Decius wrote:
] ] "Bell Canada recently started converting public pay
] ] phones in Toronto, Montreal, and Kingston into terminals
] ] for "Wi-Fi" Internet connections. Some U.S. phone
] ] companies may soon follow suit."
]
] I previously stated here that I think that most of the POTS
] infrastructure will be converted into interconnections for
] short range wireless systems...

I beleive this is a good idea as well. Back in the BlueStar days, I had an idea that we could use DSL to setup the backhaul for things like cellular POPs and even initiate a road based wireless network (for cars, instead of cellular). We even had several teevee stations request that we find a way to use DSL as the backhaul to their city-cams. DSL is incredibly efficient. You can use it to carry T1 bandwidth over POTS technology. And if you run ATM over it, you can do both data and voice, on demand, on the same $7/month wire.

The problem that will cause this to NOT happen is that the Bells will never go for it. They see wireless as competition to wireline, and since there's no competition to spur them on, they'll probably obfuscate the rollout of anything like this. You'd think that anything that can increase the utilization of 100-year-old plant would be good in their eyes, but it's just not so.

RE: Fortune.com - Technology - Making Pay Phones Pay