Alaska now says it's working on the pricing model. The company has partnered with Row 44 for its satellite-backed Internet service over Wi-Fi.
The latest edition of my co-authored book on Wi-Fi security is out: The title, which I and Adam Engst have been updating for several years, is now up to date on Wi-Fi Protected Setup, the latest issues with WPA/WPA2, and a host of other minor changes. The book is aimed at a general audience, not tech types, who want background on security topics coupled with specific, step-by-step advice for Mac OS X (Tiger and Leopard), Windows XP, and Windows Vista.
Included is details on setting up WPA/WPA2 Personal, troubleshooting network security problems, and how to encrypt and secure specific services like email or the contents of files and messages.
The immediate download book is 106 pages and costs $10. However, readers of Wi-Fi Networking News can follow the link above for a $3 discount (discount appears during checkout); you can also enter coupon code CPN71005WNN during checkout. You can download a sample that contains various parts of the book by following the link as well.
Why should AT&T be excited about Skype for iPhone: Because all of us iPhone users are paying minimum fees for service that we will use less and less in favor of Skype. The free Skype for iPhone application, due out tomorrow, will only work over Wi-Fi. (PC World has a full report including screen captures.)
Skype has 400 million users worldwide, and the voice quality tends to be better than that of the conventional POTS (plain old telephone service) or cellular network when there's sufficient bandwidth. With a user base that large, with a mobile version of Skype you're more likely to make Skype-to-Skype calls (which are free).
AT&T enabled the Wi-Fi part of this equation by belatedly offering free Wi-Fi for iPhone users to any of the nearly 20,000 in-network hotspots the company operates. AT&T acquired Wayport, its managed services provider for Wi-Fi hotspots, last year. This puts McDonald's, Starbucks, a number of hotels, and some chains under one plan, all free to iPhone users. (iPhone users should download and use Easy Wi-Fi for AT&T iPhones, a currently free app from Devicescape for automating your hotspot login.)
Why does this benefit AT&T? Every minute that you use over Skype over Wi-Fi is a minute that AT&T doesn't have to pay cellular transit costs for. Sure, AT&T makes money from selling you outside-plan minutes at about 25 to 50 cents a minute. But savvy user now buy unlimited plans or have pools large enough or use prepaid plans. I believe the fees from the overage charges are trending into place. Which means that AT&T would prefer you use less minutes, loading its network less.
Skype charges for calling to the public switched telephone network, a couple cents a minute to North America and many other countries or fixed monthly plans, but the margins are very thin there.
Let's say a billion minutes are siphoned from AT&T cell calls using the iPhone and now are made over Skype. Skype relies on peer-to-peer infrastructure for the most part (with some central authentication) for its Skype-to-Skype calling, so that's no skin off its nose. For AT&T, that's a billion minutes it doesn't have to carry with a commensurate drop in termination fees, carrying costs, and infrastructure buildout. Further, this encourage more use over Wi-Fi instead of over 3G, freeing 3G service by having people seek out Wi-Fi hotspots.
If you're like my wife and I, we already have the cheapest possible plan from AT&T: a family plan with two lines, the lowest number of minutes, and two iPhones (first generation). This still costs us $130 per month including taxes and we haven't been able to drop any lower with our current offering.
If we start calling a bunch over Skype for iPhone, then we're still paying that same $130 to AT&T, and yet we're using it less and less. It's all about margins. Skype still requires that someone else operate the network and the broadband, so even while Skype sucks minutes from the telecom infrastructure, it's hard to see how AT&T loses in this case because of the high fixed cost of obtaining a minimum cellular data plan.
iPod touch reaches out: The mobile Skype application works on the iPod touch, too, bringing such users access to a high-quality worldwide network of existing users and cheap calling. This device needs an external mike or headset (there's no microphone built in), but Apple revealed recently that 13 million iPod touch models have been sold. That's a big audience.
iPod touch owners don't have automatic free Wi-Fi hotspot access, but that's easy to solve. Hotspot operators and aggregators already offer mobile pricing. Boingo Wireless, for instance, has an $8 per month plan for mobile devices for which the iPod touch already qualifies. Get Boingo's iPhone/iPod touch application and you get automatic login, too.
