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By Dr.
Philip Baczewski, Director of Academic Computing and User Services
There's a catch phrase in
the networking industry. It's the last mile. Simply stated, the last
mile is the link that connects your computer, wherever that may be,
to the high-speed data infrastructure that now crisscrosses the U.S.
and most of the globe. It's that last mile which has been one of the
greatest challenges in developing a high-speed networking presence
in the U.S.
Technology past and present
In the early days of the Internet, the last mile consisted mostly of
dialup connections via phone modems. To many of us, this connection
is represented by that little bouncy modulated sound that the modem
would make just before it finalized the connection and allowed you
to exhale in relief. These days, the last mile is more likely to be
a broadband connection such as cable modem, DSL, or even fiber-optic
cable directly to your residence.
If you are lucky enough to have one of these broadband connections, your
options still may be limited. Competition for the last mile has been
fierce and not always fair. All players, whether they be cable
companies or phone companies, have jostled to keep, as much as they
can, their monopoly provided by their historic position as public
utilities. But these days, you can get phone service over the
Internet and receive TV programming over your phone service.
One other characteristic of the last mile is that it is fixed to one
location. Your DSL does not leave the house with you when you go to
work. Your cable modem isn't with you while you are awaiting your
flight at the airport. For these situations, we've relied on either
WiFi (wireless Internet) or cellular broadband technologies. WiFi
service tends to have to come with a cup of coffee, and won't move
with you if you are mobile.
Cellular broadband is only broadband compared to how slow data
travels over a regular cellular connection. On the horizon, however, is
another technology to traverse that last mile.
Technology of the future
WiMAX, sounds like
it should be some kind of WiFi on steroids and perhaps that's a good
description, but not exactly a technical one. WiMAX measures its range
in miles rather than feet. WiMAX may provide a respectable 10 Megabit
per second upload and download speed at a range of several miles. It may
provide that connectivity for your last mile at home and travel with you
as you roam the physical or virtual landscape.
Of course, the operative word is "may" since no one has actually
implemented a commercial WiMAX service. That may change this coming
April if Sprint is true to its announcement at the recent
Consumer Electronics
Show held in Las Vegas, Nevada. Sprint plans cards for laptops or
modems for home desktops, so competition may actually start to heat up
for the last mile. Sprint will test the product in several urban markets
and perhaps then start to build out their infrastructure across the U.S.
Any new alternative to last mile connectivity can only lower costs by
increasing competition. Sprint is not making any claims regarding their
pricing except to imply that their rates will be competitive. One thing
that may help the development of WiMAX is the impending switch to
exclusive
HDTV broadcasts. This will finally free up a chunk of communication
spectrum to be auctioned off by the U.S. government as a way to rescue
the federal budget and save us all from social insecurity. A real
benefit may be that some of the spectrum will be available to support
the expansion of WiMAX service.
So look for a new option coming to support your last mile to the
Internet. It will probably take a couple of years to get here, but it
could dramatically change the penetration of high-speed Internet service
in the U.S. Until then, we'll just have to keep trudging that mile along
whatever road will take us.
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