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August 28, 2005 • 9:34 pm 0

New York Post Interview: Cities, Providers War Over Wi-Fi as Utility

The “New York Post has an article”:1 by Sam Gustin about Wi-Fi as a public utility. I was interviewed about the work NYCwireless has done:

bq. But Executive Director of NYCwireless Dana Spiegel worries that, contrary to perceptions of a connected city, many are left out. “Only 10 percent of low-income families in New York City have access to broadband, because Time Warner and Verizon keep prices for broadband artificially high.”

bq. “Just like the grass and the trees and the benches are provided by the city,” Spiegel said, “we think that broadband Internet access should be provided as well.”

[1]http://www.nypost.com/business/51774.htm

Filed under: Community Wireless, Interview, Muniwireless, New York City, News, NYCwireless

August 27, 2005 • 4:49 pm 0

NYC MTA RFP for Subway Cellular Service

Articles in the “New York Times”:1 and the “New York Daily News”:2 announce that the New York City “Metropolitan Transportation Authority began soliciting bids for a 10-year contract that will involve immense technical complexity and probably be worth $50 million to $100 million” (New York Times).

Though not specifically broadband related, this RFP by the MTA is important because it represents the first time that any wireless technology has been embraced by the City’s subway system. I think that a planned expansion of cell systems into the subway is an important step in the right direction for New York, though limiting it to cellular technology shows that the MTA doesn’t fully “get it”.

I’ve spoken to many people who would spend upwards of 20-30 minutes waiting for a subway train to arrive, especially in stations that are outside of midtown and downtown Manhattan. These people want to be able to use their laptops and PDAs to get work done and to communicate with each other, and Wi-Fi would be the ideal technology for this. An ad-supported Wi-Fi network would complement the existing MTA advertising division.

One thing that I don’t get is that if this is meant to address safety and security issues, why the MTA wouldn’t want cell phones to be usable inside subway tunnels. Claiming concern about phones being used for remote detonation of bombs is preposterous: When was the last time that a terrorist setup a bomb in New York City, let alone in a subway? There are, frankly, plenty of other wireless technologies that could be used if a terrorist had the inclination.

Of greater concern should be the many times that someone would need assistance while stuck in a subway car halfway between stations, an event that happens at least weekly. Considering how many times the subway breaks down, I would think that the MTA would jump at the chance to give people the convenience of phone use while traveling.

[1]http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/25/nyregion/25phones.html
[2]http://www.nydailynews.com/front/story/339738p-290096c.html

Filed under: New York City, News, Urban Wireless

August 19, 2005 • 9:58 am 0

FreePress Report on the Woeful State of Broadband in America

“FreePress”:1, “Consumer Federation of America”:2, and “Consumers Union”:3 have released “an informative report”:4 on how the US is lagging behind the rest of the world with regard to broadband.

In the report, FreePress et. al. take the FCC and Commissioner Martin to task for painting a misleading rosy picture of broadband use and deployment across the US. They highlight a number of important, but often overlooked aspects of how the FCC evaluates broadband deployment (which they are required to do yearly by law):

* The FCC overstates broadband penetration rates. The FCC report considers a ZIP code covered by broadband service if just one person subscribes. No consideration is given to price, speed or availability of that connection throughout the area.

* The FCC misrepresents exactly how many connections are “high-speed.” The FCC defines “high-speed” as 200 kilobits per second, barely enough to receive low-quality streaming video and far below what other countries consider to be a high-speed connection.

* The United States remains 16th in the world in broadband penetration per capita. The United States also ranks 16th in terms of broadband growth rates, suggesting our world ranking won’t improve any time soon. On a per megabit basis, U.S. consumers pay 10 to 25 times more than broadband users in Japan.

* Despite FCC claims, digital divide persists and is growing wider. Broadband adoption is largely dependent on socio-economic status. In addition, broadband penetration in urban and suburban in areas is double that of rural areas.

* Reports of a broadband “price war” are misleading. Analysis of “low-priced” introductory offers by companies like SBC and Comcast reveal them to be little more than bait-and-switch gimmicks.

* The FCC ignores the lack of competition in the broadband market. Cable and DSL providers control almost 98 percent of the residential and small-business broadband market. Yet the FCC recently eliminated “open access” requirements for DSL companies to lease their lines, rules that fostered the only true competition in the broadband market.