Verizon talks about expanding access to broadband in rural areas, wirelessly: Cnet's Marguerite Reardon interviews Verizon Wireless's CTO, who says that his company's plan for LTE will extend far beyond its current CDMA cellular footprint. The missing piece in this interview? The fact that Verizon is obligated to build out a significant footprint in the 700 MHz band about which the CTO is speaking; more on that in a moment.
The 700 MHz band has so much bang for the buck, perhaps offering four times the coverage area with a single base station than an 1700-2500 MHz base station (3G or U.S. WiMax). And that's in urban areas. In rural locations without obstructions and with less dense usage, I would imagine a single base station could cover an enormous area. Backhaul is still an issue, of course, but Verizon has a variety of frequencies it can use for long-distance point-to-point wireless feeds. And while LTE could deliver a pool of 50 Mbps in urban areas with 5 to 10 Mbps or more available per user, rural performance could be lower and still far exceed what's currently available.
Verizon Wireless's CTO speculates that Verizon could offer fixed wireless offerings to homes, much like Clearwire's WiMax. Clearwire can't provide such service across large areas outside of densely populated areas because its bandwidth portfolio is centered in the 2500 MHz (2.5 GHz) band, which is going to be unaffordable to deploy in less-populated areas. Clearwire could cover an entire town with one base station, but it wouldn't make sense for them to cover the area between small towns. In fact, Clearwire's pre-WiMax offerings were originally in lower-tier smaller-city markets that had poor DSL and cable broadband availability.
According to research last year from the Pew Internet & American Life Project, 38 percent of rural households in the U.S. have broadband access, and 12 percent of all American households use fixed wireless for access. This shows the great potential for selling service into the rural market in two ways: it's underserved, but those with service are likely paying too much for what they get.
I contacted that report's author a few days ago to ask about the wireless stat, as it seemed incredibly high to me. He explained that it included satellite and all forms of fixed wireless. I found some more recent confirmation of the number from a University of Vermont poll released just two days ago. Vermont has a rural population, but still sees most people in towns and cities. Internet access is Vermont, the poll said, is split out as: dial-up, 18 percent; cable, 24 percent; DSL, 42 percent; satellite, 7 percent; wireless Internet, 6 percent; fiber or other, 3 percent. That 13 percent combined wireless number neatly tracks the Pew's research.
Satellite Markets & Research estimates 731,000 satellite Internet subscribers as of 2008's second quarter. With a bit over 100 million households in the U.S., that's not even one percent of the market, but the Vermont numbers show how that skews in less-populated areas. Pew research puts just 55 percent of households online, with a relatively large number that want broadband. (Some significant number will never want it for reasons of costs or utility, of course.)
As we know, satellite Internet is a kind of marvelous, ugly, and expensive compromise to bring broadband to the hinterland. People who would otherwise be restricted to dial-up service, if they could even get a decent 56K signal, can have far higher rates. But the cost is high, upstream rates low, and satellite services weren't designed to offer pinpoint residential access.
Thus Verizon has a defined market, and it won a large number of licenses covering these rural markets in the 700 MHz sale a year ago; so did AT&T, which also bought up many previously auctioned 700 MHz licenses. Verizon captured the coveted national license, but both firms purchased a patchwork of regional licenses that let them build country-wide 700 MHz networks.
But what Cnet's Reardon doesn't mention, and Verizon's CTO deftly avoids, is that 700 MHz licenseholders are obligated to build out service across the licenses they won. The FCC, tired of awarding licenses that aren't used, attached some modest but significant installation requirements on Auction 73.
While there are several classes of licenses, each class has a 4-year check-in mark for signal coverage. In some classes, that's 35 percent of the geographic area regardless of population, ideal for rural areas; in others, it's 40 percent of the population. If that mark is met, then licenseholders have a full 10 years to build out to 70 percent of the geographic area or 75 percent of the population. Failure to hit a 4-year mark shortens the license term and remaining build out to 8 years. Failure to meet the final target at 8 or 10 years results in the likely loss of the license. Licenses were carved out so that even the cheapest have significant population centers, making it less than optimal for a licenseholder to abandon the coverage area.
