US extraditing DRM-breaker
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Breaker, Breaker, Bad Neighbor, We've
Got a 10-34
Breaker, Breaker, Bad Neighbor, We've
Got a 10-34
04/05/2005 02:27 PM
Andy Seybold and Ron Sege (Tropos) hammer away on
metropolitan-scale Wi-Fi: I've had long internal debates with
myself about how to write about this issue played out in competing
guest commentaries on Muniwireless.com. Andy Seybold is a respected
figure in the industry, and someone I admire. But his approach to
external Wi-Fi, however reasonable some of his concerns are, has been
ham-handed, often inaccurate, and biased towards licensed frequencies.
Because he's a consultant and does not have a list of his and his firms'
clients, it's impossible to know what angle he comes at this. I'm not
suggesting his opinion is paid for. He's too honest, too independent,
and too smart for that. But if you just had your head inside the cell
data helmet for two years, metro-scale Wi-Fi looks absurd. Take off
that helmet, and evaluate it fairly, and you could have an entirely
different take. I'd urge Seybold to disclose any past and present
consulting arrangement with companies that compete in the space that
he is offering public opinion about. He's not a journalist, but he
still writes like one.
His opponent in this debate, Ron Sege, makes his money as the CEO of
Tropos Networks, a company that is the leader in selling metro-scale
Wi-Fi mesh equipment. So we know where his bias is: he'd like his
company to sell more and more gear. He has every interest in making
his approach seem workable. But he's also responsible to his private
shareholders and board of directors as well as his customers. As
recent years have shown, pretending something works doesn't work as a
long-term business strategy.
(Me, I accept advertising through third parties and am not involved in
negotiating or signing advertisers to my sites. I work as a
journalist, primarily, and do not consult in this or any industry.)
The difference between Seybold and Sege is that Sege can give you the
names and addresses of networks and city IT managers: you can go and
try his networks and talk to the people running it who aren't
responsible to Sege, but to taxpayers and city officials. Seybold is
poking holes through what I have to say is often specious or
inaccurate reasoning; Sege is offering a rational approach that's not
overhyping the abilities of the system he sells. I think both parties
would agree that the future for metro-scale wireless (not Wi-Fi) is
extremely bright.
If you view metro-scale Wi-Fi as a poor cousin to cell data, then I
have to say that's where the drugs have kicked in and you're
channeling Hunter S. Thompson. Verizon Wireless keeps making bizarre
statements about how their EVDO service works everywhere unlike Wi-Fi
which works mainly when your laptop is physically touching an access
point. Okay, I'm exaggerating. But their statements have been
strangely broad especially when their technology provider, Qualcomm,
has a campus-wide Wi-Fi network that they're very happy with. Seybold
agrees: indoor deployments of Wi-Fi are great uses of the technology
and they work.
EVDO is fantastic technology that I'm in love with, but let's remember
three salient points: limited spectrum available for 3G in this
country; high cost for unlimited usage to deter too many subscribers;
limited bandwidth compared to the backhaul capable with modern Wi-Fi
(mesh or fixed hotspot or hotzone).
So where's the dispute? Let me start drilling into Seybold's
Muniwireless.c
om commentary. He hates 2.4 GHz: it's a messy band. It
may experience a tragedy of the commons. It's like Citizens Band
radio: too many users turned CB into something no one can use. (Except
that it's still in use by a group that carved their own purpose out of
it when the FCC walked away.)
But that's not what's happening in 2.4 GHz. The band has become more
and more useful because it employs technology to allow many
simultaneous networks to work without rendering each other useless.
Yes, the more networks, the worse performance. But I've been at trade
shows--Wi-Fi Planet, notably--with hundreds of 2.4 GHz Wi-Fi networks
over a few thousand square feet, and you can still associate and send
data. The FCC hasn't walked away: they're actively involved in
tweaking and enforcing rules. Seybold claims companies are selling
gear that flaunts Part 15. Hey, who are they? Let's report them.
They're violating the law and threatening public safety and corporate
data networks through their gear.
Seybold moves on to airports, indoor spaces that you think he would
admire. But a lack of coordinated policy have doomed some of his
connections, he says. I and others asked where in the comments, and he
cited Dallas/Ft. Worth and San Jose as having several networks that
apparently prevented him from getting a good connection. But those two
airports have coverage from Wayport, which he doesn't mention as one
of the signals he saw. I was recently in Seattle and Austin's
airports, which are two of Wayport's oldest installations, and had
great service throughout. As you imagine, I have professional interest
in wandering around to look at signal strength and throughput. I saw
other networks, sure, but the ones that Seybold cites are ones that
are designed to cover small areas, like an airport lounge. If you're
not in the lounge, you might see the signal, but the coverage
shouldn't be good. This is frustrating for T-Mobile HotSpot
subscribers who aren't lounge members, but that doesn't mean that
Wi-Fi failed them.
