Dave Mock writes in support of municipal wireless. I'm also glad to see Intel throwing its weight in support of cities that want to take control of their airspace. I'm not saying all cities should get into the ISP business; I'm just saying that they should have the freedom to hire whatever service providers they want to deploy and manage their wireless networks. The incumbents had their chance to be innovative and aggressive and they blew it. And, frankly, they simply can't move quickly enough to support all the applications that cities want to support over these networks.

Litigation may impede innovation, but it won't stop it. Cities and states watch one another and they will quickly learn that those that are not restricted by Pennsylvania-like legislation are improving their tax base by attracting citizens lured by low-cost or free wireless, are improving city services by saving money on municipal employee communications, providing broadband to their police and emergency services people at a fraction of the cost of 3G networks, and improving security, asset tracking, and, well, the list goes on.

This is a revolution and, like most revolutions, it is encountering fierce resistance. But the incumbents are too late to ban muni-wireless in every state. Wi-Fi created a monster: a more savvy wireless consumer. Once people install Wi-Fi in their homes they realize that wireless isn't quite so complicated after they. These people go to work and they demand Wi-Fi there as well. It is only natural for cities to fall in love with home networking.

Savvy wireless consumers are a fact of life and those service providers who learn to speak up to consumers rather than talk down to consumers will be the providers who succeed in the years ahead.