Verizon's national licenses (the C Block) require population-based buildouts, which is fair for the scope of the licenses. But some significant spectrum in the A, B, and E blocks require geographic-based deployment. (The public/private D Block didn't have a winning bidder, and is now in limbo after the withdrawal of a significant partner in the public partnership.)
I don't believe Verizon is being disingenuous in pushing the rural message, but the company is also talking up how stimulus money could be used for rural buildouts after the company had, essentially, already agreed to cover 75 percent of the population of the U.S. and 75 percent of the population or area of licenses it purchased.
CradlePoint updates its 3G gateways to handle WiMax, too: CradlePoint was revealed yesterday as the provider for Clearwire's new battery-powered WiMax-to-Wi-Fi gateway, the awkwardly named Clear Spot Personal Hotspot. The company will also offer WiMax support on its business-oriented gateways.
Devices sold starting today will support Clearwire's USB modem; a firmware update for existing router owners will be released 6 April.
Alaska has a single plane wired up with Row 44's satellite-backed Internet service, while Southwest has about four craft with the same offering. Southwest Airlines is updating which routes have Wi-Fi via Twitter on a given day.
Meanwhile, Delta Airlines says it's a few days away from hitting 100 planes with Wi-Fi, which gets the airline more than a quarter of the way to its full mainline fleet deployment, expected for third quarter of this year.
The trick here, of course, is that once the horse is out of the barn there's little that you can do. If you plan, you might be able to recover that stolen laptop; reports of recovery are quite encouraging with the right software installed. This dovetails with my interest in Wi-Fi because software makers are starting to pair Skyhook Wireless's Wi-Fi positioning system and software with recovery software.
The basic idea is that you pay a relatively modest one-time fee or yearly subscription fee to have difficult-to-remove software running on your computer at all times. The computer checks in at frequent intervals to see if it's been marked as stolen. Once it has, it activates various recording and transmission modes, sending (depending on the package) anything from Web camera snapshots to IP data. A few packages now offer Wi-Fi positioning info, too. (I wrote an article for the Seattle Times that appeared last Saturday that wasn't focused on the Wi-Fi aspect.)
The assumption lies in most thieves of this kind being technically unsophisticated and having a laptop join a network in order to use it. Some laptops may be set (Windows and Mac OS X have options) to join any available network, too. While this is a security issue when the laptop is in your hands, it's an advantage when it's roaming.
Programs that use Wi-Fi location information that I've tested or use include Undercover (Mac OS X, $49 one-time fee) and MacTrak (Mac OS X, $24.95 per year); there's also Laptop Cop ($49.95 per year, Windows XP/Vista). There are plenty of others, too, mostly for Windows, that lack location scanning. Computrace LoJack for Laptops notably has a BIOS agent preinstalled on many major Wintel brand computers that can be activated and not disabled without BIOS being wiped!
Each of these firms works with your local law enforcement agency to provide data; in the case of MacTrak, GadgetTrak is happy to work with police, but you can also take the information the company's software sends you to officers directly.
After a rash of thefts among friends and acquaintances, I've installed recovery software on each of my computers, as well as arranging both local and remote backups.
Alternatives with no software installed: If you haven't installed recovery software, you're not entirely out of luck. Many people now run remote backup software, such as Mozy or CrashPlan, or use synchronized storage like Dropbox, Microsoft Live Sync, or Apple's iDisk. And many of us have email software that regularly and automatically checks for messages.
In all of those cases, the current IP address of the computer is recorded whenever a request is made. With your account information in hand, you may be able to log in directly to one of the services, and retrieve the IP address. Or, you can call the company or use customer support to get this information as long as you're the valid account holder. Some firms may require law enforcement to contact them directly.
Police can take an IP address, use that to determine the Internet service provider at which that address is located, and then get the street address that corresponded at that point in time (IP addresses are sometimes reassigned when a modem is rebooted or over time). A warrant may be required.
If you have remote backup software installed, you might get the benefit of having files backed up even if your machine can't be recovered. My friend David Blatner wrote up his own laptop-theft article after his machine was stolen. He had CrashPlan running, and the thieves reconnected to a network after taking his machine, and this gapped much of the difference between a month-old local backup he had made and what was on the stolen machine.