Seybold's airport reasoning is conclusion by anecdote. Airports are
generating hundreds of thousands of Wi-Fi connections each month. Ask
Concourse, T-Mobile, and Wayport, to name the biggest players. If
service were as poor as Seybold maintains, this wouldn't be happening.
I had terrific results in Seattle, Denver, and Austin a few weeks ago,
three of the oldest Wi-Fi'd airports in the country. (Seybold is also
incorrect about a remark in the comments to his commentary: "access
points are being deployed without knowledge or consent of the airport
commission--and sometimes with their consent." The FCC ruling last
June precludes airport authorities from restricting unlicensed
wireless.)
The commentary devolves into speculation about how metro-scale Wi-Fi
networks can't work well because of interference and many competing
networks (home and otherwise), and how if they even manage to work now
they will fail in the future because of a tragedy of the commons.
Unfortunately, all developments point otherwise. Seybold mentions the
5 GHz band in passing, but it's clear that as 2.4 GHz becomes more
crowded--I completely agree it will--that the 23 channels in 5 GHz for
relatively unused 54 Mbps communications today and 100 to 600 Mbps
communications with 802.11n in 2006-2007 will take up the slack.
Manufacturers are clearly moving towards integrated dual-band chips in
all non-consumer devices. It doesn't cost much more at this point, and
it's the way the enterprise is moving.
Combine that technology direction with the spatial multiplexing and
multipath discrimination that will appear in 802.11n (and is already
in early form in MIMO gear hitting the market), and you solve another
problem. If you can more clearly differentiate signals as they reflect
in complex, radio-crowded environments, then you effectively increase
the amount of bandwidth available across a given geographic area in a
given slice of spectrum.
Thus even if 2.4 GHz becomes unusable due to crowding with today's
technology, tomorrow's technology won't be subject to the same
limitations. Even better, you can continue having bad results with
today's technology while tomorrow's is installed all around you.
Tropos could move from 802.11a/g to 802.11n for backhaul and use
multiple radios for service to support legacy users.
Seybold also writes, "The problem with 2.4-GHz Wi-Fi is that if it
works in a given wide area today, there is no guarantee that it will
continue to work tomorrow. Building a system that requires, for
example, 500 access points today might require the addition of another
few hundred access points in the future. This would throw a wrench
into the business model."
That's a lot of different ideas, but I don't buy any of them. The
technology will improve, so upgrades to the technology will be
necessary. But all of the plans I've seen and read about involve the
idea that technology will improve. A 500-node network that needs 200
to 300 more because of usage or other factors is already in the plan.
Nobody is deploying a network of fixed size, crossing their fingers,
and trusting that it will work indefinitely--or even 1 to 2 years in
the future without adding nodes.
Seybold transition into questions of mobility, or accessing metro
Wi-Fi while in motion. "If public safety officers have to pull over to
the curb to run a license plate while they are in pursuit of a
vehicle, what good is the network?" I don't think Seybold has talked
to police officers about how they work to make that statement. Most of
the selling point of public-safety networks is about keeping staff in
the field instead of returning to base to fill out paperwork. Another
part is about getting robust information in the field--but not,
typically, at 100 mph pursuit. You're probably on the radio at that
point and focusing on driving and not getting shot rather than typing
on a keyboard (or having your partner do such).
In any case, focusing on mobility sells the idea that a technology
that doesn't yet exist in most cities--broadband speed cell data,
which is coming--and that requires payments to external providers
trumps a flexible, multi-purpose network that a city itself could own
or have built for it. Cities should probably think about conserving
costs in areas in which outside providers have no similar interest.
This is one of the primary problems in my view with state laws that
would prevent municipalities from being able to build multi-purpose
networks that public safety personnel would benefit from.
Like so many of the arguments in this commentary and more
cellular-focused articles and chats elsewhere, Seybold wants to make
the indirect case that an unlicensed band will devolve into chaos
without rules that provide for strict separation of providers,
cell-like seamless handoff, and other features common to cellular data
networks.
