Well-written General Interest Articles On Broadband Wireless Internet Access

One of the major reasons I began writing about Broadband Wireless Internet Access was the (then, and still true) relatively dismal state of reporting on Broadband Wireless Internet Access industry trends, technologies, companies, products, etc. The problems with such reporting run the entire gamut - incorrect facts, lack of relevant context, sins of omission, sins of comission, little distinction betwen various wireless technologies, etc. At the moment, it's a sufficiently arcane subject and industry so it's perhaps not so surprising that the reporting on BWIA is generally poor.

So it's rare that I find "general interest" stories on wireless that I can recommend, such as the ones listed below. I distinguish "general interest" stories from "industry-specific" stories. For example, I'll likely not mention articles that appear in Broadband Wireless Business Magazine because that publication is specific to the Broadband Wireless Internet Access industry, and the feature stories are typically well-written and well-editied from the perspective of reasonably in-depth knowlege of the BWIA industry. (Disclaimer - I'm now writing regularly for BWB.) Note that the links provided are accurate only at the time of posting; they may well become invalid over time as web sites addresses are periodically shuffled. Stories are listed in order of "latest at top".

Stories:

July 31, 2002 - NewsForge.com - Small-time ISPs Jump On Wireless Bandwagon, by Robin "Roblimo" Miller
http://newsforge.com/newsforge/02/07/26/2258223.shtml
Profiles several "fed up with no broadband, might as well start my own" Wireless ISPs (WISP). A pretty fair assesment of what goes into being a Wireless ISP. The author describes two vendors pretty much at opposite ends of the WISP equipment spectrum and does justice to both. Most importantly the author reminds the reader that being a WISP consists of equal parts "Wireless" and "Internet Service Provider" - there are still many of the headaches (billing) of being an ISP, even though there are many fewer wires to deal with.

June 20, 2002 - Economist.com Technology Quarterly - Watch This Airspace. by (author not stated)
http://www.economist.com/printedition/displayStory.cfm?Story_ID=1176136
Wireless telecoms: Four disruptive technologies are emerging that promise to render not only the next wave of so-called 3G wireless networks irrelevant, but possibly even their 4G successors. The author (no byline is shown) does a very good job of discussing new four powerful wireless trends - "smart" antennas, mesh networking, ad-hoc networking, and ultrawideband. (Thanks to Tim Finan via a posting to Dave Farber's IP mailing list for the pointer to this story; I'll also concede that Glenn Fleishman "scooped" me on mentioning this story on his excellent weblog 802.11b Networking News.)

March 18, 2002 - Telephony Magazine - Bridging The Cumberland Gap, by Kevin Fitchard
(Link too long to display, click here for story, link only seems to work with Internet Explorer.)
The article details how tiny Allegany County in rural Maryland finally got fed up with the indifference of Verizon not providing broadband services, and constructed Allconet, a public broadband Internet access network. Allconet was constructed using different types of Broadband Wireless Internet Access equipment from several vendors, for a fraction of the cost for equivalent services using wireline technologies. Best of all, Allconet is operational now and providing Broadband Internet Access service to Allegany county residents and businesses. A bit of BWIA industry humor is the quote from a Verizon representative that the construction of "bypass" systems like Allconet are a "disincentive" for Verizon to deploy broadband services more widely. As if Verizon needs any "discincentives" not to deploy broadband services more widely, especially in rural areas :-) I'll readily concede that Telephony Magazine isn't a "General Interest" magazine, but it only rarely covers Broadband Wireless Internet Access topics. I found the article to be informative, generally accurate, and well worth mentioning. (Thanks to Patrick Leary of Alvarion via a posting to the isp-wireless mailing list for the pointer to this story.)

- sks -

Last update: 7/31/2002; 4:46:05 PM.