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Photo of worker adjusting a wireless access point.

Worker adjusting the wireless access point outside my window.

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Tuesday, January 05, 2010

Minneapolis Unwired: The network is just about as complete as it's going to be

Minneapolis is officially unwired says the Star Tribune:

The $20 million Minneapolis wireless Internet network has been completed after 2 1/2 difficult years of technical and political delays. The city's next step: getting the police and fire departments using it this year.

The City's basic requirement was for coverage of 95% of it's 59.5 miles and performance meets the City's expectations, according to Minneapolis Chief Information Officer Lynn Willenbring. There are 16,500 private subscribers, according to Joe Caldwell, marketing vice president of US Internet, which owns and operates the network. The company hopes for 30,000 individual customers.

Getting City departments to use the wireless network is another story. So far Sprint cellular services trump US Internet Wi-Fi services with the City using less than half of the $1.25 million a year worth of services it's paying for. Luckily unused money can roll over to future years of the 10-year contract. (What happens if there is still unused money after ten years?)

Esme Vos wrote about the network today at MuniWireless, stressing the need to upgrade to 802.11n units sooner rather than later if it's not been done already. (I don't think it has.)

US Internet has improved customer service in the last year and now sends out (and charges for) a technician on each install. General satisfaction of users on the system seems to be growing. I'm seeing far fewer complaints via my Google Alerts than in previous years.

Posted via email from Peter's posterous

Labels: broadband, minneapolis, USIW, Wi-Fi, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 10:10 PM |

Thursday, October 01, 2009

Minneapolis Unwired: Test the Wi-Fi System for Free!

First some background: Minneapolis is blessed with a municipal Wi-Fi network owned and operated by US Internet's (USI) USI Wireless (USIW) group. The City is the anchor tenant on the network. Businesses and residents of Minneapolis can purchase accounts and it's arguably the cheapest way to get broadband in Minneapolis. (It does give us a third choice for broadband which is one more than most cities.) Because of all the blogging I've done about the system, I'm often asked what I think of the service.

You don't have to ask me; you can check it out for yourself. As part of the community benefits in the Minneapolis-USI contract, USI has paid for a "Civic Garden." The Garden consists of community and City of Minneapolis sites. You can access the Wi-Fi network via the Civic Garden for free and browse. If access speeds are satisfactory, they should only get better once you have the USIW Ruckus modem which boosts the signal. Let's go through how you can access and test the system.

Find the access point. On the Mac, you can pop down a menu that shows all the wireless access points in range (see picture). On the PC, you can open a window that shows you the same. (Sorry, I'm a Mac guy so I don't have a PC picture.) The SSID or identifying name will be "USI Wireless," "City of Minneapolis Public Wi-Fi," or "Welcome to Minneapolis." (That last one is rare but I've seen it.) Once you see it, connect to that network and open your browser.

Wi-Fi Menu on the Mac
Your browser will open to the USIW terms of service. Read them and accept. (If you don't accept, that will be the end of your testing.)
Once you have accepted the agreements, you are at the Civic Garden.
You can browse a variety of community sites or use the "Get City of Minneapolis News" link to access the City's site.

If you are unable to even see the USIW network in your home (stucco homes are very problematic), try access from outdoors, even walking up and down the block. You can see the USIW antennas on electric poles—some look like kegs and others are flat panels. (The picture at the top of my blog is the keg style.) If you get access outside, inside access may be acceptable once you buy or lease one of the booster (Ruckus) devices from USIW. If there is no access inside or outside, let USIW know and see if they can do anything. Your mileage will vary. There are problem ("challenge") areas in the City where you just can't get a signal.

Ordering Wi-Fi

USIW now sends a technician installer person out for every install whether you think they need to come to your house or not. They charge $25 for this. I've heard there is currently a wait period of a week or so.

I'm not a USIW subscriber (yet). I do get a good signal where I live without any special antennas or devices to boost reception.

