Websites & eNewsletters

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Check out these websites, and where possible, sign up for e-newsletters - there's lots going on out there, and these sites are doing the hard work, covering the market for you and me.

Broadband Properties Magazine Seeing this site made me marvel at the content that is out there on the Internet. According to the Mission Statement: BROADBAND PROPERTIES is the leading source of information on digital and broadband technologies for buildings and communities. Our editorial aims to accelerate the deployment of Fiber-To-The-Home and Fiber-To-The-Premises while keeping readers up to date on the available solutions capable of serving their practical needs. I'm curious to hear what you readers think of this site.

Broadband Reports This trade journal covers a wide swath of issues on broadband, from product and service reviews to news items, etc. I would visit this site AFTER you have developed a little bit of knowledge of broadband issues, because while it offers a tremendous amount of information, to the uninitiated it will be like drinking from a firehose.

Broadband Wireless Business Magazine On your digital magazine rack, this website magazine features news items and in-depth articles that examine wireless technologies offering alternative solutions for backhaul and last-mile access - from wireless LANs to wireless MANs, millimeter wave fixed wireless and free-space optics. A good glossary, events calendar, and other features make this site very useful. For the technologically sophisticated reader, this site is well organized and has a great amount of information.

Corante is a premier blog site that covers technology and business issues, so often it has an article of interest in re wireless broadband. As it describes itself: "The world's first blog media company, Corante is a trusted, unbiased source on technology, science and business that's authored by highly respected thinkers, commentators and journalists; read by many of the sector's top entrepreneurs, executives, funders and followers; and is helping to lead the emergence of blogging as an influential and important form of reportage, analysis and commentary."

DailyWireless.org At first glance, the sheer amount of data on this website may appear intimidating. However, I've found it to be a rich, if quirky, source of interesting applications and developments in the world of wireless. I've set my browser to launch with this website, because it is kept up to date with the latest news, and has a tremendous set of links to other sites on the web. This is the Swiss Army Knife of wireless websites. Not to be confused with DailyWireless.com, which offers coverage of wireless industry news from more of an industry point of view.

eWeek.com this eMagazine has a section entitled Mobile and Wireless.

Google This site is the beginning and end of web searches. Search engines grew in popularity as the Internet grew by leaps and bounds - the founders of Google put together the most elegant and robust of search engines, and now, on the heels of their blockbuster IPO last year, Google is the acknowledged "King of Search." Often by typing a few key words, Google will list the website you are looking for. Websites that are the product of Google searches are listed in order of links to other sites and the presence of key words inside the sites that match your search terms, with the logic that good alignment on these parameters gives you a high probability of finding what you are looking for. And it works, 9 times out of 10! Make this a part of your web browser and get used to using it, and your effectiveness in using the Internet, and your level of enjoyment, will rise considerably.

Government Technology sponsored by Intel, is a content-rich, professional website that should be bookmarked by those interested in metropolitan broadband. This site also features a section and newsletter titled Digital Communities that will keep you informed via your email of the latest in digital communities that have MetroNets. Lots of good content - for example, I found this document through the Wireless Mesh link. The One Hundred Year Storm: Wireless Disruption in Telecommuncations, is a Deloitte & Touche whitepaper that gives good theoretical backing for why we pay attention to metropolitan broadband - because it disrupts the traditional approach to telecommunciations.

Howstuffworks.com This site is great to get started on figuring out the insides of things. Type relevant search terms and browse the results to get expert, detailed descriptions of how things work. Depending on your search, it may be hit or miss, but it is a great learning tool to get an understanding of technology terms.

Jiwire is devoted to providing info on Wi Fi Hot Spots, primarily as a resource for business travelers, with its now industry-standard Hot Spot Guide. JiWire was founded by Kevin McKenzie as a hotspot directory with an editorial component, focused on product reviews and how-tos, with contributions from Glenn Fleishman. The site has changed only slightly over its two and one-half years of existence, bringing more focus to product than it originally did.

Motorola Connections is an e-zine produced by Motorola's Canopy division. It has very relevant content for cities looking at wireless broadband as an option.

National Journal's Insider Update: The Telecom Act This website is true to its title, offering good quality, timely scoop on the goings on in Washington, DC, concerning the rewriting of the Telecom Act of 1996. Bookmark this one and follow their posts!

Search Mobile Computing's 802.11 Learning Guide Published over two years ago, this compendium of information on Wi Fi is a must read for a beginner - learn the terms here first and you will not find your time spent in vain. See the Search Mobile Computing website as well - "the Web's Best Mobile Computing Information Resource for Enterprise IT Professionals" - very tech oriented, but a good source of information.

