« May 2005 | Weblog | July 2005 »

June 2005 Archive

All the town's a stage?

All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely Players;
They have their Exits and their Entrances,
And one man in his time playes many parts.
-- Shakespeare, As You Like It

BBC NEWS | Technology | Bard's home town goes wireless Visitor's to Stratford-Upon-Avon can now lease PDAs to access information at Hot Spots throughout the town. While not a metropolitan network per se, this approach demonstrates a creative use of wireless technology to fill an unmet need in a town. I've seen this approach used at museums...if all the world's a stage, as Shakespeare once wrote, then it seems that now, all his hometown's a wireless museum.

The wireless hotspots, provided by BT, will be installed in hotels, shops and local tourist attractions, giving complete connectivity throughout the town.

"Now all the world's a wi-fi stage as far as this town is concerned. We are sure that the many tourists who like to visit Stratford from across the globe will appreciate how much easier it will be to hit the literary hotspots using the latest technology as your guide," said Chris Clark, chief executive of BT Wireless Broadband.

Posted on June 30, 2005 at 08:39 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

One Cleveland

OneCleveland This website is an example of a community effort to integrate its technologies and provide for a future connected city.

Posted on June 29, 2005 at 05:07 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Florida: Case Studies on Municipal Broadband

I was looking through my files and came across a couple of good white papers that were circulated in Florida during the legislative debate a few months ago. I like them because they are well written and have good background information on the issue of municipally owned networks, and in particular, data on the economic benefits of a wireless broadband network for a city.

The Case for Municipal Broadband succinctly states the argument for municipal broadband.

Broadband Economic Development: An Economic Case Study is a more academic look at the economic impact of a municipal broadband network. Highly recommended because of the quantitative approach.

Posted on June 29, 2005 at 09:54 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Vo Wi Fi for business (and your city too?)

Does it make sense to go fully mobile? - vnunet.com While this article talks about dual use handsets for using cellular phones and voice over Wi Fi in the enterprise, this possibility extends to using a dual use phone in your unwired city.

Imagine a cell phone that works with a cellular plan, but when in your unwired city, it transitions to make calls over the Internet, over your wireless network. This is fast moving from a possibility to a probability. One more use of a municipal wireless network.

Posted on June 29, 2005 at 09:37 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Best Practices RFP Tool

Greg Richardson at Civitium has seen one or two RFPs over the past year. No, we better move that number up. I'm guessing he's seen more than you can count on your fingers and toes, and to hear Greg tell it, the quality of the RFPs can range more widely than it should. While such is to be expected at this early stage of the budding municipal wireless industry, Greg and I talked about what we could do to improve the procurement process, and we came up with this paper on RFP best practices to help cities communicate better with the vendor community. Civitium put this tool together for exclusive distribution to UnwireMyCity readers. I recommend you download it today and use it as a guideline for your RFP. There are some great templates of other RFPs referenced at the end of the document.

Fact is, an RFP should not be the beginning of the purchasing process. Rather, it should reflect the many long weeks of planning and thorough, deliberate process your community has undergone to get ready for this important stage in the procurement process.

In short, an RFP is not the place for originality, nor is it the place for long-winded but vague vision statements. It is a communication document to the vendor community and if well done, it should minimize the need for questions afterwards. If it's well-written, you will get good results (and if it's not, get ready for a lengthy Q&A!) By building on the wisdom and experience of those towns and cities that have gone before you, you're increasing the odds that you'll have a satisfactory outcome in your procurement. Work smart, not hard. Learn from those who have gone before and start your RFP with this document.

Best of luck! Please let me know how it goes!

Posted on June 26, 2005 at 08:43 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

West Hollywood Unwires

Wireless Internet Pilot Project Gets Green Light West Hollywood announced that it will build a wireless network to make public high speed internet access available by the fall of 2005. The network, which will be designed and deployed by PCC Networks, will use metropolitan mesh gear from Tropos Networks mounted on traffic signals.