Wi-Fi Issues

The Wi-Fi spectrum is subject to all kinds of interference including microwave ovens, cordless phones, and other Wi-Fi access points. Trees with leaves will also cause interference so your reception will usually be better during our Minnesota winters. Sometimes your signal just goes away or gets so weak as to resemble the old days of the dial-up modems.

Good luck. I hope these instructions are clear and if they aren't, please let me know how I can improve them. Also I'd like to know your experiences if you test the system and whether or not you decide to subscribe to USIW.

Labels: broadband, minneapolis, USIW, Wi-Fi, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 8:15 PM |

Saturday, May 30, 2009

Minneapolis Unwired: Dead zones & IOUs (plus a Wi-Fi in the parks update)

Steve Alexander has a report on the Minneapolis Wi-Fi deployment at the Star Tribune. Judging from the dates on the comments, I think it's from May 26 but there's no dateline on the story.

The gist is that it's not done which is also the ongoing mantra. "It's always something" as Gilda would say. Prospect Park is still a "challenge" area and there are others around the metro--a total of three square miles still unwired. The park issue I reported on before seems to be resolved and a contract is in place with a bit of money changing hands from US Internet to the Park Board. (Read details over at the eDemocracy Forum).

The City of Minneapolis is using only $50,000 worth of services but paying $1.25 million per year. The article says the money carries over (an IOU so to speak) so supposedly we will get full value eventually. Some reasons we aren't getting full value now are because the network needs to actually be complete before Police and Fire will mess with it and because some City departments are slow in adopting the service.

Alexander talks about using the network to track video from a police car going 80mph. I would love to know how that is possible. I don't think the current network, in areas where it is fully implemented, allows you to smoothly travel from node to node in a car without losing the connection some of the time. So do we have a "special" high-speed backend network for police and fire? I know there is a "public safety" channel or something but if it's still in the Wi-Fi range, it would be subject to all kinds of interference.

US Internet meanwhile says they now have 14,000 subscribers. Those numbers should eventually translate to cash infusions in the City's Digital Inclusion Fund with a minimum of 5% of net pretax income. The fund has $100,000 left of the initial $500,000 from US Internet. The fund and the money are part of the Community Benefits Agreement in the contract. I'm on the Digital Inclusion Fund Committee and so far we have not heard when we will receive more money and we have postponed this years grant-making cycle.

We are still the muni-wi-fi poster child of the world. It's working here because the City of Minneapolis signed on as anchor tenant and is paying a hefty fee to support a network. However, unless the City starts to get its money's worth of services soon, we may have rethink this poster child status.

Labels: broadband, minneapolis, municipal, politics, USIW, Wi-Fi, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 11:08 AM |

Sunday, October 14, 2007

Minneapolis Unwired: Community meetings 10/18 and 11/1

Upcoming Wireless Minneapolis informational/community meetings.

Oct. 19 at Logan Park, 690 13th Ave. NE.

Nov. 1 at Nokomis Park, 2401 E. Minnehaha Parkway.

Both go from 5:30 p.m. until 7.

Labels: minneapolis, USIW, Wi-Fi, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 9:19 PM |

Minneapolis Unwired: Digital Inclusion Update

I am a community representative on the Digital Inclusion Fund Advisory Committee and if you drop by often you may have read this article when we were looking for proposals for our very first funding cycle.

I now have forty-five proposals to go through requesting far more than the $200,000 that's available for grants. I think there will be some interesting projects coming along in the next year to help low income and marginalized folk in Minneapolis get to the Internet. Not much more I can say until an official announcement some time before the end of the year.

I can announce our members though. I was shy about that previously as there was no listing available on the web until recently. I planned to check with my colleagues about listing names here after reading Josh Breitbart's post pointing out that we aren't identified anywhere. That has changed and the official list of reps is up at the Digital Access site. (Thanks, Josh. I have a feeling your blog post helped in getting this information out there.)