TCS: Tech Central Station - Where Free Markets Meet Technology provides a comprehensive window of analysis and commentary from a free-market, corporate perspective on the changing face of technology and how it is reshaping the world to bring greater benefits and increase the size of the economic pie. This site is global in perspective and provides tremendous reach, in both depth and breadth. This site is sponsored by DCI Group, a conservative public affairs firm with reach around the globe.

TECHtionary: World's First and Largest Animated Magazine on TECHnology The first time I went to this site, I got lost about 30 minutes of consciousness as I clicked through it, searching for different terms and watching the animated slide shows - it was very similar to how you would become absorbed in a video game. This free site has over 2500 animated tutorials on technology terms. This is another tool for your toolbox on tracking and understanding the changing face of wireless broadband.

Whatis.com, the leading IT encyclopedia and learning center If your focus is technology, this guide published by TechTarget is a good source for the very technical terms you may come across in your research.

Wikipedia This on-line people's encyclopedia is a great reference guide for just about anything. Move over, Encyclopedia Brittanica. Oh yeah, that's gone now. Type in your word or phrase and up comes a reference. Wikis are a new type of Internet software that allow on-line documents to be edited by anyone, resulting in a large, open-source encyclopedia. This is an encyclopedia by the world, for the world. Move over, World Book. Check it out.

WiMAX.com This brand new site was recently established to serve as an information resource for the new technology of WiMAX, which will offer cities another solution for unwiring. The intent of the site is to open up this new technology and raise the level of awareness on the possibilities of WiMAX.

Posted on February 03, 2007 at 10:22 PM | Comments (0)

Too Much of a Good Thing? Swimming v. Drowning in a Sea of Information

I was intrigued by a post in Gordon Cook's website Cook's Collaborative Edge: Helping Communities Build Bridges to 21st Century Communication entitled A Colleague Shares Some Thoughts on the Commodification of Knowledge. The gist of this post is to ask where we all are left when information is widely available (as it is now).

As products or services move into the category of commodity (widely available from multiple sources) it becomes more and more difficult to show how they are different from each other (i.e., differentiation), other than by virtue of how much the product or service costs. When price is the only signal of value, the buyer shops and uses tools (on-line auction, reverse auction, RFP, automatic buying software tools, etc) to find the lowest price in order to make a purchase decision.

But what about information and how we use it? I make the argument in the following Comment that I posted yesterday, that widely available information can become "too much" information, actually slowing down the decision making process and making it sub-optimal. That's where it helps to have a consultant who can cut corners and help the client to identify a path through the woods, so to speak.

My comments below.

As I approach the ripe old age of 50, I'm thinking more and more about the trade offs involved in what I do. How do I manage my limited resources - most especially time and money? I'm getting more and more picky on what I spend my time on - I consider each engagement as trading off a piece of my life (measured in hours, days, weeks, etc.) in exchange for some form of monetary compensation. There is a qualitative and quantitative assessment involved in evaluating each new project. I think this is the essence of the time / money trade-off that Grace talks about above. It is inherent in every build v. buy / outsourcing decision that an organization faces as well.

There's also that aspect of value, where we ascribe value to a resource based on how much we paid for it. In a world of abundant, "free" information, we think in terms of commodities and getting things at least cost. And in today's Internet world, we all tend to suffer the illusion that information has been somehow devalued because substitutes are readily available at no or low cost. In fact, the marketplace just grows richer and more complex with more free information.

But we tend to overlook the time involved in processing information, separating wheat from chaffe. Consultants, more experienced and better connected, provide the value-added service of sorting through the mountains of 'free" information to find the kernels of truth that will make an impact on their lives or businesses, the real value that the client seeks.

In a hyper-competitive, time-crunched world, where each decision can have ever-greater impact, the ability to evaluate all the decision variables is compounded not only by the lack of time, but also by a surfeit of information. The organization that tries to do it all themselves risks becoming penny-wise and pound-foolish. A consultant offers a way to mitigate that risk and ensure better decison-making.

I believe we're in the middle of a transition in how we do business, at all levels. How we leverage our resources - including how we manage and use information to our advantage - makes the difference in a success and an also-ran. And as with any other business, those consultants who offer high-touch, high-value service will stand out from the pack. We live in an age of plenty, information and otherwise, and there exists a continuum of choices regarding information acquisition and management.

Differentiation is key. Service providers who are successful at packaging information into valuable, unique knowledge services, custom-tailored for their clients, will stand out from the crowd and are at little risk of being commoditized by ever more free information (IMHO, its about the 3 Rs: relationships, reputation, and referrals).

