Some are refering to it as “Wi-Fi on steroids”, others are calling it a significant breakthrough in computer communications. The FCC this week announced that they have approved “white space” wireless, which uses the spaces between TV channels to provide wireless network. The advantages are all over, including that the frequencies have reasonably good building penetration potential (not as easily blocked by buildings) and the range is up to several miles, rather than hundreds of feet.
This is a signifcant development in many ways, including the potential that this sort of system could be much more easily used for Municipal Wi-Fi or other public access wireless systems. The transmission distances would shrink significantly the number of nodes required to provide service to an area, which has been a major drawback in other projects. It certainly would appear to be giving a better alternative between 3G / 4G wireless and wi-fi.
This approval also makes the cities that attempted Muni-wifi before look a little to eager to get going. They weren’t so much early adopters as much as over eager and wasteful.
Check out stories on PC world here, and a good business viewpoint from Businessweek.com here
Originally Syndicated via RSS from Broadband Wireless Access
