TowerStream, the fixed wireless company which has been making steady progress, has finally been discovered by The New York Times. I wrote about them in 2003, and have marveled at their progress. Times, like other media, continues to flub the facts. Tower Stream is a fixed wireless company which uses gear built with proprietary technology. It is not a WiMAX company, like Times says. WiMAX label on everything is just such a misnomer, and marketing-speak promoted by the likes of Intel. I wonder why it is taken as gospel by reporters, even at the Times.
In the article there is this quote with respect to their pricing:
TowerStream charges $500 a month for a 1.54-megabits-a-second connection, about one-third to one-half less than the cost of service on comparable T1 lines.
Considering the capacity that is becoming available for some broadband services to both homes and businesses these seems quite expensive to me. Since TowerStream serve big city markets that tend to have more competitive bandwidth options I don’t see how they can mantain this price point. Just a quick tour around the web is showing business T1 Internet access at prices half of what these guys are charging.