Read Josh's post. His ideas around horizontal collaboration vs. hub-and-spoke deserve serious discussion. He likes much of what he sees in Minneapolis compared to Philadelphia. But we are still in the development stage, now creating the reality of the shared vision. What is disheartening for me is the minuscule information about the Wi-Fi project itself and the walled/civic garden portals. (I am supposed to be on a committee that is planning the community portals and it hasn't met in months.) The deployment is a month or more behind schedule and I doubt if the network will be completed before 2008. I think delays are to be expected in new ventures like this but US Internet Wireless (USIW) and the City of Minneapolis have not been forthcoming in updating residents as to status. There is a city-sponsored mailing list but little flows through it and there has never been any type of status report even when new neighborhoods are added to the Wi-Fi mix.

USIW and Minneapolis need the community to rally round the Wi-Fi system. Frequent and honest communication is the best way to ensure that engagement.

Technorati Tags: wireless, broadband, municipal, minneapolis, wifi, digital_inclusion

Labels: broadband, digital_inclusion, minneapolis, USIW, Wi-Fi, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 9:13 PM |

Sunday, September 02, 2007

Minneapolis Unwired: ZDNet article covers USIW response to bridge collapse

Marguerite Reardon at ZDNet has an Aug. 8 piece on the US Internet Wireless (USIW) response to the 35W bridge collapse in Minneapolis (just surfaced in my Google Alerts). It's the standard blow-by-blow about USIW's quick and strategic response to the crisis plus how public safety is a major reason for muni Wi-Fi.

Citywide Wi-Fi network put to test in Minneapolis

Part of the USIW response was the opening of the subscription-based Wi-Fi network to allow use by anyone. This was announced via local broadcast media. With the cellular network flooded, USIW hoped people with Wi-Fi enabled smart phones could use Wi-Fi for placing calls. Most articles then give usage statistics provided by Joe Caldwell, CEO of USIW: network use jumped from 1,000 registered users to 6,000 users. The inference is that lots of phone calls were placed over Wi-Fi (Voice over IP or VOIP).

Reardon is the only writer who took the figures to task:

Exactly how many of those 6,000 users were actually using the Wi-Fi network in lieu of the cell phone network isn't known. It's unlikely that many people were able to use the network for voice communications, given that most cell phones don't have Wi-Fi capability and those that do may not be able use voice over IP clients.

Additionally, a large number of VOIP calls would have degraded services on the Wi-Fi network as surely as it did on the cellular network. I assume USIW could share usage data with us showing how many VOIP calls were placed and what other types of activities were going on.

Also interesting to note is that text and instant messages were still moving over the cell network. (Jon Gordon mentioned this to me via Twitter.) I see this as an education issue with cell phone users needing to know how to send text messages and that this is an alternative when you are unable to place a voice call. Most of my (older) friends—even those who have had cell phones a long time—don't know how to text message or IM on their cell.

Technorati Tags: minneapolis, wi-fi, municipal, 35W, broadband, USIW

Labels: minneapolis, twitter, USIW, Wi-Fi, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 10:12 AM |

Wednesday, August 15, 2007

Minneapolis Unwired: Having City as an anchor tenant is the way to go

BusinessWeek sees problems with muni-wi-fi deployments with companies requiring cities to become the anchor tenant with guaranteed revenues. That sounds very familiar. Maybe it should be called the Minneapolis Option.

BusinessWeek: Why Wi-Fi Networks Are Floundering

Labels: broadband, minneapolis, USIW, Wi-Fi, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 9:42 PM |

Tuesday, August 14, 2007

Minneapolis Unwired: Muni Wi-Fi Meeting Tomorrow Night

City Wi-Fi Community meeting for Southwest Neighborhoods tomorrow night at Lyndale Farmstead Park, 3900 Bryant Ave. S., 5:30 p.m. to 7.

Whether you live in Southwest or not, you can attend for more information on what's happening with the wireless system.

For more information on this and future meetings, check the City site.