In an oddball case last year, an Apple Store employee who had the remote access software Back to My Mac installed, which allows remote screen-sharing and file transfer, was able to snap shots of a thief and transfer photos he and a collaborator had put onto her computer. That was a sort of one-in-a-million shot.
"And it's fast, and I'm watching YouTube clips. It's amaz--I'm on an airplane! And then it breaks down. And they apologize, the Internet's not working. And the guy next to me goes, 'This is b___s___.' I mean, how quickly does the world owe him something that he knew existed only 10 seconds ago?"
Bit starts at 2 minutes in. [Thanks to John Moe]
BelAir's new cable-mountable Wi-Fi/WiMax access point could be boon for WiMax deployment: BelAir has introduced the BelAir100SX Strand Mounted Dual Mode Wireless Node, a long way of saying that this device can be attached directly to existing cable wiring, powered by cable plant voltage, and drive two kinds of wireless: Wi-Fi and WiMax. (No one apparently ever told BelAir to not introduce a product with the initial SX--say it aloud--on April 1st. But it's real.)
This device is an extension of BelAir's earlier 100S, which feeds out Wi-Fi only, and which is the basis of Cablevision's $300m deployment of many many thousands of nodes across its New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut territory. Backhaul and power come from the cable plant; the device has a built-in DOCSIS 2.0 modem (U.S. and European standards), and can accept a variety of radios.
Comcast has already said it will resell the Clear-branded WiMax service in Portland, Ore., the only U.S. market deployed with that offering. Comcast needs Clearwire for the fourth element in a quadruple play of voice, video, data, and mobile communications (which can be voice, video, and data as well).
This all neatly dovetails.
Australian tech agency CSIRO settles with HP, continues case: CSIRO says that HP has settled on confidential terms over the agency's claims to have a patent that covers some of the fundamental parts of how 802.11a, g, and n Wi-Fi works. CSIRO continues to engage, as the article notes, "Microsoft, Dell, Toshiba, Intel, Nintendo, Netgear, Belkin, D-Link, Asus, Buffalo Technology, 3com, Accton and SMC." Cisco and its Linksys division aren't in the list because Cisco agreed to patent terms when it acquired an Australian network authentication firm a few years ago.
The patent may or may not be found valid. I have trouble with how it was revised to include frequencies not mentioned in the original filing that weren't in common use when the filing was first made. A patent review hasn't yet occurred. If upheld, CSIRO will collect what it has frequently described as a small royalty on all devices containing Wi-Fi.
The article misstates the current state of the Buffalo/CSIRO lawsuit by missing a fine detail. CSIRO claimed to have come out in top last September in an appeals court decision, but both parties got something out of it. In December, Buffalo was allowed to start selling gear again, even as the case was sent back to lower court to deal with a small issue. Now, it's still possible Buffalo will have to pay damages, back royalties, and future royalties, but it's actively selling gear at the moment. CSIRO says it won something in appeals because of this possibility.
The company is opting for an interesting rollout: 150 MD-80s this year; about the same number in 737-800s in 2010. The first of the MD-80s with Gogo will go into service this week. The firm's 15 767-200s with Internet service used for cross-country routes will remain available, too.
The strategy is a bit odd: the expectation of service availability will likely be one factor that drives usage. Regular travelers will want to know that they can use Wi-Fi on a flight; otherwise, why would they change traveling preferences for a given flight without that assurance? I expect American might try to guarantee certain routes will have Wi-Fi, but it's still a bit odd.
Related to that, why stretch this over two years? Cost? I don't see how the company achieves a real competitive parity with Delta, which expects to have its domestic mainline fleet equipped by third quarter, without meeting Delta's fleet rollout.
Further Delta has signaled that it plans to announce a schedule later this year for putting Aircell's offering on domestic craft in the Northwest fleet that the airline acquired.
Delta reported on its blog a few days ago that it's at 77 planes with Internet service, or about 25 percent.
Clearwire unveiled the Clear Spot Personal Hotspot: Yes, the firm needs help with naming, but it's a great idea to push early adoption outside the home. The CradlePoint-developed device is a WiMax-to-Wi-Fi gateway designed for nomadic use due to its built-in battery. Plug in a Clear USB modem, and you're good to go over 802.11b and 802.11g wherever. The device will retail for $139; the USB modem costs $49 and can be used on a pay-as-you-go basis ($10 per day) or with monthly mobile subscriptions. It will be available in Clear markets in mid-April.
