I know an old folkie by the name of McGuinn. From the lofty peak of a life full of strange and wonderful experiences he keeps coming back to some wisdom that was laid down a couple of thousand years ago: ‘To everything there is a season and a time for every purpose under heaven.’ I can hardly disagree.
You will recall a few years back that Larry Ellison, the nuclear-capable CEO of Oracle, pumped the concept of network computers and Internet appliances full of hot air. As usual, the vicious circle of over promising and under delivering laid waste to what was otherwise a sound idea. A combination of technical, infrastructural and social pieces were missing from the Internet appliance puzzle back when the concept was first lofted. But there are signs that this phenomenon is about to spring to life at long last.
Point your browser at eBay and search on 3Com Audrey. 3Com unceremoniously dumped Audrey last spring after making a dog’s dinner out of a retail channel strategy that was supposed to reinvigorate the company. The Kerbango Internet radio was also a casualty. However at a very keen price point and in five retro colours, Audrey is very much alive on eBay.
Now that a good tranche of Internet bandwidth is available in even the meanest US household (and soon, too, this emerald isle?) and that ‘e-mail’ and ‘Web’ are words uttered by babes hardly out of arms, Audrey could find a place in many domestic situations. I have one on my kitchen counter where it serves as the 21st century equivalent of a fridge magnet plugged into my (sometimes) DSL-powered network. However, my Audrey is a brazen hussy compared to the demure device that 3Com had in mind.
You see, Audrey has fallen into disreputable company. The hacker community has found a new focus for their affections. My Audrey has been hacked so that she runs two or three times as fast as intended by merely re-soldering a couple of connections and adding a small fan. Her software has been perverted as well. 3Com built Audrey on top of a QNX kernel and that is close enough to Linux for the fans of that operating platform to rub their hands together with glee.
My Audrey boasts a shell prompt and that is the gateway to making Audrey and others like her into exactly the kind of Internet appliance to suit a family, a small business, a remote terminal in a dispersed enterprise and indeed a special purpose terminal for any network.
Part of the 3Com plan was for a back channel of revenue from e-commerce sources (Drugstore.com et al.) that were pre-programmed into Audrey. That went out the window with so much new economy ephemera leaving Audrey rather thinly supported for a public that was asked to pay $500 for an Audrey during Christmas 2000.
Never fear, the Linux community has been at work. The Web now is brimming with hack tips and tools so that the redundant channel knob on Audrey’s front can be put to whatever use the owner fancies. I have mine pointed at CNN.com, BBC.co.uk, The Weather Underground, Google, eBay, an MP3 player and a local traffic situation site. I’d argue that with the possible exception of eBay and the music channel, those would be good general information sources to have in any corporate waiting room or available at the twist of a dial to any employee.
The one thing that Audrey isn’t ever going to do on me is elope. She is securely tethered to my counter by a power cable and UTP harness. But she may soon have sisters with more ability to get out and see the world. Wyse, the leader of the thin client world, is looking to make mobile thin clients in the future. Why would it consider this?
The piece of the puzzle that has been missing for itinerant bandwidth junkies in need of mobile network computers or Internet appliances is now being supplied (in the US so far) by Boingo, a silly name for a very serious company being headed by one of America’s founding ISP captains.
Lest you think I am filling this sacred page with more non-applicable Yankee frippery, Boingo could be cloned and rolled out in Ireland by anyone for not much money and in a very short space of time. It seems like the verse for WiFi, catchy though it has been thus far, is about to be set to new music.
Even given the modest growth of the WiFi (or IEEE 802.11b) market, I have seen the cost of PC card or USB devices that speak its wireless wavelength drop from hundreds of dollars per item to about $50. It will probably halve again in the next year. The year after that? Probably built into many mobile devices as a premium feature. And wallpaper status for WiFi by 2005?
Boingo’s business is to put WiFi ‘hotspots’ in places where travelling business people would love to have broadband Internet connectivity: this is the Starbuck’s WiFi idea without the £2.00 large half-decaf skinny latte. Unlike previous attempts to unwire significant chunks of the globe, Boingo is aimed at individual users that can pay a flat level subscription or a la carte according to their use.
Another thing that makes Boingo a thing for this time is the understanding that computer users aren’t all hackers. Despite my shell prompt adventures with my new girlfriend, there are times I just want things to work. Know what I mean? Boingo has created really really simple client software for mobile PCs with WiFi cards that hides all the gears and levers to the almost universal acclaim of the rapidly swelling ranks of Boingo users.
Road warriors, and I frequently count myself in that downtrodden class, have had a good turn out of services like GRIC or iPASS or have signed up for ubiquitous ISPs like AOL or MSN in desperation. But these are only useful with a willing telephone socket and a length of wire and time to fiddle about with access numbers and flaky service providers. Boingo blows that away. Find a hot spot and log in. No muss, no fuss.
Furthermore, the security travails of WiFi have been well documented and, even with its native security switched on (something most neglect to do), your radio-borne digital stream can be purloined.
If you are dealing with corporate or government data so hot that you have a spook on your tail waiting for you to stick your 2.4 GHz head above the parapet, then you really shouldn’t be interested in this at all. For the rest of us with confidential sales info, office gossip about the boss or a girlfriend on the side, there is enough security to be had with readily available tools to suffice.
Bluetooth is another long time coming technology. But it has arrived in my Ericsson T39 cellphone not coincidentally a long time after a TDK Blue5 wound up strapped to the back of my Palm V (they also do Blue5 for M500 series users).
What could be more natural than using your handheld data container to send SMS messages, look up and dial contacts, or even do a bit of WAP or Web surfing when far away from any telephone socket (or in advance of any Boingo hotspot appearing where you are)? Your phone stays safely in your pocket and, through the miracle of Bluetooth, calls can be transferred wirelessly to your ear (or car kit) as required.
Bluetooth has been well worth waiting for even if the range is nowhere near the 10m range advertised. My pocket, palm and ear are not even a metre apart. Installation was a doddle and enjoyment was instant. A bit more work on the dialler interface should be forthcoming soonish. TDK gets full marks for a whimsical sounding utility called ‘Find phone’. My phone is smaller than an average bar of chocolate, so using Bluetooth to make it ring so that it draws attention to itself when I’ve mislaid it, is a useful feature. BlueV is a tad expensive at the moment but worth it (somewhere north of £150) but the usual erosion will doubtless put it within reach of everyone with a need in the next year.
Sometimes the IT wheel turns slowly but good ideas nearly always tend to come around in their own good time, surprisingly, with other useful bits tacked on. It’s a shame that the bad ideas seem to have their season for untimely reappearance, too. I’ll leave the debating of Internet de jure standards and implementation de facto standards for the next time but there are some big expensive mistakes about to be made in the world of Web services.
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