But the availability of so much information is increasing the number of substitutes for such high-touch consulting, and each new low-barrier-to-entry business with a better information mouse trap creates ever more downward price pressure on the consulting marketplace. And any service provider who offers no real differentiation from a few hours spent on Wikipedia and Google is already a commodity, they just don't know it yet.

Posted on September 19, 2006 at 11:04 AM | Comments (0)

What are You Going to Do With Your New Network?

Here's a new website, KillerApp.com, that's worth taking a look at. The folks at Broadband Properties are producing this new resource.

According to Wikipedia (and the it's MetroNetIQ glossary entry), a "killer app" is what drives adoption.

Killer App - This term was devised to explain what happens when a computer application is so popular that it leads consumers to adopt a new technology in droves. For instance, e-mail and the Netscape web browser are described as killer apps with regard to the early days of dial-up Internet access. In more current terms, I have described VOIP, or Voice over Internet Protocol, and its accompanying voice applications and services as a Killer App for metropolitan networks.

I like this focus because applications are what really float my boat. While some of my friends, especially those more technically inclined, get into all the gory details of wireless internet technologies, I view all of this as simply a means to an end. As fascinating as it is, infrastructure is what is going to enable all the added value and experience we talk about. As I've frequently said on this page (and on my other websites WikiMetroNet and MetroNanoNet) - the real fun begins when we start using these networks to do new and exciting things.

Check it out - www.killerapp.com - hard to believe that URL was available!

Posted on July 12, 2006 at 04:15 PM | Comments (0)

WikiMetroNet Launches

I've been a semi-blogger the past couple of weeks, as projects have heated up. One particular project has reached a new milestone I want to share with you. I launched (publicly) the WikiMetroNet website today, in an email to 365 of my closest industry friends - OK, not all of them are that close, but I've personally met each of them at one point or another, and many are what I would consider close colleagues and friends. BTW, that's one for every day of the year.

While this mailer was limited to consultants, integrators, and vendors (and a few high school buddies, just so they know what I'm up to), the next mailers will go to the Registered Users of this site, and then to the city officials and staffers that are in my Rolidex (about 150 more). With some momentum and more content, I plan to work with city organizations and other groups to get city officials and staffers onto the site.

This is an exciting day for me because I've worked hard to create this Wiki, its the first Wiki I've ever launched, and its a gas to have a vision and execute on it. While I'm quite convinced that Wikis have a great future because the software lets everyone participate and promotes collaboration, we're all going to find out over the next year - if it takes off, my vision is right. If it flounders and nobody contributes, I was off the mark.

So, please, help me be right. Go to the website now and take a look - and why not register and try your hand at writing. There is little to fear, nobody is looking over your shoulder to tell you whether you got it right or not (well, actually, the whole world is, but with a Wiki, its a matter of perspective - there is no penalty for being wrong, and "wrong" is a very subjective term). The point is, in the Wiki Universe, nothing is permanent until the community says its permanent, nothing is correct until the community says its correct, and its less about being right or wrong than it is about participating in a collaborative event. Its more about getting your thoughts out there onto the website and then letting the rest of the community have at it. At some point, the community decides that the entries have reached a harmonic state and the content becomes stable. But by sharing your ideas, thoughts, wisdom, and learning, the entire community benefits.

Anyway, that's how its supposed to work. My one concern is that the Wikis are still too new a concept to many people and that many people will think they're too busy to contribute, or not experienced enough to chip in. Please don't be one of those - jump in and write something, come back and read and then write some more, and before you know it, we'll all have a resource that we all can benefit from. Pass along the site to five or ten people who are interested in this space, and the Wiki will be off and running.

Finally, let me know how I can improve it. Please.

Here's the letter I sent out today:

Dear Friend,

Lighting a Candle in the Darkness

I've been active in the metropolitan broadband space since mid 2003, and despite all the incredible change and progress we've seen in nearly three years, at least two things have grown ever more apparent: 1) the tremendous potential of this fascinating technology; and 2) the need to raise awareness and educate interested parties on the details and potential of wireless broadband.

Last summer, I began my efforts to raise awareness and educate with my first blog, www.unwiremycity.com, which I relaunched as www.metronetiq.com in February, with a new look and feel. I've tried to fill a gap and provide something new and useful - practical resources for interested parties, regardless of skill level or experience. Over the past year, I've had numerous discussions with colleagues about the need for a Metropolitan Broadband Users Manual to capture the lessons learned, expand the number of users, and speed up the pace in deployments.

Problem is, nobody has yet found the time to write that manual, and even if they did, this industry is so new that no one party would have all the answers, and anything put into print would risk being out of date before the ink dried, so fast is the pace of change. What to do?

