802.11b Networking News reported
it first – and Slashdot
followed up. Yes, that’s right, the new Sputnik Community Gateway has been formally released.
The most
important new features are:
- PCI card support
- PLX card support
- Linux kernel 2.4.18 (latest and greatest)
- Enhanced autoconfig of 802.11b card drivers
- Support for the latest PCMCIA cards based on both the Intersil PRISM 2
and PRISM 2.5 chipsets
- Smaller ISO image (was 49 MB, now 30 MB)
Understandably, support for PCI/PLX cards has been the most requested
feature. We worked with Jouni Malinen to get some bugs in the PCI/PLX
Linux drivers fixed and he really came through. We’ve seen significantly
improved bandwidth figures when using the PCI cards – on the order of a
20-30% improvement over the PCMCIA cards. Now people can create APs
using just about any old hardware, including those 486 doorstops piled
up in basements across the land.
This release also coincides with a major website update that reflects
our changed focus on building enterprise products. We are not going to
charge for the Sputnik Network, ever. We hope that community networks
will use the Network as an easy way to roam, and developers will use it
to test out their Sputnik apps.
We’re still working on the Enterprise gateway, which has a whole bunch
of other cool features, including the robust backend management console,
rogue AP detection, and more. Expect that release this summer.
Related posts:
And the Unique Selling Proposition to potential sites goes away… and the fire goes out.
Tell me why I’m wrong.
It really came down to this: We couldn’t figure out a way to make money
doing the joltage/boingo thing, i.e. get people to set up hotspots and
then do revenue shares with the hotspot operators. Essentially, there
are two big problems with the model:
1) AUPs. Most inexpensive wireless broadband access have some pretty
restrictive Acceptable Use Policies, and they usually include a “no
sharing your bandwidth” provision. Of course, the way around this is to
work out deals with the cable co’s and ILECs so that we give a revenue
share back to them as well. Unforunately, the slices of the pie keep
getting slimmer and slimmer, even if you assume that you can work a deal
with the local monopoly^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H^H broadband provider.
2) Customer Service. Know the cornerstone reason why AOL was so
profitable for so many years? Because they perfected the art of
eliminating customer service calls. This is the bane of so many
thin-margin businesses (see point 1 above). One call to your 800 number
can blow your profit on that customer for the month, or even the year.
Now factor into the equation that you don’t control AP placement,
coverage, equipment, or internet uplink, and the customer service issues
start to look VERY unattractive. Think about what happens when someone
is paying you $19.95/month, getting great access via their neighbor’s
DSL connection, and then their neighbor decides to move. All of a
sudden you have a dissatisfied customer, and absolutely no way to
control or predict when these situations will arise. Have it happen
enough times and your reputation is totally shot.
So, we decided to change our model. We still believe in secure
authenticated roaming, and we still believe in community networking, all
we did was remove the subscriber fee and revenue share part of the
model. This way, people can set up nodes, and can easily particiapte in
a worldwide network of free community nodes as well.
If you want to be a commercial WISP, great, more power to ya, we’re glad
to sell you the infrastructure and management software that will turn
you into a WISP. If you want to deply secure 802.11 networks across
your enterprise, you can take proven technology and authenticate against
your chosen single-sign-on system, be it RADIUS, LDAP, NDS, Active
Directory, or whatever, and the APs enforce policy, like bandwidth
shaping and per-user firewalling based on that policy as well.
I hope that further clarifies what we at Sputnik did, and where we
stand in relation to all the great community network initiatives out
there.
Dave