I think one of the most important findings of this report is something I’ve been talking about for a while, namely the misleading pricing that cable/telco companies have been promoting. Also important is the report’s assertion that there is no real competition in the broadband market, and that wireless and satellite broadband should even be considered anything but a fringe part of the market. All of the findings in the report are based on published facts, many of them provided by the FCC. Every statement FreePress makes cites the relevant source for information.

If you read one thing this week, “make it this report”:4!

[1]http://www.freepress.net
[2]http://www.consumerfed.org
[3]http://www.hearusnow.org
[4]http://www.freepress.net/docs/broadband_report.pdf

Filed under: News, Policy

August 18, 2005 • 10:38 am 0

Consumers Still Don't Understand Wi-Fi Potential

In-Stat, a market research firm, “released a report”:1 stating that consumers still don’t understand the potential of Wi-Fi:

bq. “Consumer electronics vendors have a challenge to educate consumers about Wi-Fi and to overcome the perception that Wi-Fi is simply a data networking technology,” In-Stat analyst Norm Bogen said in a statement. “In-Stat believes the benefits to consumers of Wi-Fi connectivity in consumer electronics devices are significant enough to build a major market segment over the next five years.”

Those of you who are readers of this blog and supporters of Community Wireless groups know that the potential for Wi-Fi lies in its ability to break down barriers between the people living in a local community. It is a fundamentally social technology, especially when used in public spaces. NYCwireless has worked hard to spread this view, especially through the events we hold at our parks, like “Spectropolis”:2.

I think its important for all of us that support Community Wireless to work on educating the general public.

[1]http://www.mobilepipeline.com/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=169300050
[2]http://www.spectropolis.info

Filed under: Community Wireless, News, NYCwireless

August 15, 2005 • 11:56 pm 0

Students Work on Singapore Community Wireless

I was recently contacted by a group of students, Jacinta, Lionel, Amy and YuGai, from “Raffles Junior College”:1 in Singapore, asking about NYCwireless. They are interested in bringing public wireless networking to the people of Singapore, and I support them completely. We need more students working on Community Wireless.

Their questions, and my responses:

bq. *Since setting up of the wireless service, just exactly how popular is this service since you started it in terms of average daily users?*

bq. _NYCwireless has helped create dozens of public hotspots with partners throughout Manhattan. Some of our most popular parks, like Bryant Park, Union Square Park, City Hall Park, and the South Street Seaport see hundreds of users per day._

bq. *What are some of the feedbacks(positive and negative) you have got from the members of the public?*

bq. _The best feedback we get is that people use our hotspots. Most users don’t even contact us about their usage._

bq. _We have held a number of events at our hotspots, including educational sessions about Wi-Fi and big Arts Festivals. “Spectropolis”:2 was incredibly successful, and drew thousands of people from around New York and around the country (some even internationally)._

bq. *This is a non-profit organization. How do you pay for the cost of setting up this service? Do you have the government funding the organization?*

bq. _All of our hotspots are funded by partner organizations. For example, the hotspots that are located in Downtown Manhattan are sponsored by the Alliance for Downtown New York, a Business Improvement District company. Some of our personal hotspots are set up and run by individual volunteers. We have some funding through personal donations to NYCwireless, but no formal funding arrangements._

bq. *What are the costs of set up and maintenance like?*

bq. _A public park hotspot costs on the order of a few $1000’s. The internet is brought in via a local ISP at a cost of about $100/month. The hardware costs only about $500-$1000._

bq. *Is this service available 24 hours?*

bq. _Yes. All of our hotspots are online all day. Some even operate all year round (it gets very cold in NYC in the middle of February!)._

bq. *What are the problems the organization face in implementing the service?*

bq. _Some of the difficulties include getting access to surrounding buildings to mount the wireless hardware, and promoting the availability of the wireless service. We have a great record of accomplishment with our deployments, which rarely need any maintenance._

bq. *Following the success of this project, what are the impacts that it has on the people and economy?*

bq. _As one of the first Community Wireless Network, and one of the most visible, we believe that our work has paved the way for an entire movement of people. We have generated a significant amount of press (and still do), which has led to many people learning about Community Wireless, and the possibilities of public Wi-Fi. We also work with other organizations around the country, like Free Press and the Consumer’s Union to promote awareness and deployment of affordable wireless broadband in local communities. Some of our work in New York City has involved bringing free Wi-Fi to underprivileged and underserved residents._

