For about $10 million, city officials believe they can turn all 135 square miles of Philadelphia into the world’s largest wireless Internet hot spot.
The ambitious plan, now in the works, would involve placing hundreds, or maybe thousands of small transmitters around the city – probably atop lampposts. Each would be capable of communicating with the wireless networking cards that now come standard with many computers.
Once complete, the network would deliver broadband Internet almost anywhere radio waves can travel – including poor neighborhoods where high-speed Internet access is now rare.
Judy Newman says that Mayor Dave is in favor of it (count me as a skeptic on this one. The Madison airport, as of August, 2004 still does not have wireless internet, otherwise known as wi-fi. Most other airports have had it for years). True two way high speed internet access should be a public good, just like our roads and utilities. This is the economic issue for the state.