Posted on June 26, 2005 at 09:18 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Minnesota: Go Moorhead Broadband

Go Moorhead is the brainchild of Moorhead Public Service, which services Moorhead, Minnesota, just across the river from Fargo, North Dakota. This small municipally-owned utility provides us all with an example of the possibilities when a community works together to meet its own needs.

Communications Director Jennifer Walz presented the details of their project at the American Public Power Association Annual Meeting in Anaheim last week (6/19-22). Jennifer, who also does improv comedy on the side, held the crowd's attention as she walked through the details of how affordable and manageable a community network can be.

Jennifer described a series of events that must be all too familiar to small communities around the US. Faced with the inability to get traditional providers to provide Moorhead with high speed internet access, the town leaders investigated installing a fiber system in Moorhead, but could not make the business case provide a reasonable rate of return, so they abandoned their plans.

But taking yet another look at the issue in the past year, they discovered that wireless broadband now provided the speed and coverage they needed at an affordable cost.

How did they make the business case work? On the revenue side, they worked with city government and the Univ of Minnesota at Moorhead, establishing two anchor tenants who would cover enough of their costs to make a solid business case to bring broadband access to their citizens.

On the expense side, they not only used affordable wireless technology by Tropos Networks, but also worked the project through their locally-owned electric utility, where they could take advantage of the utility's fiber optic ring that circles the city for connecting to the Internet (also known as backhaul), and its poles and street lights for mounting the network's wireless equipment.

Jennifer spent considerable time discussing the interaction with the community that they feel is essential to the long-term success of their project, because they need the community's citizens to embrace this new service and subscribe in order to meet their conservative financial projections. I wrote about this in the recent article about setting up a community blog.

If you need broadband for your town and already have your own municipal electric utility, you would be well advised to look further into this case study as an example of how to proceed. And, Jennifer will probably provide you with a few good laughs while you're at it!

Posted on June 25, 2005 at 04:52 AM | TrackBack

California: Broadband Broadcasting, Podcasting in Newport, CA

I was fortunate to accompany a group on a boat tour of Newport Harbor last Tuesday night (6/21), as a guest of the folks at Laguna Broadcasting Network, a new kind of community network that is springing up around the US to take advantage of metropolitan mesh network infrastructure.

It was a delightful evening. The natural beauty of the sunset harbor cruise was accompanied by interesting demonstrations of Wi Fi Mesh technology by Tropos Networks, with a mesh node mounted to the mast of the yacht, enabling Voice over Wi Fi telephony and video transmission on large screens on the lower deck. We enjoyed unique video presentations by local artists: in cooperation with the local community college, LBN is producing orignal local content for broadcast to the local community.

Wireless computer networks that serve and support the particular needs and concerns of local citizens and businesses are popping up as a new kind of broadcasting, unlike what we grew up with watching TV in the 60s, or even cable in the 70s, 80s, and 90s. Whereas ABC, CBS, and NBC worked with local affiliates to present a mix of content (national network, syndicated, and local news, weather, and sports), these new networks showcase local talent and events, and offer such interactive features as podcasting (content for download) and live coverage of events that would only interest the local community.

Subscriptions to LB Net go beyond the standard High Speed Internet Access (which they make available with prepaid cards at four cents/minute). Besides live webcasts of community events and scheduled programs of community interest, there are news headlines and reporting, on-demand audio and video archives, community personalities, political coverage, and local business advertising on an interactive downtown map.

In Laguna Beach, small is beautiful.

Posted on June 25, 2005 at 04:14 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Senators McCain and Lautenberg Introduce Muni Broadband Bill in Congress

Sens. McCain & Lautenberg Introduce Community Broadband Bill Two prominent US Senators have joined the battle with the Community Broadband Act of 2005 (see also S-1294 Introduced). This is a good report on the issue, so I'll go no further, but suggest you click over to the report. For those who like to dig down a little deeper, I also included Senator McCain's floor statement, below.

