Silicon Valley to become one ginormous WiFi hotspot

Silicon Valley can't be shown up by, say, Singapore, now can it? That's why the Wireless Silicon Valley Task Force has selected the Silicon Valley Metro Connect, a tech consortium that includes IBM and Cisco to build a giant WiFi network for the region. When built, this massive WiFi hotspot will span 1500 square miles (nearly 3900 sq. km), from the city of South San Francisco to Santa Cruz, a distance of over 60 linear miles (96 km). The plan, for now is to have free access for local residents via advertising, but higher bandwidth applications like VoIP or streaming video would cost extra, reports The Associated Press. No word on how GoogleFi fits into all of this, given that Mountain View is part of this territory. Perhaps Google will use its other stronghold in San Francisco to make a power play for the rest of the Peninsula -- creating one giant battleground of free wireless internet access. Still, WiFi for the SiVi is superfly.

[Chris @ Sep 6th 2006 5:03PM]

What, no love for the peninsula?

[Eugene @ Sep 6th 2006 5:15PM]

man I wish they have a date for when this will start I live in Fremont CA so this will be awsome, great use for wi fi phones

[ElectroGeek @ Sep 6th 2006 5:42PM]

Chicago already has that plan in the works for 228 square miles however it's not free. When will it will actually happen? Who knows. This was an old story I previously published here:

http://www.electrogeek.com/blog/2006/02/18/chicago-gets-wired-for-wifi/

[CharlieX @ Sep 6th 2006 6:04PM]

as our brains slowly cook from all the high energy radio wave bombardment. woot! woot!

[Ghetto Pete @ Sep 6th 2006 6:19PM]

What about Oakland? bastards...........

[Cyrus Farivar @ Sep 6th 2006 6:20PM]

Yeah Oaktown! It's coming, dude:

http://cyrusfarivar.com/blog/?p=1125

[DR BUZZ0 @ Sep 6th 2006 6:39PM]

Quote: as our brains slowly cook from all the high energy radio wave bombardment. woot! woot!


God. Not again. Not again. This is driving me freakin crazy. Seriously. Dude. Please don't be stupid.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverse_Square_Law

http://hps.org/publicinformation/ate/cat60.html

Okay.. the second link refers to cell phones, but the same principals apply, as both opperate at low power in the low-microwave area (L and S bands).

[Cade @ Sep 6th 2006 7:11PM]

Ok, but how about answering what we're all thinking. When will it come to rural Minnesota?

[CharlieX @ Sep 6th 2006 7:21PM]

i am so tired of sarcasm being interpreted as ignorance. of course it isn't going to fry anyone's brain. good lord in digital medical heaven.

please smoke a fatty and r-e-l-a-x. strap a couple cell phones to your johnson and run around making lengthy calls. "stick your head in microwave and get yourself a tan."

[Oddmanout @ Sep 6th 2006 7:37PM]

What is that map actually showing ? The darkend area doesn't extend all the way to south city, so this map can't actually be showing the proposed coverage area....which is a reliefe since I'm from Redwood City, and that map leaves us out in the cold cold unconnected purgatory that is suburbia sans-wifi...

Just curious...

[sam @ Sep 6th 2006 7:53PM]

according to slightly more detailed article in the chronicle it's actually as far north as daly city. and all cities in san mateo and santa clara counties are involved.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2006/09/06/BUG90KVS8N1.DTL

[Mark Roberts @ Sep 6th 2006 9:14PM]

I am hooking up Deep Ellum TX. Little smaller area. Much smaller budget. The hardware has gotten cheap and there are tons of really great open source software solutions.

Yep, I'm a geek. Just wish I was a smart geek.

[Jordan Amdahl @ Sep 6th 2006 11:06PM]

Berkeley better be in on this...

[Aaron Davidson @ Sep 6th 2006 11:13PM]

Did anyone not see this?

[T @ Sep 6th 2006 11:15PM]

The map isn't of proposed coverage; it's a political map showing the divisions of Santa Cruz, San Mateo, Alameda, and Santa Clara (label mostly cut off) counties.

See them all here:

http://www.baprivateschools.com/images/counties4.gif

[Rodman @ Sep 7th 2006 4:31AM]

Maybe some people in the Bay Area may get to choose from more than one (ad supported) WiFi provider. Perhaps all the street lights and tall structures in the region will eventually have radios mounted on them.
http://www.fostercity.org/community_info/telecomm/Wi-Fi-Services-Come-to-Foster-City.cfm

[Paul @ Sep 7th 2006 1:38PM]

How come non of these reports ever give download speeds? Anything less than 2 mbps is almost worthless. Might as well be dial-up.

[ryan @ Sep 7th 2006 5:37PM]

Crap, and just when i aggeed to move to Miami for work. Oh well.

[Ware @ Sep 7th 2006 6:32PM]

You said the magic words, Santa Cruz...

[APortillo @ Sep 7th 2006 7:31PM]

So.... Sacramento is out?

[JohnnyC @ Sep 7th 2006 11:14PM]

Free WiFi means one thing to me.

Market research. Supposedly anonymous data collection of web usage trends to sell as marketing strategy. Sounds cinical, maybe, but think of it this way. Your ISP that you are PAYING for their service probably can't get away with the resale of said information. But someone offering to be a free ISP just may be able to.

OK, I'm not saying that this specific network is for. What I am saying is that it WILL happen, if it hasn't already.

[JohnnyC @ Sep 7th 2006 11:16PM]

Apologies for the poor grammar and spelling... I'm very, very tired.

[wade @ Nov 18th 2008 11:54PM]

Still not sure if wi-fi is the best technology for outdoor wireless but hey... the spectrum is free so I guess it makes economic sense.

Wade
82nd street hotspot software