IP: The Internet Amenity

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

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From: Dewayne Hendricks <dewayne () warpspeed com>

The Internet Amenity

The Net Effect  By Simson Garfinkel   March 2002
<http://www.techreview.com/articles/garfinkel0302.asp>

For big organizations, hoarding wireless bandwidth costs more than giving
it away. Smell a free lunch?

  Before I started writing this column for Technology Review, I spent eight
months as the "chief scientist" for an Internet startup called
Broadband2Wireless. (In fact, I was the only scientist.) Our company tried
to build a high-speed wireless Internet service that could be accessed in
cities throughout the United States, South America, Europe and Asia. We
were going to do it using unlicensed portions of the spectrum and with
wireless network equipment that employed a hot new standard called 802.11.
And we were going to charge no more than $50 a month.

Of course, we failed. We had $30 million in funding; we needed $200
million. We had a handful of good engineers; we needed dozens.
Nevertheless, our company's basic vision was right on target. We knew that
one day there would be a pervasive wireless Internet that's as easy to use
as today's telephone network. Within 10 or 15 years' time, practically
every computer and every handheld device will be online all the time.

What many people don't realize, however, is that this visionary network is
increasingly up and running today. And it doesn't even require any new
technology, business models or significant investment. Indeed, if there is
a single difference between the Broadband2Wireless mission and the reality
of this new ubiquitous network, it's that the real wireless Internet
doesn't cost $50 a month-it's free. All that's required, really, is
openness.

One of the most surprising things we learned from launching our Internet
startup was that providing wireless Internet service is really cheap. What
ended up bankrupting the company were all the ancillary services we had to
develop-credit card billing, technical support, the corporate Web site and
the various security measures we had to put in place to prevent
unauthorized use of the network by nonsubscribers. Organizations that
aren't trying to make money providing wireless Internet service can do away
with all of these measures and offer the service for free.

This isn't just some techno-utopian notion-it's today's reality. Of course,
there's not much incentive to set up towers and deliver free wireless
broadband to homes that can't get high-speed Net access through cable
modems or digital subscriber lines. But many businesses and universities
are doing their part right now by making wireless Internet service
available without restriction in their buildings and nearby public areas.

The other day, for example, I was at the Boston University school of
journalism to have lunch with a friend, but he wasn't there. Realizing that
I was half an hour early, I took out my laptop and discovered that I was
getting an excellent signal from the school's wireless network. But I
didn't just get a signal-the university's network helpfully gave my laptop
an address on the Internet. Within moments I was downloading my e-mail and
surfing the Web. When I shut down my computer 30 minutes later, the address
was automatically returned to the university. And since the J-school's
network wasn't running at full capacity at the time, even my minor use of
bandwidth had no impact on other users. Total cost to Boston University:
zero. (The same thing happened a few weeks later when I was at Harvard's
John F. Kennedy School of Government.)

Sadly, however, not every wireless network is open. A few of the schools
and businesses that I have visited have set up blocks to lock out
"unauthorized" wireless cards-much as we tried to do at my wireless
startup. Fortunately, more organizations are realizing that its easier,
friendlier and ultimately cheaper to have a network that's open to
employees and visitors alike.

Essentially, the schools were providing me with wireless "IP tone," the
21st-century equivalent of telephone dial tone. (IP stands for Internet
Protocol.) Bring your own hardware and a wireless local-area network card,
and you can get on the Internet for free.

It's free for the schools, too. Well, almost free. Assuming an organization
already has a high-speed Internet connection and has spent $100 for a
wireless transmitter, the only real cost associated with providing this
service is the negligible amount of Internet bandwidth used by guests like
me. Since most organizations pay flat fees for their bandwidth, there is no
marginal increase associated with opening their networks to visitors. The
same principle applies to campus phones that let anyone dial an off-campus
toll-free number.

Of course, allowing strangers to tap into an organization's network does
carry some security risks. Were a visitor to use his or her laptop to
attack computers at the CIA or send out a million unsolicited e-mail
messages, the university's largesse could quickly require an expensive and
time-consuming investigation and cleanup. But the increase in risk
associated with having an open network is minuscule and, ultimately,
irrelevant. Telephones in lobbies are so useful that most companies are
willing to live with the risk that someone could use them to commission
drug deals or call in threats to the White House. With the Internet as
large as it is today, trying to increase security by restricting physical
access is a losing proposition. Besides, if bad guys are actually in your
building, keeping them off your wireless network is probably the least of
your worries.

Other organizations are experimenting with a cut-down version of IP tone
that I call "Web tone"; basically, they provide a computer with a Web
browser and a high-speed connection, but they don't let visitors plug in
their own equipment. Amtrak, for example, offers Web tone in its Acela
lounges in Boston, New York, Philadelphia and Washington, DC. "You can
access any e-mail account-MSN, Yahoo!, whatever your flavor," says Michael
Toczylowski, Amtrak's manager of station technical support.

But the problem with Web tone is that it limits you to only those services
that are available through the Web. While America Online, MSN and Yahoo!
all offer Web-based e-mail, most corporations don't. Public Web browsers
aren't particularly valuable to me because they don't allow me to download
my e-mail to my laptop and then read it later on the train. If Amtrak
provided IP tone, I could.

What makes IP tone possible is a broad collection of standards. Because I'm
writing about wireless networks, it's tempting to focus on 802.11(b)-the
standard that makes it possible to network computers over the air. But far
more important for the emergence of ubiquitous wireless connectivity are
the standards that make the Internet plug-and-play. The most important of
these standards is the Dynamic Host Configuration Protocol, which is what
my laptop used to get a temporary "lease" on an Internet address, as well
as the other information necessary to send data over the wire. For years
the support for this protocol has been a largely dormant part of the
Macintosh, Windows and Unix operating systems. Now it's actually being
used, thanks to those little "home routers" that let people share a single
high-speed Net connection among several computers in their households. As a
result, when I was at a friend's house in San Jose, CA, a few months ago,
all I had to do to get a high-speed connection for my laptop was plug it
into the wall. Everything else was automatic.

With a $50-per-month Internet connection and either a $70 router or a $150
wireless base station, any home or business can provide high-quality IP
tone. The base station makes it possible for people to use this IP tone
without stringing up any cables, which is nice-but it's the connectivity
that's the important thing.

A growing number of hotels and other businesses catering to business
travelers are trying to sell IP tone (Wayport and MobileStar are two of the
better-known players in this industry). Most provide Ethernet jacks in the
rooms; some provide wireless service. A friend of mine travels with his own
wireless hub, so he can turn any hotel's Ethernet jack into a wireless
service. To me that seems excessive, but he likes the freedom of being able
to take his laptop anywhere in the room, or out on the balcony.

Ultimately, IP tone becomes valuable not when it is just in your hotel room
but when you can count on it being everywhere. I have it in my house for
guests. My friends have it in their offices. This is the friendly future
that I see starting to shape up: instead of seeing Internet connectivity as
a profit center, my guess is that businesses, universities and government
facilities are going to provide IP tone to visitors for the same reason
that they offer free local telephone service, water and the use of rest
rooms-it makes the environment warmer, friendlier and more productive.

Do your part: set up an open network today.

Simson Garfinkel writes on information technology and its impact. He is the
author of Database Nation (O'Reilly, 2000).



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