The Clear Spot appears to be a rebranded version of CradlePoint's PHS300, which has a built-in lithium-ion battery and can be recharged via or used with an AC adapter. The PHS300 works with a variety of cell modems and lists for $179.99.
This is an extremely smart move on Clearwire's part because it signals two things: The company knows that it'll take a while to develop an ecosystem of WiMax-enabled devices; and it wants customers to use its network extensively instead of imposing lots of limits.
If Clearwire can deliver on its top download speeds (4 Mbps with mobile gear), that's a big bump up from the 600 Kbps to 1.7 Mbps downstream rate promised by various 3G carriers. Of course, AT&T is aiming to double its speed through what's described as a software upgrade (to 7.2 Mbps HSPA), and Clearwire suffers from 384 Kbps upload speeds which now compares unfavorably with even 3.6 Mbps HSPA and EVDO Rev. A.
Clearwire has an advantage on mobile data limits, however, because the company apparently believes it has such a big pool and such a large spectrum swath that it can offer an unlimited plan. Whenever I've asked Clearwire what unlimited means, the firm says, really, unlimited. It'll shut down abusers, but it will apparently look at patterns, not quantity.
The Clear service has an unlimited mobile offering for $50/month with no commitment; contracts and bundle discounts drop the price to $40/month and waive a $35 activation fee. A 200 MB per month plan is an appalling $30/month, but likely targeted as a bundle for home users where it's heavily discounted. A more moderate $40/month 2 GB usage plan can be bundled, too; each additional GB is $10 in a calendar month.
Businesses pay on a different scale that offers a better deal but more "risk" of overages, too. An account is priced with two devices (included) under a 2-year contract, with 15 GB/month for $100/month up to 30 GB/month for $150/month. Additional GB are $10 each.
Good news/bad news about 802.11b: According to this article, 802.11b expires today, 1-April-2009. That shouldn't be a surprise, but it sort of crept up on me. I suppose it's all for the best: 802.11b slows down networks, fools people into using a broken encryption standard, and keeps the economy from getting back up to speed. Forcing people to buy new adapters is probably a good way to jumpstart purchases.
Eight years ago, I launched this site: Hard to believe I've been pounding away at wireless data stories this long. It's been quite enjoyable. Despite a severe drop in traffic in the last couple of years, I'm still finding enough to write about on a regular basis, and appreciate the loyal audience out there. I have a hard time believing this site will exist in this form in 2017, but I wouldn't have imagined it would have lasted this long in more or less the same format when I launched it with zero fanfare in 2001.
You can see the first real post from 7 April 2001 (in the current design framing, of course).
The Bluetooth SIG has approved its 3.0 spec with a 21 April launch date: I've written before about Bluetooth 3.0, which pairs the 3 Mbps low-power frequency hopping radio system of 2.1+EDR with high-speed transfers via 802.11 standards. The idea is that a properly integrated Bluetooth 3.0 system will have a bulk-transfer mode that two devices can swap into. (Note that the SIG is referencing 802.11, the generic standard, as it doesn't have a specific program in place with the Wi-Fi Alliance--yet?--for cross-certifiation.)
For instance, if you had one of those ubiquitous BlackBerry or iPhone smartphones with Bluetooth 3.0 and Wi-Fi inside, you could start a sync session with your PC. For normal calendar data and other matter, the sync would use the Bluetooth radio system. To sync a large music or video file, the handset's BT gear would talk with the computer's, agree to switch to 802.11, and then make the bulk transfer. At the end, communication would return to the other radio.
This mode works in a quasi ad-hoc fashion, without requiring that a device join a Wi-Fi network, which is part of why the 802.11 label is being used. With the collapse of UWB as a near-term generic option for personal area networking (PAN)--it may wind up being important, but it's not right now--802.11 standards will likely morph into WLAN/PAN systems. Intel has been working on this for a while, disclosing its Cliffside project a year ago as part of a larger effort to rethink mobile device functions.