Labels: broadband, digital_inclusion, minneapolis, USIW, Wi-Fi, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 9:13 PM |

Saturday, August 04, 2007

Minneapolis Unwired: New Wi-Fi helps in aftermath of bridge disaster

ComputerWorld has a nice article about how the City of Minneapolis was able to utilize the new wireless network in the aftermath of the bridge collapse.

US Internet Wireless also opened the network for free service after the disaster. With the cell network maxed out for voice calls, some people were able to use voice over the Wi-FI system.

Labels: minneapolis, USIW, Wi-Fi, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 3:04 PM |

Thursday, July 26, 2007

Minneapolis Unwired: Status and a report at W2i

Has USI Wireless (USIW), builders of the Minneapolis Wi-Fi mesh network, officially finished Phase 1 (the downtown area and near downtown and where I happen to live). Local media hasn't reported and the two official mailing lists--one from City of Minneapolis and one from USIW--have been silent.

Today, via Google Alerts, I found a current report of sorts dates July 25. It's by James Farstad, the City's wireless consultant. It's remarkably frank and gives some insight into the building out process and some of the problems USIW is facing.

Here's a copy of the phase map with the current schedule.

Some highlights...

Although it doesn't say that Phase 1 is done, it says Phase 2 has started.
The network does cover 12 miles and it worked on a T-Mobile Wi-Fi device.
Electrification is a big problem. Crushed conduit is a big problem as it has to be replaced. There are also permits to consider.
Phase 2 should go faster because of the standard street grid but there is some road construction and missing poles to hang the nodes.
Phase 3 is parks and lakes and potential headaches. Farstad: "I've asked the team to locate solar powered artificial pine trees that we can plant." Wow.
Customer experience is important (sign-up, sales, support, etc.). Farstad: "Some early test interactions indicate there is work to do here and it has become an important focal point this week." Statements of poor customer service have been reported at the community wireless meetings.

Read the full report and watch for more. There are a couple of other articles on the local deployment listed here.

And USIW, it's still not too late to implement some of my community wireless related recommendations. (They got a bit of airplay via MuniWireless.)

Labels: broadband, minneapolis, USIW, Wi-Fi, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 9:45 PM |

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Minneapolis Unwired: Are we live yet?

Has US Internet USIW finished phase 1 of the network? This includes downtown, Cedar-Riverside area, and part of Seward Neighborhood.

Checking their ordering site, I'm told that I can't yet purchase service at 24th Ave. and Franklin. I assume that means they haven't finished yet. The current build-out schedule lists June but also says that all dates are subject to change.

The next community meeting will be at Lyndale-Farmstead Park, 3900 Bryant Ave. S., on Thursday, July 19, 5:30 p.m. to 7. A second meeting with same time schedule will be held there Aug. 15.

Labels: broadband, USIW, Wi-Fi, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 10:53 PM |

Thursday, July 05, 2007

Minneapolis Unwired: Kari tests Phase 1 Wi-Fi

Kari VanDerVeen at the Downtown Journal tests the network in the downtown area. Works well where it works, she says, but there are still holes (which USI Wireless acknowledges.

Seems she could keep a connection while riding in a car. I wonder how fast she was going.

Labels: broadband, minneapolis, USIW, Wi-Fi, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 9:48 AM |

Monday, June 18, 2007

Unwired in Philadelphia Part 2

Miriam Hill at the Philadelphia Daily News has a good piece on the trials and tribulations large municipal wireless deployments. Of course her focus is Philadelphia but it's really an overview as to what is going on in this space nationally. She provides a good description of how a wireless mesh network works and why it might be difficult to keep up and running and providing ubiquitous access.

Philadelphia is a whole lot bigger than Minneapolis both in population—1.4M compared to some 300,000—and area—135 square miles compared to 60 square miles. The stakes are definitely higher. How Earthlink fares with it's Philadelphia network will set a tone for large deployments around the country and world.

