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Big News Week!

We can go on for months and, seemingly, years, with relative balance in the environment, then along comes a week with some major disruptions.

First, on Wednesday May 7, there was Clearwire's deal with Sprint, which brings renewed promise to WiMAX, no doubt just in time to help the shareholders at Clearwire and Sprint to sleep a little better at night, at least for the short-term. The details of that deal remain to develop, but nobody can discount the disruptive effect. See Forbes and WiMAX.com coverage.

Second, on Thursday May 8, we saw another development. It looks like some movement among incumbent cables and telcos regarding the usefulness of unlicensed wireless broadband - see the coverage of Cablevision's decision in Long Island at Daily Wireless, Muniwireless, and Wi Fi Networking News (May 8).

Third, the continued bad news on the municipal wireless front, as early business plans unravel. See the Earthlink / Philadelphia squabble here, and for broader coverage on Earthlink's withdrawals, see Dailywireless coverage.

These trends all come together when we look at the environment as a whole. Mobility is accepted as a necessary element of broadband communication, and we are seeing the worlds of mobility (wireless) and capacity (wireline) starting to come together. A lot of the argument about what is "right" and what "should" happen often boils down to competing perspectives on the world and the natural world order coming into conflict as this convergence happens. Check out the debate thread over on MuniWireless about a retrenchment in Sydney, Australia from one week ago, which I was clued into (Thanks Jason at Strix Systems!) and couldn't help but join after reading (see my comments reprinted below).

This is a fascinating thread, so against my better judgment, I'm jumping in (moth to the flame).

First, just because city-wide Wi Fi Mesh hasn't worked yet doesn't mean it won't ever, or that it shouldn't. We're still early in the game, so failures of experiments to date may just be learning moments leading to ultimate success (think Edison and the light bulb and Marconi and wireless - lots of widely criticized failures before ultimate game-changing success).

Second, just because Earthlink led a marching band down a dead-end alley doesn't mean that all parades are bad, just that particular one. We should all be more discerning in the future.

Third, just because incumbents have been against this trend because it threatened their comfortable status quo doesn't mean they're evil or corrupt (though some certainly are) - it may also be that they've been insufficiently motivated. Things change: witness the news this week that cables are starting to drop wireless zones into their territory, and the jury's still way out on the stimulus effect of the Clearwire/Sprint WiMAX announcement.

Fourth, free was never "free," rather it was "subsidized." The right subsidy model may well still be waiting out there to be discovered, and we may well still find a home for free access in the right markets. As long as wireless access provides value, it will find a market, and free will be less and less relevant.

There's a lot of confusion in this argument, but there are rational positions still to be taken on all sides. What we need to be mindful of is throwing out the baby with the bathwater...unlicensed wireless technology has a future, we're just trying to figure out what exactly it is. There are more mistakes yet to be made, but they too will bring lessons and we'll all get smarter (let's hope!).

Posted on May 09, 2008 at 02:49 PM

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