Bluetooth 3.0 will get its formal unveiling later this month along with information about which chipmakers have products ready to sample. Because the SIG is a practical group, standards aren't released until there are multiple vendors with interoperable prototype chips and hardware.
Qualcomm opens research labs in video tour to show next-generation distributed tech: Qualcomm engineers have determined an optimal way to use flocking behavior to have mobile aerial femtocells that can expand coverage. There are a few downsides to the technology, which the company is remarkably forthcoming about.
I'm sometimes critical of Qualcomm for its market behavior, but the company has certainly transformed itself lately into a new sort of creature, which this video helps demonstrate.
Alaska seems likely to put Wi-Fi on its planes if it gets a good response from passengers to the in-flight Internet service. Many of Alaska's routes pass over water, and a satellite-backed service is a good fit if passengers are willing to pay for the privilege. It's also a way for the no-extras airline to bring entertainment onboard without installing seatback systems.
Earlier stories reported that Alaska Airlines was also sponsoring free Wi-Fi at the far larger Seattle-Tacoma airport. An Alaska spokesperson just told me that information was in error. The free Wi-Fi underwriting is for Oakland's airport only.
"And it's fast, and I'm watching YouTube clips. It's amaz--I'm on an airplane! And then it breaks down. And they apologize, the Internet's not working. And the guy next to me goes, 'This is b___s___.' I mean, how quickly does the world owe him something that he knew existed only 10 seconds ago?"
Bit starts at 2 minutes in. [Thanks to John Moe]
Alaska seems likely to put Wi-Fi on its planes if it gets a good response from passengers to the in-flight Internet service. Many of Alaska's routes pass over water, and a satellite-backed service is a good fit if passengers are willing to pay for the privilege. It's also a way for the no-extras airline to bring entertainment onboard without installing seatback systems.
Earlier stories reported that Alaska Airlines was also sponsoring free Wi-Fi at the far larger Seattle-Tacoma airport. An Alaska spokesperson just told me that information was in error. The free Wi-Fi underwriting is for Oakland's airport only.
Verizon talks about expanding access to broadband in rural areas, wirelessly: Cnet's Marguerite Reardon interviews Verizon Wireless's CTO, who says that his company's plan for LTE will extend far beyond its current CDMA cellular footprint. The missing piece in this interview? The fact that Verizon is obligated to build out a significant footprint in the 700 MHz band about which the CTO is speaking; more on that in a moment.
The 700 MHz band has so much bang for the buck, perhaps offering four times the coverage area with a single base station than an 1700-2500 MHz base station (3G or U.S. WiMax). And that's in urban areas. In rural locations without obstructions and with less dense usage, I would imagine a single base station could cover an enormous area. Backhaul is still an issue, of course, but Verizon has a variety of frequencies it can use for long-distance point-to-point wireless feeds. And while LTE could deliver a pool of 50 Mbps in urban areas with 5 to 10 Mbps or more available per user, rural performance could be lower and still far exceed what's currently available.
Verizon Wireless's CTO speculates that Verizon could offer fixed wireless offerings to homes, much like Clearwire's WiMax. Clearwire can't provide such service across large areas outside of densely populated areas because its bandwidth portfolio is centered in the 2500 MHz (2.5 GHz) band, which is going to be unaffordable to deploy in less-populated areas. Clearwire could cover an entire town with one base station, but it wouldn't make sense for them to cover the area between small towns. In fact, Clearwire's pre-WiMax offerings were originally in lower-tier smaller-city markets that had poor DSL and cable broadband availability.
According to research last year from the Pew Internet & American Life Project, 38 percent of rural households in the U.S. have broadband access, and 12 percent of all American households use fixed wireless for access. This shows the great potential for selling service into the rural market in two ways: it's underserved, but those with service are likely paying too much for what they get.
I contacted that report's author a few days ago to ask about the wireless stat, as it seemed incredibly high to me. He explained that it included satellite and all forms of fixed wireless. I found some more recent confirmation of the number from a University of Vermont poll released just two days ago. Vermont has a rural population, but still sees most people in towns and cities. Internet access is Vermont, the poll said, is split out as: dial-up, 18 percent; cable, 24 percent; DSL, 42 percent; satellite, 7 percent; wireless Internet, 6 percent; fiber or other, 3 percent. That 13 percent combined wireless number neatly tracks the Pew's research.