STATEMENT OF SENATOR JOHN MCCAIN ON THE INTRODUCTION OF
THE COMMUNITY BROADBAND ACT OF 2005

JUNE 23, 2005
MR. McCAIN. Mr. President, I am pleased to join in sponsoring the Community Broadband Act of 2005. In the simplest of terms, this bill would ensure that any town, city, or county that wishes to offer high speed Internet services to its citizens can do so. The bill also would ensure fairness by requiring municipalities that offer high speed Internet services do so in compliance with all federal and state telecommunications laws and in a non-discriminatory manner.
This bill is needed if we are to meet President Bush's call for "universal, affordable access for broadband technology by the year 2007." When President Bush announced this nationwide goal in 2004, the country was ranked 10th in the world for high speed Internet penetration. Today, the country is ranked 16th. This is unacceptable for a country that should lead the world in technical innovation, economic development, and international competitiveness.
Many of the countries outpacing the United States in the deployment of high speed Internet services, including Canada, Japan, and South Korea, have successfully combined municipal systems with privately deployed networks to wire their countries. As a country, we cannot afford to cut off any successful strategy if we want to remain internationally competitive.

I recognize that our nation has a long and successful history of private investment in critical communications infrastructure. That history must be respected, protected, and continued. However, when private industry does not answer the call because of market failures or other obstacles, it is appropriate and even commendable, for the people acting through their local governments to improve their lives by investing in their own future. In many rural towns, the local government's high speed Internet offering may be its citizens only option to access the World Wide Web.

Despite this situation, a few incumbent providers of traditional telecommunications services have attempted to stop local government deployment of community high speed Internet services. The bill would do nothing to limit their ability to compete. In fact, the bill would provide them an incentive to enter more rural areas and deploy services in partnership with local governments. This partnership will not only reduce the costs to private firms, but also ensure wider deployment of rural services. Additionally, the bill would aid private providers by prohibiting a municipality when acting as both "regulator" and "competitor" from discriminating against competitors in favor of itself.

Several newspapers have endorsed the concept of allowing municipalities to choose whether to offer high speed Internet services. USA Today rightfully questioned in an editorial, "Why shouldn't citizens be able to use their own resources to help themselves?" The Washington Post editorialized that the offering of high speed Internet services by localities is, "... the sort of municipal experiment we hope will spread." The San Jose Mercury News stated that a ban on localities ability to offer such services is "bad for consumers, bad for technology and bad for America's hopes of catching up to other countries in broadband deployment." Finally, the Tampa Tribune lectured Federal and State legislators, "don't prohibit local elected officials from providing a service their communities need."

My home state of Arizona boasts the largest approved municipal broadband system in the United States, for example. The City of Tempe's wireless system will serve all of the city's forty square miles and a population of 159,000, including the campus of Arizona State University. Citizens will have Internet access from anywhere at any time, and police, fire, water and traffic services personnel will use the system to enhance their efficiency.

In addition to Tempe, several Native American tribal governments offer high speed Internet access services to their citizens. This bill would ensure that such offerings could continue to assist Indian country and their ability to connect to the Internet.

Mr. President, our country faces some real challenges. We need to find ways to use technology to help our citizens better compete. We need to help our businesses capitalize on their ingenuity so that they can become more internationally competitive. That is why we need to do all we can to eliminate barriers to competition and create incentives for the delivery of high speed Internet services for public suppliers of broadband services, private suppliers of broadband services, and public-private partnerships as well.

Mr. President, I hope my colleagues will join us in sponsoring the Community Broadband Act of 2005.

