Comments on: We already use Wi-Fi more than cellular; Why not continue the trend?

By: Steve Bryan

Steve Bryan — Thu, 26 Jul 2012 16:08:07 +0000

Ever heard of VPN? Even without VPN much of e-commerce uses https which is not something your garden variety script kiddies can hack.

By: Tsahi Levent-Levi

Tsahi Levent-Levi — Tue, 17 Jul 2012 19:22:29 +0000

Kevin,

Wi-Fi and LTE must go hand-in-hand. Putting the focus only on LTE or only in Wi-Fi won’t help carriers – they need to do both, and I think the smart ones actually do.
Since Wi-Fi isn’t managed in most cases, then it has no SLA, and no single throat to choke when things go wrong. If it will ever get the transparency that cellular data has these days, then it might stand a chance.
I wrote about it on the Amdocs Voices blog: http://blogs.amdocs.com/voices/2012/07/12/to-wi-fi-or-not-to-wi-fi/

By: Matt Cauble

Matt Cauble — Thu, 12 Jul 2012 20:27:09 +0000

Thanks for providing this article! We are working to be a WISP for m2m comm over ‘Super Wi-fi’. Let me know if you are interested in learning more!

By: rektide de la fey

rektide de la fey — Thu, 12 Jul 2012 17:30:11 +0000

I’m pretty sure the trend isn’t continuing because the specifications to perform federalization are still in the works.
http://gigaom.com/broadband/wi-fi-alliance-begins-certifying-passpoint-devices/

By: Dave Mackey

Dave Mackey — Thu, 12 Jul 2012 16:36:01 +0000

Moving to more wifi reliance is a good idea, imho.

By: chris

chris — Thu, 12 Jul 2012 02:08:22 +0000

I agree triple the number of cell triple the number of throughput 10 Mhz can produce, carriers should move to 2~3Ghz spectrum for data. but WiFi has 5msec latency in theory and more in practice, that is much higher than 1msec LTE; not mention the interference, security, distance……

By: Björn Smedman

Björn Smedman — Wed, 11 Jul 2012 22:10:56 +0000

Jack, have you seen http://anyfi.net? It’s the perfect tech for doing pretty much exactly that. :) You should check out http://anyfi.net/documentation#architecture and http://anyfi.net/documentation#api in particular.

Disclosure: I work on this.

By: Chris Lyons

Chris Lyons — Wed, 11 Jul 2012 18:23:03 +0000

I think that we need to get past single minded thinking. The licensed networks will still be king with devices that are delivered with “always-on” connectivity, for example, if your grandmother receives a home health monitoring device, she would rather it work right out of the box without the need for configuring her Wi-Fi router. A Kindle3G type model works best for this application.
On the other hand, companies like Shaw Cable in Canada are building out Wi-Fi services because the infrastructure is so much cheaper. Shaw already has a very large high-speed network, and provides network services to homes and businesses throughout western Canada. It is a trivial exercise to install carrier grade access points at their existing customer’s locations, covering inside and outside. Shaw will pay for electricity usage. The Shaw Wi-Fi (EXO) uses WPA2-Enterprise authentication, so there are absolutely no security concerns. Configure the network settings once and you will automatically connect to their access points when in range. No one is spoofing an access point with this kind of authentication. This also solves the problem of in-store network connectivity. I often find that my cellular data drops to nothing when I am in a large super market or big box store. I don’t like to trust open access points provided for free in Safeway or McDonalds and I don’t like to have to go into my settings and hunt around for an open access point in every store that I visit. The Shaw model solves the security issues, and also the issue of hunting for a different AP every time I enter a new store.
Emerging Wi-Fi standards like 802.11ac will deliver gigabit to Wi-Fi devices. This blows the pants off LTE for speed and expected to be ratified and adopted much more quickly than the 802.11n standard was.
Other standards like 802.11u will allow for metro Wi-Fi providers to establish roaming agreements between their networks. Suddenly a Shaw customer may be able to roam to a Wi-Fi provider’s network in a different serving area.
Wi-Fi isn’t a perfect solution. It will not work in all situations, but it could easily take a big bite out of the cellular data market.
Personally, I would rather let my teenager use a metro Wi-Fi service that is provided for free on my home Internet and cable service rather than paying $60 to $100 per month for a smartphone voice and data plan.
A company like Shaw already offers a “Digital Home Phone” service. It is a very short hop for them to introduce a SIP client for iPod Touch, tablets and smartphones to extend the existing home phone service to mobile devices on their Wi-Fi network.
Stay tuned… it will get interesting.

By: Jack

Jack — Wed, 11 Jul 2012 18:18:15 +0000

The article doesn’t discuss business model. In the traditional approach, no company is willing to invest billions of dollars to do a network buildout on top of (unreliable) unlicensed spectrum. There’s too much risk.

A viable approach I see would be for cable/dsl broadband providers to piggyback this into their existing residential deployments. I.e., the cable/dsl modem in each house also has a sideband “public data” wireless service, completely separate from the internet connection provided at the residence but sharing the same wire. You bill people to use the data network thus created, and perhaps share some of that revenue with the homeowner as compensation for participating. Even more straightforward would be to sell the wireless connectivity wholesale to mobile operators like Verizon — essentially you’re providing a form of data roaming. An approach like this eliminates the biggest costs in deploying a wireless WAN network: Rights of way, power, and wired bandwidth.

By: Keith

Keith — Wed, 11 Jul 2012 16:06:14 +0000

The more customers cell service providers convince to use wifi is good for the cell service providers on (at least) two levels. 1)Takes traffic of the cell network to allow providers to charge more for less service. 2)Provides more salable data collection off wifi networks.