Satellite Markets & Research estimates 731,000 satellite Internet subscribers as of 2008's second quarter. With a bit over 100 million households in the U.S., that's not even one percent of the market, but the Vermont numbers show how that skews in less-populated areas. Pew research puts just 55 percent of households online, with a relatively large number that want broadband. (Some significant number will never want it for reasons of costs or utility, of course.)
As we know, satellite Internet is a kind of marvelous, ugly, and expensive compromise to bring broadband to the hinterland. People who would otherwise be restricted to dial-up service, if they could even get a decent 56K signal, can have far higher rates. But the cost is high, upstream rates low, and satellite services weren't designed to offer pinpoint residential access.
Thus Verizon has a defined market, and it won a large number of licenses covering these rural markets in the 700 MHz sale a year ago; so did AT&T, which also bought up many previously auctioned 700 MHz licenses. Verizon captured the coveted national license, but both firms purchased a patchwork of regional licenses that let them build country-wide 700 MHz networks.
But what Cnet's Reardon doesn't mention, and Verizon's CTO deftly avoids, is that 700 MHz licenseholders are obligated to build out service across the licenses they won. The FCC, tired of awarding licenses that aren't used, attached some modest but significant installation requirements on Auction 73.
While there are several classes of licenses, each class has a 4-year check-in mark for signal coverage. In some classes, that's 35 percent of the geographic area regardless of population, ideal for rural areas; in others, it's 40 percent of the population. If that mark is met, then licenseholders have a full 10 years to build out to 70 percent of the geographic area or 75 percent of the population. Failure to hit a 4-year mark shortens the license term and remaining build out to 8 years. Failure to meet the final target at 8 or 10 years results in the likely loss of the license. Licenses were carved out so that even the cheapest have significant population centers, making it less than optimal for a licenseholder to abandon the coverage area.
Verizon's national licenses (the C Block) require population-based buildouts, which is fair for the scope of the licenses. But some significant spectrum in the A, B, and E blocks require geographic-based deployment. (The public/private D Block didn't have a winning bidder, and is now in limbo after the withdrawal of a significant partner in the public partnership.)
I don't believe Verizon is being disingenuous in pushing the rural message, but the company is also talking up how stimulus money could be used for rural buildouts after the company had, essentially, already agreed to cover 75 percent of the population of the U.S. and 75 percent of the population or area of licenses it purchased.
BelAir's new cable-mountable Wi-Fi/WiMax access point could be boon for WiMax deployment: BelAir has introduced the BelAir100SX Strand Mounted Dual Mode Wireless Node, a long way of saying that this device can be attached directly to existing cable wiring, powered by cable plant voltage, and drive two kinds of wireless: Wi-Fi and WiMax. (No one apparently ever told BelAir to not introduce a product with the initial SX--say it aloud--on April 1st. But it's real.)
This device is an extension of BelAir's earlier 100S, which feeds out Wi-Fi only, and which is the basis of Cablevision's $300m deployment of many many thousands of nodes across its New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut territory. Backhaul and power come from the cable plant; the device has a built-in DOCSIS 2.0 modem (U.S. and European standards), and can accept a variety of radios.
Comcast has already said it will resell the Clear-branded WiMax service in Portland, Ore., the only U.S. market deployed with that offering. Comcast needs Clearwire for the fourth element in a quadruple play of voice, video, data, and mobile communications (which can be voice, video, and data as well).
This all neatly dovetails.
Qualcomm opens research labs in video tour to show next-generation distributed tech: Qualcomm engineers have determined an optimal way to use flocking behavior to have mobile aerial femtocells that can expand coverage. There are a few downsides to the technology, which the company is remarkably forthcoming about.
I'm sometimes critical of Qualcomm for its market behavior, but the company has certainly transformed itself lately into a new sort of creature, which this video helps demonstrate.
