A wireless Internet service provider is an Internet service provider with a network based
on wireless networking.
Technology may include commonplace Wi-Fi wireless mesh networking, or proprietary equipment
designed to operate over open 900 MHz, 2.4 GHz, 4.9, 5.2, 5.4, 5.7, and 5.8 GHz bands
or licensed frequencies in the UHF band and LMDS
In the US, the Federal Communications Commission released Report and Order, FCC 05-56 in 2005
that revised the FCC’s rules to open the 3650 MHz band for terrestrial wireless broadband
operations.
On November 14, 2007 the Commission released Public Notice in which the Wireless Telecommunications
Bureau announced the start date for licensing and registration process for the 3650-3700
MHz band.
History Initially, WISPs were only found in rural
areas not covered by cable or DSL.
The first WISP in the world was LARIAT, a non-profit rural telecommunications cooperative
founded in 1992 in Laramie, Wyoming.
LARIAT originally used WaveLAN equipment, manufactured by the NCR Corporation, which
operated on the 900 MHz unlicensed radio band.
LARIAT was taken private in 2003 and continues to exist as a for-profit wireless ISP.
Another early WISP was a company called Internet Office Parks in Johannesburg, South Africa
that was founded by Roy Pater, Brett Airey and Attila Barath in January 1996 when they
realized the South African Telco, Telkom could not keep up with the demand for dedicated
Internet links for business use.
Using what was one of the first wireless LAN products available for wireless barcode scanning
in stores, called Aironet, they worked out if they ran a dedicated Telco link into the
highest building in a business area or CBD they could wirelessly "cable" up all the other
buildings back to this main point and would only require one link from the Telco to connect
up hundreds of businesses at the same time.
In turn each "satellite" building was wired up with Ethernet so each business connected
into the Ethernet LAN and could instantly get Internet access.
Due to the immaturity of wireless technology, security issues and being forced constantly
by Telkom SA to cease its service, the company closed its doors in Jan 1999.
There were 879 Wi-Fi based WISPs in the Czech Republic as of May 2008, making it the country
with most Wi-Fi access points in the whole EU.
The providing of wireless Internet has a big potential of lowering the "digital gap" or
"Internet gap" in the developing countries.
Geekcorps actively help in Africa with among others wireless network building.
An example of a typical WISP system is such as the one deployed by Gaiacom Wireless Networks
which is based on WiFi standards.
The One Laptop per Child project strongly relies on good Internet connectivity, which
can most likely be provided in rural areas only with satellite or wireless network Internet
access.
Overview WISPs often offer additional services like
location based content, Virtual Private Networking and Voice over IP.
Isolated municipal ISPs and larger state-wide initiatives alike are tightly focused on wireless
networking.
WISPs are predominantly in rural environments where cable and digital subscriber lines are
not available.
WiMax is expected to become mainstream in the near future, bringing with it dramatic
changes to the marketplace by increasing the number of interoperable equipment on the market
and making mobile data transmission feasible, increasing the utility of such networks in
rural environments.
However, high-bandwidth wireless backhauls are already common in major cities, providing
levels of bandwidth previously only available through expensive fiber optic connections.
Typically, the way that a WISP operates is to pull a large and usually expensive point
to point connection to the center of the area they wish to serve.
From here, they will need to find some sort of elevated point in the region, such as a
radio or water tower, on which to mount their equipment.
The WISP may also connect to a PoP and then backhaul to their towers, reducing the need
to pull a point to point connection to the tower.
On the consumer's side, they will mount a small dish or antenna to the roof of their
home and point it back to the WISP's nearest antenna site.
When operating over the tightly limited range of the heavily populated 2.4 GHz band, as
nearly all 802.11-based WiFi providers do, it is not uncommon to also see access points
mounted on light posts and customer buildings.
Since it is difficult for a single service provider to build an infrastructure that offers
global access to its subscribers, roaming between service providers is encouraged by
the Wi-Fi Alliance with the protocol WISPr is a set of recommendations approved by the
alliance which facilitate inter-network and inter-operator roaming of Wi-Fi users.
Modern wireless services have comparable latency to other terrestrial broadband networks
Technology problems Line-of-sight and non-line-of-sight propagation
See also Wireless local loop
ConnectKentucky Geekcorps
Neighbourhood Internet Service Provider Satellite Internet access
Motorola Canopy MikroTik
References
External links WISPA - a trade association for WISP owner/operators
Wireless ISP FAQ Media
Daily Wireless – Wireless ISP news Want Wireless Broadband Today?
Try a WISP