Information Research Weblog

I forgot to add to the last entry that 802.11b clearly has significant implications for organizations as well as communities. Public libraries, for example, could provide wireless internet connection within the walls of their central libraries and perhaps, money and other things allowing, their branch libraries. The same goes for university libraries, student unions, halls of residence, and individual departments.

In fact Apple already promote their AirPort Extreme, which can serve 50 users at a time. And, at the end of last year, Bell Canada announced that it was converting payphone sites in Montreal and Toronto into wireless access points. The press release notes that libraries have expressed an interest in the system and that analysts suggest that their will be a $9.5 billion market by 2007.

As usual, there are early adopters around: the University of Texas at Arlington has wireless connectivity in its Central Library, Architecture & Fine Arts Library, and Science & Engineering Library as does Hofstra University School of Law [whenever I read about Hofstra I can't help thinking of Bill Cosby's famous story about playing football (American) for Temple and coming up agains the Hofstra team - hilarious], and Library Journal reported last October on three public libraries providing wireless internet access in Virginia, Indiana and Florida.

Keep abreast of things via the 80211b Weblog - and start preparing a paper on the subject for Information Research!