I want to commend Ms. Hill for her article and entreat our local press (Star Tribune, Pioneer Press, TC Daily Planet) to start providing this type of coverage. More than anything, we need more information about what is happening locally and nationally. We want US Internet Wireless (USIW) (our muni wireless network builder) to prosper and give us another choice for broadband Internet services in Minneapolis. But we also need to be weighing the problems with a large deployment and nurturing a conversation on how we can make this work together.

Labels: broadband, minneapolis, Philadelphia, USIW, Wi-Fi, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 10:00 PM |

Sunday, June 17, 2007

Unwired in Philadelphia

Glenn Fleishman has a good post on the Philadelphia wireless effort. Philadelphia will be the first major city deployment and he (and others) think that the success or failure of that deployment could be a bellwether for other big city deployments.

One issue he points to is nodes. Originally, Tropos believed a city network could provide adequate service with twenty to twenty-five nodes per square mile. That number has since risen to 30+ and Novarum (a muni-scale independent testing service) puts the number even higher.

I don't know what the node density is in Minneapolis but I'll try to get that information. I do know that US Internet is increasing density in the pilot area and they told current pilot customers that the reason was "to accommodate the additional leaf coverage since installing the original
network."*

Read Glenn's post.

*from an email that US Internet sent to current customers.

Labels: broadband, minneapolis, Philadelphia, USIW, Wi-Fi, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 3:34 PM |

Friday, June 15, 2007

Minneapolis Unwired: Technology Day in Minneapolis featuring Wi-FI

Minneapolis Wireless Update

Minnesota Stories guy Chuck Olsen captured the Technology Day festivities on video. Included is information on the community portal system. This blogger will talk about that soon too.

Labels: broadband, digital_inclusion, minneapolis, USIW, Wi-Fi, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 6:23 AM |

Minneapolis Unwired: Only one can roam

Minneapolis Wireless Update

In my rush to the presses last night with details of USIW charges, I forgot to cover roaming accounts on the US Internet-Minneapolis Wi-Fi system. This is the ability to pick up your laptop and go nomadic since theoretically you should be able to connect to the system anywhere in the city limits where you can get a strong enough signal.

Monthly fees allow you a single roaming account. In two-laptop families (like mine), you would have to purchase a second account if you both want to sit in the back yard and surf the Web.

Now if you rent or purchase the USIW/Ruckus modem, you get an extra login somehow tied to the modem. Now Mary can be logged in the modem and I can roam or vice-versa.

You can rebroadcast the modem signal via a hub, switch, or an internal wireless radio (like an airport).

Labels: broadband, minneapolis, USIW, Wi-Fi, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 5:59 AM |

Minneapolis Unwired: The Nitty Gritty Details

[Update: I forgot to mention nomadic roaming accounts and logging in anywhere in the City where you can get a signal. You get one roaming account. More details here.]

Minneapolis Wireless Update

Technology Day, Minneapolis, and finally details of how much Wi-Fi is going to cost on the US Internet Wireless (USIW) network.

That's a quick view (click the image for enlargement). For the official prices, go to http://www.usiwireless.com/Promo03, "Click Here," agree to whatever they ask, and you will see the official offer.

You need the Ruckus device (USIW modem) to have a guarantee on the speeds. That will cost you $5/month rental or $80 to purchase. Joe Caldwell, US Internet CEO, says rental is better for the consumer as USIW will replace it if you break it. From conversations with USIW sales, I also know that firmware upgrades will also come from USIW if you rent. Rental looks like the best deal.

Uploads Throttled! My hope was for symmetrical upload/download but USIW has decided to hold all uploads at 1 Mbps. Ironic that our local vlog guy, Chuck Olsen, was recording tonight. Sorry Chuck. If you get high-speed USIW, your vid to the Net will still be in the slow lane.

If you can't get a decent signal with the Ruckus, USIW can try mounting an external directional antenna on your house or apartment building. Didn't catch the brand but I will guess Belair, same company that is making the main radios.

High Rises. After the network is in place, they are going to tackle the high rises. I think the first plan will be to turn a radio sideways which will "paint" the side of the building with a signal. Another possible plan is to use IP over electric in the building. (What's the bandwidth on that?)

