More research: Pro and Supporters of Muni Wifi

From the Broadband for All website:
The Pros are...
- lower income families can receive broadband for free or reduced price
- help to eliminate the Digital Divide
- shapes communities in positive ways

• educational resources
• health care
• economic development
• community development

Note: A smaller number of Americans have internet access than 12 other countries in the world

This is specifically for you, Cmo.

What Wikipedia says...

I searched Wikipedia for "municipal broadband" and found that they included (what it seems) like the questions posed in our class. They answer questions about:

- Philadelphia, Silicon Valley and San Francisco
- Pros and Cons of Muni
a) different arguments such as time constraints
b) typical people who would usually oppose/support broadband
- definition of municipal broadband

You can find the Wiki here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Municipal_broadband

Yet the article specifically says it lacks international discussion on the topic.
This may include:
- the implementation in international cities (political and economic)
- problems/successes with foreign systems

I definitely think we could focus on this international subject. In addition, we could focus on the major hubs/cities that would most likely have muni broadband...which happen to be linked on this site (search terms = municipal wireless network):

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Municipal_wireless_network#Existing

The list includes cities ranging from Singapore to Hong Kong. We could look at local news articles that reported on these tech advances or search through the companies that these cities used to implement broadband (which are also listed on the site.)

These guys also list some general problems and financial costs.

We'll have to dig a little harder, but I think we can do it.

Municipal Broadband: What do people think about it?

I used Google Advanced Scholar to look up some more dependable articles, and by dependable, I mean relatively unbiased. I searched ‘municipal broadband and poor communities’ only in 3 groups of subjects:

- [Engineering, Computer Science, and Mathematics]

- [Social Sciences, Arts, and Humanities]

- [Business Admin, Finance, and Economics]

I found the article, Municipal Wi-Fi; Big Wave or Wipe Out? It is written by Steve Ruth, a professor at George Mason University, and grad student, James Gibbons. It is edited by Elisa Bertino and Ruth. Published in 2006, it gives many perspectives the effects of municipal broadband from the standpoint of “municipalities, providers, and legislators.”

They analyzed particular cases around the U.S. that address issues such as the high cost of installing municipal wireless technologies, which put some cities in debt. Yet while the initial cost may be detrimental, there are cases where only time will show an increase in revenue. In a case in Tacoma, WA (my hometown!), “MuniWi-Fi’s detractors didn’t
allow adequate time spans when judging returns on investment or report the increased price and speed competition in these communities.”

The wireless providers also have a say. Like any company, a provider will be skeptical in entering into a long-term agreement. They depend on the market situation on whether to enter into contract with cities looking for municipal wi-fi—“if the market for these services rises to the billion-dollar level in a few years…there’s a definite opportunity for profit.”

It also gives additional research options that lead to key references they used in the article which includes both commercial and governmental sites.

The article is posted in the Internet Computing online journal, which is funded by the IEEE. IEEE Xplore is an online technological library that has journals, articles, and other resources.

Here’s the URL for the site: http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpls/abs_all.jsp?arnumber=1631980

The second time I wanted to get a more specific perspective. By looking at the references in the previous article, the Wall Street Journal came up quite a bit. I figured that The Economist might have a slightly different opinion. I’ve read some other articles from this publication that have given some more striking observations.

I searched Google using municipal broadband site: economist.com and found one story. It takes a critical view of the technology of Muni Wi-fi, pointing out its flaws like availability of fast service in comparison to private wireless connection, particularly picking on Anaheim’s new plan to introduce a city-wide plan. They complain, “Outside, there are the added problems of foliage, tall buildings and hills. These can reflect, absorb or otherwise interfere with a municipal Wi-Fi’s signal.” They also point out that wireless services run on unlicensed radio waves, meaning “that there are many PCs jostling for access. Adding to the mayhem are the domestic appliances, like cordless phones and microwave ovens, that radiate in the same frequency band.”

The Economist article also claims that consumers are not the ones pushing the development of these large networks (in comparison to policy-makers). “In almost all cases, however, the reigning philosophy was “build it and they will come.” I was skeptical of this claim, because the consumers who are benefiting the most from municipal broadband are not those who already have service.

Here is the URL: www.economist.com/science/displaystory.cfm?story_id=9244199

The Economist is funded by consumer interest and various consulting agencies including other advertisers.

The author of this article is not mentioned. It was published in 2007.

I searched a third time using the same format as the last, hoping to get some more critique on the infrastructure based around municipal broadband. I retrieved an article that looked promising and talked about the importance of ownership by the community, rather than the company/policy-makers. However, it lacked resources and I didn’t recognize the organization. The organization was called “Institute for Local Self Reliance.”

What is WiFi?

To find a general answer to "What is WiFi?" I searched using Google (search: WiFi technology) because I was looking for common knowledge on the topic and wondered what other sites would reference if searching for WiFi. I found an article that looks promising, but lacks recent updates.

www.itaa.org/isec/docs/innovation/wifiwhitepaper.pdf

The ITAA is the Information Technology Association of America which helps businesses and the government alike help configure different technologies. The site is funded by both the government and commercial industries.

The paper gives a careful definition of Wifi and provides some history of the technology. It also gives the strengths and weaknesses of WiFi, unlike sites who were trying to promote the technology. However, it would be more useful if the information was written recently. It was published in 2004.

Google also gave me a Wiki link which was really helpful for becoming familiar with technological terms, but was not credible enough for sources.

I also searched for images through Google Image and found a great one from The Washington Post that compares WiMAX to WiFi. It will be helpful for us to look into the differences between WiFi and WiMAX in the presentation, and what WiMax can do for municipal broadband. In addition, there is a pretty comprehensive Wiki about those differences.

Here is the image link.
www.washingtonpost.com/.../GR2007100900131.html

The search terms "Wifi technology" through Wikipedia also led me to a newspaper site about citywide wifi in London through the references at the bottom of the Wiki.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4578114.stm

Hey Look!

Would you look at that? A new blog site. How spectacular.