bq. *What do you think of our idea of trying to provide a similar service to the working public of Singapore?*

bq. _We whole-heartedly support and encourage you to undertake this project. We would be happy to help you in any way we can. We also encourage you to make use of all of the wonderful Open Source tools created by Community Wireless Groups around the world, from CUWiN’s (Urbana, Illinois, USA) “wireless mesh software”:3, to IleSansFil’s (Montreal, Canada) “WifiDog Hotspot portal management system”:4, to our (“NYCwireless”:5) “Pebble Linux hotspot operating system”:6, to Freifunk.net’s (Berlin, Germany) “Freifunk Firmware”:7 for the Linksys WRT54G._

[1]http://www.rjc.edu.sg/newrjc
[2]http://www.spectropolis.info
[3]http://www.cuwireless.net
[4]http://www.ilesansfil.org
[5]http://www.nycwireless.net
[6]http://www.nycwireless.net/pebble
[7]http://www.freifunk.net/wiki/FreifunkFirmwareEnglish

Filed under: Community Wireless, Interview

August 14, 2005 • 7:13 pm 0

Bruce Fein's New York Times Letter to the Editor

Bruce Fein, a former general counsel for the FCC under President Reagan, “published a letter to the editor”:2 in today’s New York Times. He claims that Nicholas D. Kristof’s recent column “wrongly chastises New York for neglecting to emulate the citywide wireless networks in rural Oregon” due to far greater cost of deploying Wi-Fi in populated urban areas.

While Mr. Fein is correct in stating that Wi-Fi in New York would be more costly than in, say, Philadelphia (as I have written previously in this blog “here”:3 and “here”:4), his claim that it would cost $1 billion is way off the mark. Yes, New York City recently put out an RFP for a $1 billion wireless network for police, fire, and emergency rescue use. This network is intended to be private and secure, and won’t likely use Wi-Fi (it certainly won’t use Wi-Fi in the normal 802.11a/b/g bands).

From where is Mr. Fein getting his $1 billion figure? “According to JupiterResearch”:5, the cost of building and maintaining a municipal wireless network is $150,000 per square mile over five years. “Sascha Meinrath of CUWiN claims”:6 that a network with a density of 142 nodes per square mile would cost about $49,700. If we take these as a low and a high estimate, we wind up with a total cost for NYC between $15 million and $50 million. Even if we triple the JupiterResearch cost estimates, we don’t come even close to Mr. Fein’s number.

Furthermore, Mr. Fein’s claim that such a network would be entirely Wi-Fi is misinformed. Such a network should use whatever wireless and wired technologies are appropriate. Wi-Fi happens to be the best solution for getting internet access over the “last 100 yards”. As for competition, New York could be the city that encourages the most R&D in wireless, if only the City created the right environment, perhaps by opening up more light-pole franchises at an affordable rate.

All of this doesn’t address the most important issue: only about 35% of New Yorkers have broadband, and only 10% of low-income families in New York City have broadband. And this is the most connected city in the country! We should be demanding that the Mayor and everyone else in our City Government address this situation! Wi-Fi, WiMax, Wi-whatever—wireline or wireless—it doesn’t matter. In fact, any viable solution will make use of all of these technologies, as well as some others that aren’t even released yet.

We shouldn’t look at this problem as being so large and costly that we can’t address it. We can start small. “NYCwireless”:7 and its partners have brought free Wi-Fi to many City parks and other public spaces. And we continue to bring public Wi-Fi to low income buildings and other neighborhoods. Working together, “we”:8 (and every single New Yorker) can make a difference.