Completion of the first segment (Phase 1) covering downtown, Cedar-Riverside, and part of Seward, is June 19.

That's all for now, folks. Post your questions and I'll try to answer plus the USIW folk read this blog so maybe they will chime in. What do you think of the rates?

Labels: broadband, minneapolis, USIW, Wi-Fi, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 5:55 AM |

Thursday, June 14, 2007

Minneapolis Unwired: Community Benefits

Ed has a good summary of the community benefits included in the City's contract with US Internet. Also check my home page for links to various documents like the full contract and the original community benefit recommendations.

Happy Technology Day, Minneapolis! Everyone should wear one of those little hats with a propeller on top. The Wi-Fi Wireless Rollout is at 4 p.m. in the Doty Room at the DT library accessible by train, bike, bus or automobile. Bring your ideas about what equals community content.

Labels: broadband, digital_inclusion, events, minneapolis, USIW, Wi-Fi, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 7:36 AM |

Wednesday, June 13, 2007

Minneapolis Unwired: 2.0 style marketing

Early Wi-Fi adopters in the pilot area (Seward Neighborhood mainly) have not been well-served. Service has been very intermittent since around Mother's Day. At least one person I know has not been able to use Wi-Fi for at least a month. I believe users were warned of outages by US Internet but not that they would be without service for days or weeks.

To their credit, US Internet Wireless (USIW) is trying to rectify the situation and has refunded monthly fees.

Back in October, when USIW started selling accounts, I had some suggestions as to how a company might market Wi-Fi as they build out the network. Reading them over again, I realize I was trying to help them to transform sterile municipal wireless into something akin to community wireless.

I think the suggestions—listed below—are still viable and would result in more long-term profit than the current course USIW is following.

Don't charge anything for now. In fact, give us free accounts for a year and we'll help you troubleshoot problems. [Plus, subscribers could keep their other Internet accounts until the network was official.]
Start blogging about the deployment. In fact, start blogging about your company. Be as transparent as you can. Make sure the CEO is blogging. [Information about the deployment from both the City and USIW has been sparse at best.]
Lend out your Ruckus Metroflex Wireless Access Gateway units. We'll pay a deposit and return it in good working condition or buy it if we like the Wi-Fi
Help us optimize service and set up networks in our homes. You will learn as much as we do and foster good will.
Hold events at Wi-Fi hotspots in the pilot area.
Give away some of the Ruckus units at the events. (Winners must prove they live in the pilot area!)
Give away some of the 3-6Mbps accounts.
Meet with the community to educate them about the Internet and wireless. Talk to PTAs, senior centers, trade groups, and neighborhood groups. Engage the people with how cool the Internet is. Don't sell anything! In fact, answer questions honestly about the competition, and discuss the pros and cons of Wi-Fi.
Start working on digital inclusion initiatives.
Engage the open source and software development community in the Twin Cities. Attend Minnebar and Minnedemo and read the blogs.
Give us cool lawn signs advertising our USI Wi-Fi connection.
As you build out, give away some accounts in each neighborhood. Hold a street party with a raffle.

Labels: broadband, minneapolis, USIW, Wi-Fi, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 6:39 PM |

Wednesday, June 06, 2007

Wi-Fi Antenna MIA

Please note the picture at the top of the page which is a Belair Wi-Fi antenna outside my window, part of the Minneapolis muni wireless. Those of you who follow the blog know that I once linked to the Internet via that antenna during the pilot project.

Well the antenna has disappeared. So has the one on the corner. My block is without antenna.

What happened?

There are upgrades going on so maybe they are coming back with a new and better antenna.
No one on my block is subscribing so they moved the antennas to a block with subscribers.
St. Paul (our twin city) is stealing the antennas to start their own municipal Wi-Fi deployment.

I think I'm at a meeting with one of the principals of US Wireless. I will let him know about the missing antenna and maybe he will have some answers.

