Are we wireless yet?

BY DENNIS GEISENGER

"Installation is currently in progress," is the message that appeared on US Internet's website when attempts were made last week Wednesday to order wireless internet service for parts of downtown, the University's West Bank and for the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood.

Service was scheduled for current availability in these pilot areas, but construction and technical setbacks have delayed the realization of the City of Minneapolis' plan to provide affordable high-speed wireless service for residents in all of its 59 square miles.

According to US Internet, almost 1,000 consumers have pre-registered for the service, in addition to 250 people who were allowed to sign up in the square-mile test area of east Minneapolis last year.

"The new service has not gone 'live' in any part of the city," US Internet co-founder Kurt Lange told prospective users on a Star and Tribune web blog after a critical review of his service appeared in the paper the middle of last month. "Two areas are in process but neither is live. Those areas are still being optimized and tested," he said.

"Our goal as US Internet is to make Minneapolis our showpiece and to make it perfect," said US Internet CEO Joe Caldwell in a February interview with w2fi.org/weekly. "Because that will give us the ticket to go around the country," he said.

"Any IT director who's carried out even a small-scale project within one building can tell you it’s no piece of cake,” wrote eweek's Carol Ellison about Philadelphia's wireless internet project in 2005. "Every deployment has its problems, and the bigger the deployment, the bigger the problems," she observed.

Damage to buried conduit downtown and technical problems in getting signals to go around trees are two reasons for delays to service, although tests conducted by Southside Pride have found good signal strength available in many parts of the pilot area with a laptop computer.

"The signal inside the main part of our building works OK. When you go to the back of the building, it fades." said Amanuel Godefa, an MIS instructor for the Brian Coyle Community Center, near Cedar-Riverside. Godefa is a member of the wireless project's Digital Inclusion Fund Advisory Board that will decide where the millions of dollars collected by the city from US Internet profits will be used for bridging Minneapolis' "digital divide." Godefa teaches adults, mostly immigrants and refugees from East Africa, how to use a computer.

"Fast and affordable internet service will be very valuable to our students," said Godefa.

"I'd like to concentrate more on how people use the network," said Peter Fleck, of Minneapolis, another digital board member. "There is tremendous opportunity here to do things like giving people a larger voice in the political process and creating more economic opportunity. I like the term ‘digital expansion,’ based on plans put together in Chicago for bringing that city’s population into the computer age."

Fleck served on the Minneapolis Digital Inclusion Coalition that drafted the original community benefits agreement—the part of the city's final contract with its internet provider that defined how local users will be equipped and educated in computer technology. He also currently serves on the city's Digital Inclusion Task Force Portal Committee, deciding content for community entry pages to the wireless network.

"Allowing people to work out of their homes in internet businesses could also help create 'green communities,'" said Fleck, "where people wouldn't have to drive or use other resources to make a living."

Stephen Cawley, vice president and chief information officer for the University of Minnesota, said that there have been "informal, ad hoc discussions with the city" about bringing the new network service to university students, but no timeline for the process has been set.

"There actually would be conflict with the university's existing wireless network from an engineering standpoint," Cawley said, "but it would be a good idea to have wireless service available in common areas outside.” The network currently used by the school makes internet service only accessible inside its buildings.
"I would also like to see wireless service made available on campus buses," said Cawley.

To gain access to the wireless network once it is available in your area of the city (residents will be informed by letter from US Internet Wireless), you will have the option of signing up for service by using the web portal available at www.usinternet.com or by calling the service number provided on the letter.