Posted on June 23, 2005 at 03:54 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Independent ISP conference

Wireless Internet Service Providers Network Operators Group

I bet Park City, UT in August is nice. You now have an opportunity to visit on official business. The Wireless ISP Network Operators Group (I hope I got that acronym right) is hosting a Forum from August 15-17 in Park City, and Public Private Partnerships are the key focus of the forum. I just got off the phone with Charles Wu, whose job it is to promote the conference and he asked for help in getting the invitation out to muncipal government network specialists and policy planner types.

From their website: As the Public vs. Private Sector Broadband Network Debate gets more and more tied up in the legal system, what is clear is that, like in all lawsuits, "ultimately, no one ends up winning." So, what are the options? Rather than wasting resources "fighting amongst one another" - let's meet, talk, work together and coordinate an action plan that both public and private sector can jointly leverage.

In continuing the WiNOG EXCHANGE tradition, this August we will establish a forum to bring together both sides of the table, public and private, to stop the fighting and to discuss methods of working together to accomplish the task of "Bridging the Digital Divide."

I encourage you to take a look and attend if you can. There is tremendous potential in getting the public and private sectors to act more cooperatively to deploy wireless broadband, and this could be a good start for your town or city.

Posted on June 23, 2005 at 11:29 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Great Overview by Wall Street Journal

Hostile Reception: Phone Giants Are Lobbying Hard To Block Towns' Wireless Plans
 As Cities Try to Build Networks, SBC and Other Companies Say It's Unfair Competition Going Online in Police Cars

This article clearly spells out the current debate, including the introduction today of a bill by Sens. McCain and Lautenberg. If you had not followed this debate before today, this article would be all you needed to catch up.

Posted on June 23, 2005 at 07:44 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Using Wi Fi for Location-Based Services

Software company Skyhook Wireless announced the commercial launch yesterday (June 20) of their location-based software product. Through triangulation, its software can pinpoint the location of a WiFi-enabled device by its proximity to different WiFi access points that the device picks up through its WiFi radio chip. Skyhook says it is accurate within 20-40 metres. See the press release for the official word. Another good site to check out (as usual) is Daily Wireless, which has a good write-up with comparison topical references.

Posted on June 21, 2005 at 10:42 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Broadband Across the Nation

Business 2.0 :: Magazine Article :: Features :: The Road Map to a Broadband Nation This feature article by Om Malik provides a great overview of municipal broadband projects, broken out by region and describing in short paragraphs what makes each network unique. I recommend you browse this.

Posted on June 18, 2005 at 10:41 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Opinions on Muni Broadband

Readers Sound Off on Municipal Wireless This is a good article with a variety of opinions on the municipal broadband policy issue, from readers.

Posted on June 18, 2005 at 10:16 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Minnesota: Review of Municipal RFPs

Minneapolis Plans to Go Wireless Philadelphia and Minneapolis RFPs are prgressing - this article dates back to before they were issued, opines on how things will go. Both cities' plans reflect a trend in turning to outside sources to fund, deploy and manage the network. By not relying on taxpayer money, the cities avoid direct conflict with telecoms and cable companies that have fought such plans with well-financed ad and public relations campaigns claiming they waste taxpayer dollars.

Posted on June 18, 2005 at 10:08 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Introductory Interview with New Belair Board Member

BelAir's Fox: Backhaul Key Issue in Metro Networks eWeek interviews Scott Fox, newly appointed to Belair Networks' board of directors.

Posted on June 18, 2005 at 09:54 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

VO Wi Fi calling

Rio Rancho Boasts First Metro 'VOWi-Fi' Service A good description of the the innovative uses of the new network in Rio Rancho. If you connect the dots, you can start to see the next cellular network.

Posted on June 18, 2005 at 09:31 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Motorola and Mesh Networks

Radio-Hopping Leaps Ahead Interview with Motorola executive describes routing protocol and innovative uses for a mesh network, such as this: Portsmouth, England, deployed the technology across its public transportation system, wirelessly connecting its 308 buses to 35 intelligent bus stops, where passengers can see where buses are on the router, whether they're running on time, receive service messages and pay fares electronically in advance of the bus's arrival.

