Abstract
With an alarmingly low teledensity in South Africa, just 12%, and not much hope of further wired infrastructure at the local loop level, as the costs incurred are high compared to potential revenue, wireless connectivity could be a great asset and service in South Africa. However, the use of unlicensed spectrum in building wireless networks can be comparable to “The Tragedy of the Commons”, the result of selfish behaviour towards common and limited resources. This paper evaluates the use of 802.11 wireless technologies in building a broadband wireless network and the effects of high amounts of interference on such a network. The paper concludes that for urban areas 802.11 technologies using unlicensed spectrum is not advisable, unless used in point-to-point links, while its use in rapid rural development (where there is less interference) is very promising.
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Brandt, I., Terzoli, A., Hodgkinson-Williams, C. (2007). Wi-Fi as a Last Mile Access Technology and The Tragedy of the Commons. In: Sobh, T., Elleithy, K., Mahmood, A., Karim, M. (eds) Innovative Algorithms and Techniques in Automation, Industrial Electronics and Telecommunications. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-6266-7_33
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4020-6266-7_33
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