Wireless broadband from sea to shining sea

The Toronto Star has an interesting column in its technology section today that ties up a number of threads including wireless Internet, broadband access and the federal government to spread it to every corner of Canada, competition in the wireless market from the little guy (Fido a.k.a. Microcell), and Canadian connections to Craig McCaw. It's here, titled Boost for high-speed wireless Web.

Read the article if you have anything to do with wireless, Internet, telecommunications, or the way of high-tech driven communications in general. It's quite fascinating. Without going into the detail, here's a snip for flavour:

Microcell plans to sell the fixed-wireless modem ó from Minneapolis-based NextNet Wireless Inc. ó for about $325 and the service will go for $40 a month, which is $5 to $10 cheaper than rival DSL and cable services.
In Cumberland and Richmond, people signing up today only have to pay $20 for the first six months, and need only pay $125 for the modem.

The modem is the size of a paperback novel and sits upright on a desk. After plugging it into your computer, it instantly finds the closest radio tower in your neighbourhood and makes a high-speed connection ó this bridges the so-called 'last mile.'

The service is portable, meaning if you take it to a friend's house or a hotel and plug it in, it will detect the nearest tower and automatically sign you in under your account. The modem only delivers high-speed Internet access today, but before the end of the year it will also act as a Wi-Fi home wireless network and will be capable of offering telephone service using voice over IP technology.

Well worth finding out more, I think.

Posted by Grayson at March 29, 2004 08:08 AM