Posted on June 18, 2005 at 09:19 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Report processing goes from 10 days down to 2

Cleveland to Unwire Building Inspectors Whoa. Listen to this..."By minimizing their time returning to the office to perform these functions," said Blackman, "they shrink the processing time involved in issuing permits from 10 days to approximately two days. That's a demonstrable ROI. The ramifications of basically moving all the processes out in the field and giving them all the information they request at their fingertips is an enormous value-add." And, what's more, Cleveland is looking at these kind of results by using Hot Spots - they don't have a digital cities project yet....you go, Cleveland!

Posted on June 18, 2005 at 09:00 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

eWeek Motherlode of Municipal Wireless Articles

eWEEK.com Special Report: Municipal Wi-Fi This is a good grouping of articles on municipal wireless, but unfortunately, some of the articles are a little dated. 23 - count 'em, 23 articles on municipal wireless at this site. Worth a look!

Posted on June 18, 2005 at 08:48 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Mesh Neworks Explained

Mesh's Second Act This article from the January 2005 edition of Broadband Wireless Business provides a good overview of mesh technology, the providers, its capabilities and issues. Helpful.

Posted on June 18, 2005 at 07:07 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Municipal Wireless Webinar Review

Broadband Wireless Business Magazine A good write-up of a webinar I was going to attend and missed. Muniwireless.com and Airpath co-hosted this look at municipal networks and the progress in this exciting industry. Muniwireless founder Esme Vos highlighted 51 current or planned municipal network projects in US, with about 41 outside the US, with 13 RFPs out on the street currently.

Posted on June 18, 2005 at 06:55 AM

First Ever Muniwireless Conference

Muniwireless 2005 in San Francisco, Sept 26-27 After two years in the trenches, wireless pioneer Esme Vos is going to host her first conference. And it looks great! Here's a short list of topics:

Successfully deploying a wireless network
Calculating ROI
Writing a Great RFP
How to Get Political and Public Support for your Wireless Network
Applications and Muni Wireless
How to Fund your Network
Battling Anti-Municipal Broadband Bills

Check out Muniwireless today and make plans - San Francisco is nice in September.

Posted on June 17, 2005 at 07:10 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Fingerprints over the air

BIO-key Announces IdentityMatch(TM) - The Industry's First Patented Wireless, Web-Based Fingerprint ID System High Tech crime fighting takes another big leap forward with this anouncement. Fingerprint identification can be performed in the field using BIO-key's PocketPC with a wireless connection, from a police cruiser using a laptop or from a stationary office location using a desktop PC. The real power of IdentityMatch is it enables almost immediate suspect identification directly from the scene of a crime.

Posted on June 17, 2005 at 06:49 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

From Telegraph Lines to Wireless in a Single Bound: Super!

TownOnline.com - Beverly Citizen - Local News Sensor applications like the one discussed in this article are the wave of the future. This town was faced with an upgrade to an old (very old) wireline system, which supported their fire alarm system, at a cost of $750,000. By working with a generous private sector partner, the town was able to install a wireless system at a cost of $100,000. I like this story for several reasons (public private partnership, great cost savings of wireless solution over a wireline solution, and focus on future-looking technology to replace older, backward looking technology).

Posted on June 17, 2005 at 06:15 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Keeping Up with the Joneses or Losing Ground - Either way, it's gonna cost ya

U.S. broadband lag behind Asia, Europe could hurt economy - Jun. 17, 2005 This article reminds me of that old auto repair commercial on TV - where the guy says "you can pay me now, or pay me later..." In the world economy, infrastructure makes a difference for a country's competitiveness. Some say that broadband is today's equivalent of interstate highways 50 years ago, and the railroads a century ago. Neglecting to build infrastructure may cost the nation in competitiveness, in real dollars, argues this article. While these statistics tend to be cited in many articles that you will read about the municipal broadband policy debate, this article has a link at the bottom so you can examine the actual OECD statistics themselves. Check it out.

