With the recent announcement of Amazon's e-book reader with wireless syncing, and this year's triumph with the iPhone, it has me thinking about the future of wireless devices.
For some time now, mobile carriers such as AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, etc... have offered data service, "the Internet", separate from phone service (but conditional on phone service), for a separate fee. It allows you to access the internet with varied efficiency. The first deviation we've seen from this are the broadband cards, as offered by Verizon (and some others I believe,), which are essentially a data chipset and power router that just plugs into your pc or laptop and provides internet access. Also a monthly fee.
I'm starting to wonder, given the very limited use so far of this technology, what the next step is and what i may look like. What it comes down to is this.......
......When will start to see gadgets sold by companies other than cell carriers that come with a monthly fee to use the company's own proprietary wifi service? Amazon's e-book reader is a perfect example of a device that would benefit from such a prospect. You buy the e-book reader, and pay $5 or $10 monthly to have internet access from it. Anywhere.
This may seem out of reach at the time, but its the future. It will happen. But when it does, what shape can we expect it to take?
Is it more likely for individual companies to have their own network ( or simply granting commissioned access to existing network(s) already in place and owned by the congloms).....
Or is it more likely for them to offer localized access, ie: A Wifi network available in major cities, maybe even smaller towns., just not the inbetween, which means ALMOST everywhere.
For some time now, mobile carriers such as AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, etc... have offered data service, "the Internet", separate from phone service (but conditional on phone service), for a separate fee. It allows you to access the internet with varied efficiency. The first deviation we've seen from this are the broadband cards, as offered by Verizon (and some others I believe,), which are essentially a data chipset and power router that just plugs into your pc or laptop and provides internet access. Also a monthly fee.
I'm starting to wonder, given the very limited use so far of this technology, what the next step is and what i may look like. What it comes down to is this.......
......When will start to see gadgets sold by companies other than cell carriers that come with a monthly fee to use the company's own proprietary wifi service? Amazon's e-book reader is a perfect example of a device that would benefit from such a prospect. You buy the e-book reader, and pay $5 or $10 monthly to have internet access from it. Anywhere.
This may seem out of reach at the time, but its the future. It will happen. But when it does, what shape can we expect it to take?
Is it more likely for individual companies to have their own network ( or simply granting commissioned access to existing network(s) already in place and owned by the congloms).....
Or is it more likely for them to offer localized access, ie: A Wifi network available in major cities, maybe even smaller towns., just not the inbetween, which means ALMOST everywhere.
