Self-install WiMax kit comes to Tokyo

Rather bold experimentation with Wi-Max in a broadband-saturated, large urban area. If successful, this may show that Wi-Max is more than just a solution for areas not served by fixed broadband. 

"Despite the ready availability of broadband in Tokyo, Yozan will sell the service as a cheap alternative for mobile people who do not want to be tied to a contract for a fixed line. "It will be pitched much cheaper than DSL or fiber, for users who don't have a phone at home," said Paul Senior, vice president of marketing at Airspan. "This is a whole new market for wireless broadband."

5:34:46 PM    

 

Success is all a matter of where you are on the "hype curve". Interesting stuff from Ken Novak's Weblog:

frontline: high stakes in cyberspace: Paul Saffo in 1995 on PBS:  Fun to read the old stuff.  Paul Saffo is remarkably on-target, 10 years later.  This article mentions "macro-myopia: A pattern where our hopes and our expectations or our fears about the threatened impact of some new technology causes us to overestimate its short term impacts and reality always fails to meet those inflated expectations. And as a result our disappointment then leads us to turn around and underestimate the long term implications and I can guarantee you this time will be no different. The short term impact of this stuff will be less than the hype would suggest but the long term implications will be vastly larger than we can possibly imagine today."  I've since encoutered Gartner's Hype Cycle, which they say they started to use also in 1995, with a graphic version of this insight. 

I found this when looking for a reference to an aphorism that I think comes from Saffo.   The aphorism:  Over two years, things change much less than we think they will; but over ten years, they change more than we imagine. 

It makes me wonder about the timeframe in between, say 5 to 7 years in the future, when major impacts will be felt from things we know are changing now, despite hype (digital sensors and surveillance) and disillusion (wind and solar power).

[Ken Novak's Weblog]
5:25:01 PM    

Satellite Takes Broadband to New Heights (NewsFactor).

"Satellite communications provider Inmarsat is delivering on the promise to provide high-speed Internet access to the far reaches of the globe with the launch of its latest spacecraft. "

The event is significant, as it brings two-way, 1/2 Mbits/sec IP connectivity virtually ANYWHERE in the globe. I have personally used the device in BGAN's current incarnation in Europe (RBGAN, 144 kbits/sec) and it delivers what it promises. Latency is obviously an issue, given that the satellites are geo-stationary, but unless you are playing XBox live, the user experience is acceptable where 3G, DSL or cable are not an option. The device is the size of a laptop computer, can be installed by untrained personnel and connects to a PC via a USB cable.

"The two I-4 satellites will then cover 85 percent of the world's land mass, enabling Inmarsat officially to deliver the company's Broadband Global Area Network (BGAN).

BGAN is an IP and circuit-switched service providing connections at speeds of up to 432 Kbps, according to Warehand."

 

5:13:43 PM