Posted on June 17, 2005 at 06:06 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Lousiana: Baby Steps

Local News - The Lafayette Daily Advertiser - www.theadvertiser.com Bell South and broadband proponents have a long history of disagreement in this neck of the woods, but there are signs of progress on the horizon. This article describes the talks regarding bringing Fiber to the Home (FTTH) for residents - as with most of these projects, which can be very expensive, risk is a prime topic of discussion, as planners ponder how the bond holders will be repaid.

Posted on June 16, 2005 at 09:41 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Earthlink trying on a new suit of clothes

Muniwireless: Earthlink sets its eyes on municipal Wi-Fi Hop over to Muniwireless and check out the latest on Earthlink, one of the competitors in the Philadelphia RFP and a very motivated company when it comes to municipal broadband, according to the Wall Street Journal. You go, Earthlink!

Posted on June 16, 2005 at 09:30 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Virginia: Small is Beautiful - How to Stretch $20K

Alexandria Goes Wireless On the Washington Post editorial page, an experiment in local government is detailed. City leaders in Alexandria, VA, just down the road from the US capital, have installed a test metropolitan mesh network using Tropos gear to experiment with city services, and opened it to the public for free broadband Internet service for part of Old Town, the downtown entertainment district. According to the editorial: The network, covering eight blocks of King Street, will serve as a laboratory for new technologies that could reduce costs and increase efficiency in years to come. Among the wireless innovations the city is exploring are sensors that can tell if a traffic light has stopped functioning and report instantaneously to traffic monitors. Advances in parking meter enforcement, fire truck and ambulance dispatching, and even trash collection could arise out of a citywide wireless network, but first Alexandria officials want to try out the new devices in a small area to see if they would be worthwhile investments. Could this be a model for cities to dip their toe in the water and let their citizens experiment as well? You bet it could! This kind of experiment is in any town's budget. Let's go, America!

Posted on June 16, 2005 at 09:12 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Financial Times on Wireless Security

The Wednesday IT special section of the Financial Times had a good feature on wireless security, Ways to Keep Hackers at Bay. The article gives a thorough review of wireless security issues, concluding that both wireless and wireline security are a necessity for network managers, but ironically, because wireless security gets more attention, it ends up being more secure. Go figure.

Posted on June 15, 2005 at 09:25 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Wireless Planning Explained

The Wednesday IT special section of the Financial Times had a very readable article on wireless planning,
Integrated Plan Keeps Costs Down. The article gives a great overview of planning issues for the enterprise, including the city government planner. As the author states, mobility strategies require specific management software and IT skills. This is a helpful planning document.

Posted on June 15, 2005 at 09:17 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Municipal Networks Get Thorough Coverage from Financial Times

FT.com / FT-IT review In this series of articles on municipal wireless, the Financial Times Wednesday IT section covers metropolitan wireless from mesh to Wi Max. This series of articles provides a great overview for the novice reader with the very high quality, concise writing expected of the Financial Times.

In Cities Look to the Sky for Broadband Revolution, the first article, the author details the progress of vendors in the US and the political situation, then describes a recent IDC report on municipal networks in Europe, concluding with a vision of integrated networks in the future that use each different technology where appropriate for the most economic and efficient network, a refreshingly different approach from the somewhat tiring war of my technology can beat up your technology that is all too common these days.

Freedom to Roam Makes New Pioneers provides a detailed account of the Chaska, Minnesota wireless mesh deployment, one of the most bally-hooed wireless mesh deployments in the US to date. They did it on their own, they brought $16.95/month broadband to their residents, and by gum, it works.

The Complete Wireless Alphabet provides a concise explanation of the 57 confusing varieties of the alphabet soup that represents wireless standards in the narrow spectrum of Wi Fi and WLAN alone.