But he's taking a very small slice and a set of strawman that I don't
think hold up to scrutiny to posit that today's networks don't work
(when they do) and that the same technology will get worse and worse
instead of the inevitable path that's already underway to improved use
of spectrum, better signal discrimination, and more channels for use
overall.
Now you think I have forgotten about Tropos CEO Ron Sege's
commentary on Seybold's piece? I have not. Here's my
dilemma. I'm not a toady, but I agree with practically everything Sege
writes. Why? Because he's not trying to create an reductio ad
absurdum argument. Sege is willing to consider and even introduce
points of view contrary to his own interest in the purpose of arriving
at a logical conclusion.
Sege doesn't look as Seybold does at spectrum in the classical, early
20th century view that is being widely discredited by people as varied
as open-source radio enthusiast and the FCC. Spectrum is only scarce
when you spew radio waves over it. It's abundant when devices are
smart enough to use the least signal, to avoid stepping on others, and
to hop away from frequencies in use. Some of this is already in place
in 2.4 GHz; some in European rules for 5 GHz.
In the non-scarce spectrum worldview, the more transmitters, the more
difficult but not unsolvable the problem becomes. Coordination happens
among devices using protocols that allow this to be sorted out.
If you apply Sege's arguments to the tragedy of the commons you get a
very different outcome from Seybold's. Seybold would argue that in a
space intended for 1,000 cows consuming regularly that he found 5,000
cows and the field was trampled. Sege, in contrast, would point out
that there were 5,000 cows, but they were led in and out on a rata
system that assured that no more than 1,000 cows--and often only a few
hundred cows--were munching at every given time.
In fact, rather than 1,000 cows mostly owned by Verimoo or SBCow, the
5,000 cows were owned by hundreds of different dairy farmers. By
keeping the commons open and using a protocol that determined the
number of cows that could contend for grass, the commons continued to
flourish. To follow Sege's commentary, he would say that Seybold
didn't stoop to look at the grass at all, but reasoned that 5,000 cows
were an untenable number for the commons, and vowed to return in a
year to see if any grass was left at all.
Sege's summary is rather stirring and in accord with my opinion:
"Cautionary projections of potential failures of technology solutions
based on previous failures have a place in the debate, as long as they
are fully verified as still valid and acknowledge real changes in the
environment."
Comments welcome below that advance a civil discussion of these
issues.
Breaker, Breaker: 10-100 Filtering
Breaker, Breaker: 10-100 Filtering
04/19/2005 11:06 AM
Truck stops in Texas with free Wi-Fi
may have to filter content: A Slashdot poster connects
the dots in a Texas house bill that would require filtering on any
state-provided wireless network on public property. This means the
truck stops that have been equipped would need filtering. I don't need
to make snickering references here, as you can read plenty on
Slashdot.
A SOAP syntax breaker
A SOAP syntax breaker
08/09/2002 11:09 PMCNET Aug 9 2002 10:08PM ET
The New Republic Online: Law Breaker
The New Republic Online: Law Breaker
02/19/2004 08:05 AMimpact of the FMA .. devastation .. today joins .. Jacob
Levy
tnr.com/doc.mhtml?i=scholar&s=levy021804
track this
site | 5 links
Advanced Office Password Breaker v1.20
Advanced Office Password Breaker v1.20
03/19/2003 10:45 PMAdvanced Office Password Breaker (formerly Advanced Office Key
Recovery), or AOPB for short, is a program to decrypt Word and Excel
97/2000 files that have file open protection set, as well as Word and
Excel XP files with default (Office 97/2000 compatible) encryption -
guaranteed, regardless the password length and complexity. This is
being done by trying all possible encryption keys (instead of
brute-force and dictionary attacks) and takes only about two weeks on
single Pentium III/1000 PC (or just four-five days on faster dual-CPU
systems).
Snake Skin Bean Breaker
Snake Skin Bean Breaker
09/02/2004 01:28 PMNamespace Collision
FC Now: Decision Maker, Deal Breaker
FC Now: Decision Maker, Deal Breaker
09/16/2004 05:34 AMIn the current issue of Darwin, contributor Chuck Martin considers the
ways in which leaders make tough decisions. In a nationwide survey
over a base...
Newly Discovered Galaxy Is a
Record-Breaker
Newly Discovered Galaxy Is a
Record-Breaker
02/18/2004 01:06 AMGrok Description matches for US extraditing DRM-breaker
GrokA matches for US extraditing DRM-breaker
US extraditing DRM-breaker