[1]http://www.nycwireless.net/tiki-read_article.php?articleId=32
[2]http://www.nytimes.com/2005/08/14/opinion/l14wifi.html
[3]http://www.wirelesscommunity.info/2005/07/20/how-to-bring-an-affordable-broadband-isp-into-new-york-city/
[4]http://www.wirelesscommunity.info/2005/06/22/why-mesh-based-wireless-networks-are-ideal-for-new-york/
[5]http://www.wi-fiplanet.com/news/article.php/3518071
[6]http://www.saschameinrath.com/2005_04_29_15_40__crunching_numbers_cuwin_vs_tropos_–_costs_to_wireless_1-square_mile
[7]http://www.nycwireless.net
[8]http://www.nyc.gov/

Filed under: Community Wireless, Mesh, Muniwireless, New York City, News

August 14, 2005 • 1:31 pm 0

Broadband Is Too Important to Be Left to Cable-Phone Duopoly

Rob Pegoraro of the Washington Post has written an interesting article on why “Broadband Is Too Important to Be Left to Cable-Phone Duopoly”:1. In the article, he talks about why the FCC and Federal Government shouldn’t leave the future of broadband internet access to the cable guys or the phone company.

He lists the ways that telco and cable companies have “let down their customers”:

* Price
* Reliability
* Getting connected
* Tech support
* Features

I’m left to wonder: “What’s left?” These failings seem to cover the entirety of the business of providing internet service. If cable and telco companies fail on all of these counts, what’s left for them to succeed at?

[1]http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/13/AR2005081300149_pf.html

Filed under: News, Policy

August 14, 2005 • 3:50 am 0

InternetWeek Interview

I was recently interviewed by Christopher Heun for “an article in InternetWeek”:1 about Municipal Wireless.

bq. A lot of cities are getting involved in this specifically because they’ve been lied to and burned by the telecom companies, and they’ve thrown up their hands and said enough,” says Dana Spiegel, a software consultant and executive director of NYCwireless, a nonprofit that has helped set up dozens of free public wireless hotspots in New York City since 2001. “If a city decides for the benefit of all residents that everyone should have access to broadband services at an affordable rate and if Verizon (Communications) or SBC (Communications) is not doing that, then the city should have the right to do that.

[1]http://www.internetweek.com/168601371

Filed under: Community Wireless, Interview, Muniwireless, News

August 13, 2005 • 6:38 pm 0

Cost of Deploying an Open Source Mesh Community Network

I’m quite late in posting about “a great blog post”:1 by “Sascha Meinrath”:2 (one of the leaders of the “Champaign-Urbana Community Wireless Network”:3) about the costs of deploying a mesh-based wireless network.

Sascha’s calculations are based on a rural/suburban environment, which is where most of his experience has been. His cost numbers are quite impressive. For a network of reasonable size, using an open source solution like CUWiNware (Sascha’s open source mesh wireless OS) is *cheaper* than commercial alternatives, even after you include deployment, maintenance, and ongoing costs.

In a city environment, I suspect the numbers would be a little different, but the end result would be the same. First, you’d need a greater concentration of wireless nodes, since tall buildings would cause the wireless signals to degrade faster. Second, you’d need to have a two-pronged deployment strategy since getting wireless connectivity *to* a building doesn’t get wireless internet service *through* a building, to all of the apartments. This is where a mesh network where each mesh node also acted like a hotspot (something CUWiNware doesn’t yet do) would be helpful. You could extend the mesh throughout a building using the same nodes that are used to connect outside of the building.

Regardless, in an urban environment an open source mesh network would be even more important since it would allow people to join and extend the network without any central coordination.

[1]http://www.saschameinrath.com/2005_07_07_08_37__update_2_open_source_open_architecture_muni-wireless_costs_aka_–_how_non-proprietary_wireless_is_more_cost_ef
[2]http://www.saschameinrath.com
[3]http://www.cuwireless.net

Filed under: Community Wireless, Mesh

August 10, 2005 • 9:47 am 0

National Journal Article on Municipal Wireless

There is a good “multi-part series of articles”:1 in the “National Journal’s Insider Update”:2 that talks about policy implications of Municipal Wireless:

bq. When the Internet debuted on the national political stage in President Clinton’s 1997 State of the Union address, it was generally accepted that the private sector would take the lead in growing the unusual and compelling, new commercial network.

bq. Eight years later, the debate about whether municipalities should be funding or creating high-speed Internet networks has a back-to-the-future quality. Technological advances, dissatisfaction with the nation’s broadband pace over the past several years, and the dynamics of convergence have led “digital municipalism” to hit its stride.

[1]http://www.njtelecomupdate.com/lenya/telco/live/tb-KAZO1123617399581.html
[2]http://www.njtelecomupdate.com

Filed under: News, Policy

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