Australian tech agency CSIRO settles with HP, continues case: CSIRO says that HP has settled on confidential terms over the agency's claims to have a patent that covers some of the fundamental parts of how 802.11a, g, and n Wi-Fi works. CSIRO continues to engage, as the article notes, "Microsoft, Dell, Toshiba, Intel, Nintendo, Netgear, Belkin, D-Link, Asus, Buffalo Technology, 3com, Accton and SMC." Cisco and its Linksys division aren't in the list because Cisco agreed to patent terms when it acquired an Australian network authentication firm a few years ago.
The patent may or may not be found valid. I have trouble with how it was revised to include frequencies not mentioned in the original filing that weren't in common use when the filing was first made. A patent review hasn't yet occurred. If upheld, CSIRO will collect what it has frequently described as a small royalty on all devices containing Wi-Fi.
The article misstates the current state of the Buffalo/CSIRO lawsuit by missing a fine detail. CSIRO claimed to have come out in top last September in an appeals court decision, but both parties got something out of it. In December, Buffalo was allowed to start selling gear again, even as the case was sent back to lower court to deal with a small issue. Now, it's still possible Buffalo will have to pay damages, back royalties, and future royalties, but it's actively selling gear at the moment. CSIRO says it won something in appeals because of this possibility.
Good news/bad news about 802.11b: According to this article, 802.11b expires today, 1-April-2009. That shouldn't be a surprise, but it sort of crept up on me. I suppose it's all for the best: 802.11b slows down networks, fools people into using a broken encryption standard, and keeps the economy from getting back up to speed. Forcing people to buy new adapters is probably a good way to jumpstart purchases.
CradlePoin updates its 3G gateways to handle WiMax, too: CradlePoint was revealed yesterday as the provider for Clearwire's new battery-powered WiMax-to-Wi-Fi gateway, the awkwardly named Clear Spot Personal Hotspot. The company will also offer WiMax support on its business-oriented gateways.
Devices sold starting today will support Clearwire's USB modem; a firmware update for existing router owners will be released 6 April.
Clearwire unveiled the Clear Spot Personal Hotspot: Yes, the firm needs help with naming, but it's a great idea to push early adoption outside the home. The CradlePoint-developed device is a WiMax-to-Wi-Fi gateway designed for nomadic use due to its built-in battery. Plug in a Clear USB modem, and you're good to go over 802.11b and 802.11g wherever. The device will retail for $139; the USB modem costs $49 and can be used on a pay-as-you-go basis ($10 per day) or with monthly mobile subscriptions. It will be available in Clear markets in mid-April.
The Clear Spot appears to be a rebranded version of CradlePoint's PHS300, which has a built-in lithium-ion battery and can be recharged via or used with an AC adapter. The PHS300 works with a variety of cell modems and lists for $179.99.
This is an extremely smart move on Clearwire's part because it signals two things: The company knows that it'll take a while to develop an ecosystem of WiMax-enabled devices; and it wants customers to use its network extensively instead of imposing lots of limits.
If Clearwire can deliver on its top download speeds (4 Mbps with mobile gear), that's a big bump up from the 600 Kbps to 1.7 Mbps downstream rate promised by various 3G carriers. Of course, AT&T is aiming to double its speed through what's described as a software upgrade (to 7.2 Mbps HSPA), and Clearwire suffers from 384 Kbps upload speeds which now compares unfavorably with even 3.6 Mbps HSPA and EVDO Rev. A.
Clearwire has an advantage on mobile data limits, however, because the company apparently believes it has such a big pool and such a large spectrum swath that it can offer an unlimited plan. Whenever I've asked Clearwire what unlimited means, the firm says, really, unlimited. It'll shut down abusers, but it will apparently look at patterns, not quantity.
The Clear service has an unlimited mobile offering for $50/month with no commitment; contracts and bundle discounts drop the price to $40/month and waive a $35 activation fee. A 200 MB per month plan is an appalling $30/month, but likely targeted as a bundle for home users where it's heavily discounted. A more moderate $40/month 2 GB usage plan can be bundled, too; each additional GB is $10 in a calendar month.
Businesses pay on a different scale that offers a better deal but more "risk" of overages, too. An account is priced with two devices (included) under a 2-year contract, with 15 GB/month for $100/month up to 30 GB/month for $150/month. Additional GB are $10 each.
Atom Feed (xml)