think it is a bad deal for the city. The Silicon Valley network would cover more than 40 municipalities across mountains, valleys and urban and suburban areas, with 2.4 million residents. The nonprofit Joint Venture group formed the Wireless Silicon Valley Task Force to spearhead the project, and last September it chose Silicon Valley Metro Connect to build and run it. Along with Cisco as equipment supplier and IBM as system integrator, Metro Connect includes high-tech nonprofit SeaKay and Azulstar. No tax dollars can be spent on the estimated $100 million project. Metro Connect envisions a "layer cake" ofÂ perhaps eight wireless technologies, according to Fearey. Details are still being worked out, but they may include the following: *Â Wi-Fi for central areas of cities *Â WiMax mobile broadband at 2.5GHz for less populated areas *Â a public-safety network at 4.9GHz *Â DSRC (Dedicated Short-Range Communications) for vehicle communications at 5.9GHz *Â systems for environmental sensors and machine-to-machine communications The task force is still negotiating with Metro Connect on a "model agreement" to form the basis of deals with each municipality or agency, which is almost finished, Fearey said. Sticking points include details of prices, terms of service, minimum coverage, and privacy, he said. "It's in their hands as to when we can get this going," Fearey said. Azulstar has been the lead negotiator for Metro Connect for four to six weeks since it was designated the network owner and operator, according to Noa Eisenberg, Azulstar's vice president of marketing. The parties have made a lot of progress in the past several weeks, and Azulstar expects a model agreement to be finished in the very near future, she said. Initial forecasts of deployment starting in February may have been overly optimistic, said Glenn Loo, CIO of Palo Alto, who sits on a committee with other city government representatives working on the project. Palo Alto will host one of the test networks where all the technologies will be tried out. Meeting the needs of the many entities involved and planning coverage across the region's terrain have been hard, he said. But Loo thinks the Palo Alto test network will be up before the end of July and the main network approved and deployed in some cities by year's end. One municipal wireless consultant sees more work and delays ahead unless backers change course. They should have tackled the project like a corporate IT department and started with a few key applications to build up momentum before adding other features, said Craig Settles, an independent consultant who has not worked with the Silicon Valley team. "Someone's got to be willing to say, 'We can achieve the vision, but maybe we should simplify the initial steps,'" Settles said. "You can't sell this much complexity to the average politician."
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Microsoft and JiWire have struck a deal through which they will offer advertising on municipal Wi-Fi networks. The goal is to assess user willingness to tolerate advertising in return for free or subsidized access to Wi-Fi networks.
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Blog: Some towns are using public safety grants for law enforcement wireless networks to cover their initial costs for building a broadband infrastructure.
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Plans for municipal Wi-Fi in a dozen cities currently in negotiations with EarthLink may be in jeopardy as the company is imposing new demands on how the networks are to be paid for.
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One of the big complaints lodged against wireless phone companies is poor signal quality inside buildings, especially homes.
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Microsoft Corp. has been doing some soul-searching about the future of municipal Wi-Fi for consumers. The company's market studies are finding end user woes, but also market potential.
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CAMBRIDGE, Mass. -- In a perfect world, there'd be no wires. They clutter the view, get tangled behind desks and limit how far networks can reach. That's why the telegraph gave way to the radio. Cell phones unstrung telecommunications. Wi-Fi liberated computer data.
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British cities and their Wi-Fi providers are sniping at each other over who is really putting out Wi-Fi service and who is only putting out press releases.
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By JUDY O'ROURKE  SANTA CLARITA -- The days of patronizing certain food or coffee joints to tap a wireless Internet feed may soon be past, with citywide access on the horizon.
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Business models followed technology too closely A year ago, hardly a week went by without news of a major municipal wireless project in the US, supporting free or subsidized access and a host of shiny business models. Now hardly a week goes by without news of the death of one of these plans.â¦
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Despite the best efforts of the Wi-Fi industry to assure companies wireless networking is safe in the workplace, a new survey of executives finds security remains the leading barrier to WLAN adoption.
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It's been a tough year for municipal Wi-Fi projects and emerging wireless technologies, but with the bruises comes new muscle.
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Wi-Fi enabled phones, like the iPhone, will drive demand  for fast wireless broadband networks like the ones cities want to build using Wi-Fi, say experts.