Ways to Keep Hackers at Bay gives a thorough review of wireless security issues, concluding that wireless and wireline security is a necessity, but ironically, wireless security gets more attention, so it ends up being more secure.


Integrated Plan Keeps Costs Down gives a great overview of planning issues for the enterprise, including the city government planner. As the author states, mobility strategies require specific management software and IT skills. This is a helpful planning document.

Posted on June 15, 2005 at 08:39 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Electric Utilities Warming to Wireless Applications

Techworld.com - Industry Focus: Wireless in utilities

This article highlights a growing awareness of wireless applications among electric utilties, provides several examples, and cites an October 2004 IDC study: Power companies are not usually seen as being on the leading edge of technology adoption. But utilities are at the forefront of using wireless systems for a wide range of activities, from managing mobile workforces to reading meters and monitoring plant control systems.

An October 2004 IDC study of wireless adoption in various vertical industries revealed that 33 percent of utility companies had only recently begun implementing mobile or wireless technologies. But the report also noted that the percentage of companies in the utilities sector reporting plans to implement wireless in the next 12 months was greater than the percentages of companies in other industries with similar plans.

The IDC study also reported that the most popular wireless applications for the utilities industry are personal information management applications, remote field-service applications, and inventory and distribution management systems.

"If you did an inventory of all the wireless applications that a typical utility is using, there could be a list of 20 or 30 technologies," including wireless spread spectrum and wireless radios, says Rick Nicholson, vice president of Energy Insights, a market research division of IDC.

Posted on June 15, 2005 at 04:57 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Leverage - Getting More for Less

leverage image.bmp

Getting more value for less input - isn't that what we all want? I'm not necessarily talking free lunch here, but why work harder than you have to? While I'm not against hard work, I do object to doing work twice - why reinvent the wheel, as they say? Leverage in my mind has to do with the concept of Synergy, where one plus one can equal three, four, even five. By working smarter, by working togeher, we can avoid working harder.

In this section, I plan to bring you all together, to bring our most brilliant minds together. This is the section where we get to look over our neighbor's shoulders, peek over the fence, and see how its done. I would ask those of you who have taken the leap and put in a network to get together here and compare notes. What worked? What would you do differently next time?

And most importantly, what are you doing now to take advantage of your investment? Have you discovered new uses for your network? This is the point where we can start to leverage the original investment in our towns and turn our new networks into something much more productive than we even imagined.

Look at this section in the coming weeks for more on how to leverage your wireless network into a tool to transform your city or town.

Or, if you don't want to wait, start sending me stories and suggestions, and let's get the conversation started now!

Posted on June 15, 2005 at 07:26 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Action - Off to the Races, Let's Go Shopping

100 yard dash images.jpg

AND THEY'RE OFF! You've gone to school on this subject, organized your team, researched the vendors, put together a plan. Now, it's time to do something. Now, it's time to shop!

There are different ways to get started with a metropolitan wireless broadband network. The traditional route is to file an RFP and evaluate the responses. Another way is to work with a vendor to start a pilot and learn more before deciding what to do. Yet another way is to find a vehicle like a state contract that allows the buyer to comply with procurement restrictions and avoid an individual RFP.

The first project at hand for UnwireMyCity will be to dissect the Request for Proposals, the RFP. Be you buyer or be you seller, an RFP can be a majorly painful process, but often in the public sector, it is a necessary evil. Generally, a public sector buyer finds their hands tied with procurement restrictions and laws that govern what they can and can't do, down to the nitty gritty.

In this section, we will examine the buying process and make recommendations, with a goal of assembling a best-in-class, modular RFP. Let's imagine for a moment that the RFP is that frog you got to dissect in 10th Grade Biology class. Let's look at it piece by piece, take it apart and understand it. I'd like for you to be able to download sections that fit your needs and assemble a customized RFP that meets all the criteria for your town, and ensures a quality outcome for you. In the end, the RFP is about getting the solution you are looking for, which relieves your pain. You definitely do not want to replace one pain with a new pain, and pay for the privilege.