Stay tuned.

Labels: broadband, CityLife, minneapolis, USIW, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 7:33 PM |

Monday, May 28, 2007

Philadelphia Wireless Update

Web buzz this weekend as Philadelphia approves Earthlink's 15-square-mile proof-of-concept network and Earthlink is going to begin build-out of the 135-sq.-mile system that is scheduled for completion in the third quarter of 2007.

As in Minneapolis, Earthlink is building and managing the Wi-Fi system and will share revenues with Wireless Philadelphia, a non-profit created by the city to fund digital divide/inclusion projects.

Earthlink is offering limited-time promotional rates of $6.95/month for 1 Mbps service and $9.95 for 3 Mbps service (with a 1 Mbps upload speed—why not symmetrical)? The rates will stay in place for the first six months and then go to $19.95 and $21.95 respectively.

US Internet's Minneapolis rates are much higher. There is a current deal of $14.95/month for 1 to 3 Mbps service and $24.95/month for 3 to 6 Mbps service. This will last until the network is finished. After that, basic 1 Mbps service will cost $19.95 and the higher speed will go to $29.95. US Internet does provide symmetrical connections for downloading and uploading. Personally, I'd choose the slower upload speed and lower price in Philadelphia for the 3 Mbps service.

Earthlink has the right idea for getting community buy-in to the service. At $6.95/month, I would definitely try out the wireless system while keeping my current DSL. That's harder to justify at $14.95/month—over twice the Eathlink-Philadelphia rate. Plus my expectations for customer support would be somewhat tempered at $6.95.

Current customer support and network reports are not good here in Minneapolis. Roy, my friend down the block, bought in early here in pilot project land. There were connectivity problems immediately that were finally resolved but now they are upgrading the network and he can't really rely on his connection at all. I would hope they offer him a free month of service for the problems.

My own customer service issue is with an email I sent on May 15 asking about the number of log-ins available with a single account. So far, I've heard nothing back.

Wireless
LAN News

BetaNews

Labels: broadband, digital_inclusion, USIW, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 11:10 AM |

Sunday, May 13, 2007

Anaheim Muni Wifi by Earthlink

Business Week has an article about the Earthlink Wi-Fi build-out in Anaheim. I remember that they got this contract right around the time when they were demonstrating their pilot network in North Minneapolis before Minneapolis had chosen a vendor.

Earthlink is providing internal antennas/modems for free in Anaheim. Monthly cost is slightly higher -- $21.95 compared to $19.95 -- but some of that is probably local cost of living with Anaheim on the high end.

The article is critical of municipal Wi-Fi, wondering whether the for-profit deployments can ever sustain themselves financially. From the article:

But EarthLink and other providers have struggled with low subscriber response and reliability problems, and entrenched telecom and cable giants are fighting back with alternative technologies. The question is whether municipal Wi-Fi will ever pay off, or if this grand plan to offer broadband to the masses is headed for the dustbin of history.

According to the article, Novarum, a wireless consultant, found that the Earthlinkd network was only connecting about 72% of the time. (Earthlink states that where deployed, they have at least 90% connectivity.)

So what's going to happen if a company much smaller than Earthlink deploys a municipal wireless network in a major Midwest city and discovers that their projections were in error and they are losing money?

Municipal Wi-Fi: A Failure To Communicate

Labels: broadband, politics, USIW, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 4:31 PM |

Sunday, May 06, 2007

Wireless Minneapolis: Seward & DT to go wireless

Article at Star Tribune site posted May 4:

The new Minneapolis Wi-Fi Internet access service begins May 11 in 2 square miles including the Seward neighborhood. Service begins downtown the week of May 21.

Check my last post for a look at the current wireless purchase/log-in page. The article says the cost will be $19.95 but the portal log-in says $14.95. So will the $19.95 be for new customers or are they going to raise everyone's rate?

Labels: broadband, minneapolis, USIW, wireless

- posted by Peter Fleck @ Permalink 2:24 PM |