It's wireless not hopeless at least for now

I'm a fixed broadband wireless believer. I've followed the industry for years, appreciating its potential when others scoffed, cheering its technological innovations and quick-strike capability.

I have a confession to make. I'm a Philadelphia Eagles fan, which means, of course, I'm a masochist. I bleed green — or whatever they call that hideous marketing-influenced shade the behemoths are wearing these days. I devote my autumn Sundays to watching the Iggles lose in places like Washington and Dallas and, most despicably, the Northern New Jersey Meadowlands, where the oxymoronically labeled New York Giants hold sway.

This last season was a personal nightmare. Sixty miles up the turnpike, the despicable Giants advanced to the Super Bowl, and 90 miles down I-95, the transplanted Cleveland Browns, posing as the Baltimore Ravens, accomplished what they'd never been able to do when stationed at the Mistake on the Lake and won the whole thing.

Of course, ignoring two embarrassing showings, I had foolishly hoped that the overmatched Eagles would not lose a third time to the Giants in the playoffs.

I know I should give up and spend my Sundays doing something more constructive — like building competitive local exchange networks — but I don't because, as I said, I'm a masochist and the Eagles generally play on Sundays.

Which explains my other confession. I'm a fixed broadband wireless believer. I've followed the industry for years, appreciating its potential when others scoffed, cheering its technological innovations and quick-strike capability and wondering when all that talent would come around and trample the opposition.

I watched the fixed-wireless industry bulk up with two-way spectrum, digital technology and, most important, money. I watched it build a winning game plan around high-speed data delivery. Finally, I reached the point where I honestly believed that this industry could succeed. I even convinced myself that attending its trade shows was not a futile gesture but a glimpse into the future of a telecommunications leader.

Fixed wireless was that close to succeeding, I thought. Cable had missed wiring the small and medium-sized businesses that had sprouted like mushrooms on the cities' edges, and telcos couldn't be bothered to offer advanced technologies, reasonable prices or, for that matter, reason at all. A wireless antenna was a big stick that could sledgehammer a competitive opening. People could be served by more than one carrier.

This year's wireless campaign ended about the same time the Eagles rolled over in the North Jersey mud. February was still exercising its winter blahs when the fixed broadband wireless pooh-bahs started making excuses. There are no standards. The players don't like each other. The financial market looks bad. The technology isn't ready.

With the probable exception of Sprint, which I see as akin to Donovan McNabb's one-man heroics with the Eagles, there hasn't been much good news about fixed broadband wireless this year. Players with potential in the commercial market — Winstar and Teligent — learned that things are tough when you don't have money. Others in the residential space are so used to doing whatever it takes to survive that it's surprising a television network hasn't built a reality show around them.

Still, there are vestiges of hope. The vendor community is, to some extent, coalescing around standards. Service providers are mining small, underserved veins of customers. And of course, Sprint, with its deep pockets, stubborn determination and innate talent, is doing some dangerous scrambling that has opponents' heads spinning.

It's a long season. Maybe there will be some wireless touchdowns to celebrate before the industry convenes in Boston in June. Or maybe it's time for me to do something more productive with my time — like move to Chicago and root for the Cubs.

Contact Jim Barthold at jbarthold@intertec.com