I believe Jo Twist is a subscriber to TELECOM-CITIES. Nice quotes!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/4770188.stm
Wi-fi set to re-wire social rules
By Mark Ward
Technology Correspondent, BBC News website
With more people now using broadband rather than dial-up and online shopping
soaring during the weeks before Christmas, there is no doubt that Britons
are big fans of the net.
But most of that home net use occurs when people sit at a computer in a back
bedroom, study or lounge.
Increasing numbers of people use wi-fi in their homes so they can tote their
laptop around and surf in the kitchen, garden or garage; but still the
experience remains stubbornly tethered to a home connection.
This could be about to undergo a big change.
A click away
For some time, many cafes, libraries, shops, stations, airports and
restaurants have been installing wi-fi access points so customers can surf
the web as they eat, browse or wait.
In some British cities, plans are advancing to set up so many hotspots that
entire neighbourhoods become wi-fi enabled. One of the biggest will be in
London's Square Mile; it will give more than 350,000 workers always-on
access to the net.
At the same time, many local authorities have equipped kiosks with wireless
access so their residents can use the web when they are on the High Street.
These moves to set up wi-fi zones rather than just hotspots look set to let
people take their online lives with them wherever they are.
Dr Jo Twist, senior research fellow at the Institute for Public Policy
Research, said once the net was ubiquitous like power and water, it had the
potential to be "transformative".
The divide that separates people from their online lives will utterly
disappear. Instead of leaving behind all those net-based friends and
activities when you walk out of your front door, you will be able to take
them with you.
The buddies you have on instant message networks, friends and family on
e-mail, your eBay auctions, your avatars in online games, the TV shows you
have stored on disk, your digital pictures, your blog - everything will be
just a click away.
It could also kick off entirely new ways of living, working and playing. For
instance, restaurant reviews could be geographically tagged so as soon as
you approach a cafe or coffee shop, the views of recent diners could scroll
up on your handheld gadget.
Alternative reality games could also become popular. These use actors in
real world locations to play out the ultimate interactive experience.
Digital divisions
Key to the transformation, said Dr Twist, would be mobile devices that can
use wi-fi. These handsets are only just starting to appear but will likely
cram a huge amount of functions into one gadget.
Dr Twist believes the move could start to close the digital divide.
"If we have a ubiquitous, cheap or free wireless network that our portable
and mobile devices can access, therefore skipping the need for a pricey PC,
then that could be incredibly empowering for lots of people," she said.
Such a situation offered all kinds of opportunities for education, training
and regeneration.
"It could be really empowering and it could help encourage innovative uses
of that network which enliven our public spaces as well as our networks with
each other," said Dr Twist.
But, she added, the stumbling block could be the price of access to
ubiquitous wireless networks. At the moment, net use is a pastime of the
relatively well-off. Without moves to make access more affordable, net use
will remain a divisive force.
What also needs to be confronted are the potential privacy and liberty
implications of such an always-online world.
"When chips, sensors, and wireless devices mesh together, there may be some
unintended consequences," said Dr Twist.
"We have to make sure we think about those, and think about what other
exclusions might be brought about by those developments, too."
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