Once again, technology to the rescue: on-line wikis provide a way to collaborate and work together on a document, in this case, an on-line manual to share lessons learned with each other. Using an open-source wiki software, I've put together www.wikimetronet.com, a website that features an outline for a User's Manual, which I've started to fill in. I'll keep working on adding content, but this is a far more ambitious project than I can handle alone. It's not perfect, but it's not supposed to be - it's just a start, and an invitation to make it better. It should change as more and more content is added, growing before our eyes.

I'm sending this email to the friends in this industry whom I've met over the past three years and to a few other friends. This project is an experiment to see if there's sufficient interest to create and develop such a shared on-line resource. This email is not just an announcement - it's also an invitation for you to check it out and join in adding text. I've never started a Wiki, so I'm not sure of the "right" way to do it, but this seems as good a way as any to get started. That's part of the fun of this business, you can just jump in and try new things! So go ahead - jump in.

What's a Wiki?

What better place to go to find out than to the phenomenal on-line encyclopedia Wikipedia, which in just a few short years has gone from relative obscurity to a top ranking on Google, demonstrating the power of the Web and of collaboration using Wiki software? The definition of a Wiki then:

A wiki (wee-kee) or (wick-ey) is a type of website that allows users to easily add and edit content and is especially suited for collaborative writing. The term Wiki also sometimes refers to the collaborative software itself (wiki engine) that facilitates the operation of such a website (see wiki software).

In essence, a wiki is a simplification of the process of creating HTML web pages combined with a system that records each individual change that occurs over time, so that at any time, a page can be reverted to any of its previous states. A wiki system may also provide various tools that allow the user community to easily monitor the constantly changing state of the wiki and discuss the issues that emerge in trying to achieve a general consensus about the wiki content. Wiki content can also be misleading as users may add incorrect information to the Wiki page.

What's the Plan?

By using a Wiki for this document, we'll be able to track and promote development in this industry, capturing input not only from subject-matter experts in the industry, but also from city officials at all stages of the process. From investigating to planning, from designing to deploying, from operating the new networks to employing network applications to innovate government and civil functions, the vision is for this site to be a place where we all can share our collective knowledge, real-time, as it develops. Because this is such a new and dynamic area, it just made sense to use a dynamic, on-line tool to spread a wide net and capture the best knowledge and lessons learned about the process, the technology, etc. This will be an exciting project. Please email me at john.cooper@metronetiq.com if you would like to discuss, or if you need advice on how to get going. I'm eager to find contributors for this project to get it jump started - and that's contributors as in ideas and time, not money.

How do you launch a Wiki?

I've created the beginning outline with nearly 200 line items, and added topics and sub-topics to get us started - I've set it up so that the first contributor for any page signs their work as "Originator," and subsequent contributors sign as "Editors." By contributing, each of you can identify yourself to the world as a subject matter expert, choosing those areas of most interest to you. I'll follow up this email with a campaign to spread the word to city officials and staff - please help me by passing along the news as well. This should prove to be a good way for public officials and staff to identify and share information and resources. It's pretty easy to compose new content and very easy to paste content from elsewhere, then adapt it with simple formatting changes. Anyone can read what's on the site, but to edit, contributors will need to register. I hope that city officials and staff will begin to add content as well.

How do you get a quick start?

First, check out the pages under the Home Page banner, register as a contributor, and add some paragraphs to the About WikiMetroNet Perspectives section - stand up and be counted, so to speak. I'd like to see all my friends up near the top, and order is based on when entries are logged in, so please don't jump the queue, and please do this step first. After you've done so, go ahead and send me a logo and I'll add it to the sidebar to identify your company as a contributing sponsor. (see below).

Second, see the House Rules section - I'd appreciate your feedback on the mechanisms that I set up to organize this joint effort.

Third, add content after you practice a little in the WikiSandbox.

Fourth, link this site to yours, blog about it, tell a friend - pass on the good news.

What's in it for me - and you - and all of us?

- Help to pick up the pace in this industry
- Raise the level of debate
- Dispel rumors based on bad information
- Improve the quality of RFPs
- Promote Digital Inclusion
- Share what you've learned to help others
- Stand out and be recognized for your hard-earned subject-matter expertise
- Promote your commercial products and services
- Place your logos on the right sidebar
- Place a listing in the opening About section
- Enter content wherever you choose, with your name and contact information as Originator or Editor
- (When website traffic is sufficient, I'll ask for a small sponsorship fee for the logos, but initially, all I ask is that you contribute content and promote the site).
- And finally, when we have lots of content gathered together, I hope you and others will use this site as a primary resource to write books and produce other types of resources to raise public awareness and network knowledge even further.

Posted on April 05, 2006 at 09:24 PM | Comments (0)