RFPs vary in quality, and generally, one can spot a home-made RFP, or one where the process was rushed and/or haphazard. Good RFPs are distinct and direct, sending a clear signal of the buyer intent and requirements of the vendor. Bad RFPs are vague and unclear, resulting in a wide degree of variance in responses, which can make selecting a vendor extremely difficult, as you compare apples and oranges in bid responses, and can lead to poor vendor selections that cost money and add extra risk. If you're going to go to the trouble of conducting an RFP process, please work with us in this section to develop a best-of-breed RFP for cities and towns - I would like to make this section a community forum on what works and what doesn't work in the buying process, and together, we can fix it, borrowing from the best of what the market has to offer.

Please send me examples, comments, suggestions, and let's get going!

Posted on June 15, 2005 at 06:52 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

ROI for Muni Networks

Muniwireless: Jonathan Baltuch on ROI from municipal wireless networks

MRI president Jonathan Baltuch does a good job of describing the many purposes to which a municipal network can be put, and actually does some ROI analysis. Note the rebuttal comment at the end of the article by Frank Coluccio of DTI Consulting. Frank takes Jonathon to task (gently) for not including capital costs, etc. in his ROI calculation. This will be a topic that will get a lot more coverage over time in this section.

Posted on June 14, 2005 at 12:00 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

eNewsletters

Fierce Wireless Perhaps my favorite eNewsletter, provides a quick update on events and always seems to have the best content. I subscribe to all three of the Fierce Family: FierceWireless, FierceWiFi, and FierceVOIP.

Wireless Review This site is pretty techy, but has good info. I recommend three good email newsletters in the Primedia Business Magazine family: Wireless Review's On the Air, Telephony Wireless and Wi-Fi Weekly, and Telephony's Broadband Reality

Unstrung "the world wide source for analysis of the wireless economy," by Light Reading, has good daily and weekly newsletters - they tend to be very industry-oriented though.

Wireless Week This newsletter is a good industry weekly, with primary focus on the cellular wireless industry.

Posted on June 14, 2005 at 11:07 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Global WISP Directory

Global Listing of Wireless ISPs & Related Organizations - WISP Directory provides browsers with a valuable tool to identify a local Wireless ISP company. This directory tracks WISPs who register themselves on the site in what amounts to a Yellow Pages directory of WISPs. There is no indication on this Web site on whether the local WISP has experience with metropolitan mesh networking, but this is clearly a place to start in evaluation and local planning.

Posted on June 13, 2005 at 04:33 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Municipal Debate Issues

Municipal Networks Take Broadband to the People June 2004. If a little dated, this article is fairly balanced and comprehensive in its look at municipal broadband networks, highlighting two business models: municipally-owned networks and networks created through a utility owned by the municipality.

Intel's Paul Butcher's Address to NYC Commission Paul Butcher, Marketing Manager for State and Local Government for Intel, has been a fixture at municipal wireless events almost as long as I can remember. Intel's support for this budding industry has been significant. This statement has great perspective on the potential of municipal networks to help cities operate better. Paul's comments are poignant and worth the read.

Posted on June 12, 2005 at 09:12 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Municipal Services: What can a city do?

Cities have a big job. From the small town to the large metropolis, cities are an example of how organized humans can be. But in some cases, we may think that the city is an example of how unorganized humans can be. This website Internet and Intranet Services | communityinternet.us begins to explore some of the different ways we can look at how a city interacts with its citizens, once it has the tool of a wireless broadband network.

Posted on June 12, 2005 at 05:57 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Map of Municipal Wireless Projects in the US

Municipal broadband and wireless projects map | CNET News.com Check out your state and see how you compare!

Posted on June 12, 2005 at 05:49 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack

Mobile Voice Trumps Mobile Data