ReasonedResponse.com

Over on GigaOm, Worldwide Lexicon founder Brian McConnell has blogged about the reasons why municipal Wi-Fi has been an astounding disaster, and what can be done to fix it.

He's half right.

McConnell correctly notes that one of the biggest problems was that Wi-Fi advocates completely misunderstood who used public Wi-Fi.  He notes that "muni W-Fi proponents have misunderstood how the Internet is used in public spaces, primarily by assuming that people who can afford laptops are somehow unable to afford Internet access."

That's one of the reasons.  You can also add lack of planning, poor reception, technical obstacals, abysmal security and the "somebody else will pay for all this" mentality that seems to follow these projects, but I won't quibble.

McConnel then goes on, however, to state that the problem of serving the poor and minority could be handled by giving anyone who can't afford broadband a cell phone data plan and a data-enabled cell phone.  McConnel elegantly puts it this way:

"It seems reasonable to me to require mobile operators -- as a condition for siting cell towers throughout a community -- to provide basic service to users who can't afford it."

Pardon me for saying this, but I think most municipal governments would chew off their arms rather than give up a sheckel of the loot they extort from the cell phone companies for the right to build towers.  They are unlikely to give up the loot in particular to help poor people get cell phones.  Still and all...

McConnell should get high marks for a good idea.  He begins with the premise that public-private partnerships could be a good idea in the cell phone market, and that expanded use of data on cell phones would be helpful to some poor people.  He even takes the tech community to task -- rightly, IMHO -- for its arrogance:

"Most of us who read this site take communication for granted, and frankly, have a warped view of what people outside the tech industry need. Talk to a tradesperson or someone who falls under the category of the "working poor" and you'll get a much different view of what's important (things like an affordable place to live, basic services, the means to find work and get things done)."

But McConnell's idea suffers from the same major flaw as arguments for municipal Wi-Fi.  It's based on wishful thinking, not on data.  McConnell must know that even poor families already have cell phones, and that plans exist to help them with "lifeline" services.  Likewise, I don't think that the problem is that people can't get reasonably-priced plans for mobile communication, even if they involve pre-paid phones.

The problem remains literacy, and computer literacy.  All the infrastructure in the world won't help if Johnny can't read.  And that's the crushing problem that is holding back the national adoption of broadband, more than any other single factor.  Not deployment.  Not cost.  Not competition.

Literacy.

McConnell is on the right track -- public private partnerships, helping poor people become economically independent, and helping them to upgrade to better plans as they can afford them.  He should be encouraged to take the next steps to flesh out his ideas with more and better data.

And if they are thinking clearly, the mobile communication companies will help fund that effort.