Milton who? MILTON What?

This MILTON isn't a who, but a what?

Technically, MILTON is, in my opinion, the best thing to bridge the so-called digital divide, which, Scott MacNealy, ex-boss at Sun Microsystems, convincingly argues is a fiction. He says there is a divide - the old economic one. It's digital technology that is narrowing it. (More on this in another blog later)

If we look around and notice all the connectivity that is occuring amongst the poor via the mobile phone it won't be hard to agree with Scott.

So, then where is MILTON, whatever it is? And why is it NOT on the radar of any of the 'Big Players'?

You've heard of that saw the economists have made a cliche of - the one about bad money chasing the good one out of the market?

Maybe, its the same thing with technology. Bill Gates' Microsoft OS versions have a larger market share despite Steve Balmer's unending patchy-watchy updates and the hackers peeling and penetrating through them while Apple is, marketsharewise, struggling away.

It's a shame that Open Source has just fan clubs in the developing countries. In the Indian media I have come across only one mention of Ubuntu, the easy-to-operate, free Net-downloadable PC operating system, with three-year support. Ubuntu OS is discussed here on this icon for 10 minutes clipped from the half-hour BBC Digital Planet program. The icon-link includes my comments below the player.

While recently praising The Fiesty Fawn, Ubuntu's latest free-to-download-OS on air, BBC Digital Planet's tech-expert Bill Thompson hasn't come back with a test-drive report. To hear him, right-click on this icon and open the 36-sec clip in its own window with its accompanying comments. Or click on the player below for a listen sans the commentary.



For the question Where is MILTON? I have an audio-visual answer. This player has the audio

As you heard, MILTON is a low-frequency wireless connectivity system that addresses the crucial 'last/first' mile to/from the user.

Furthermore, it offers data transfer rates that are very significantly higher than Wi-Fi and Wi-Max.

In most developing countries, this last mile connectivity is what really matters.


The middleclass 'establishment' in Asia, Africa and Latin America can get their fibreoptic connections but I have not seen any small towns and villages in India where the 'last' mile is NOT an aggravation for the average inhabitant.

In fact, it is  in a condition analogous to the pot-holed dirt roads that usually lead to them. Here is an example from Chile:
A remote mountain village in that country got lucky and, with the help of its enthusiastic mayor, "they" came in to showcase wireless connectivity there.

Take a listen at this icon  for a 232-sec 'case-history' type report that, under the hoopla, downplays the problem of the last-mile connection, which wouldn't have occurred had they opted for the low frequency MILTON.

The small village might not have needed 16 line-of-sight connectivity high frequency nodes or hotspots. One radio frequency MILTON hub would have been enough. Those wire-meshed home walls mentioned in the clip would not have affected it propagation

The visual is in the form of the text below - An email I sent, January 30 this year, to the BBC World Service program :

["Sub: Business Daily Today on Wi-Fi/WiMax

Namaskär,

Apropos of your report today on wireless connectivity for "developing countries", I was dismayed that, aside from the heaviliy 'pushed' Wi-Fi and WiMax, a third option was not even mentioned, leave alone discussed/debated.

When compared to WiFi/WiMax, the amusingly acronymized 'cognitive' wireless system, MILTON, (a) has a faster data-transfer rate, (b) needs just one 'hot-spot' per a village or two, and (c) has a significantly lower i.e.r.h. (imagined electromagnetic radiation hazard) and other hassles because it "uses the license-exempt bands that operate at 5 Gigahertz.." and (d) is easily affordable by the end-users themselves without any doles, hand-outs or subsidies.

For anyone interested, I am pasting below a couple of URLs that will tell you more about MILTON - successfully tested a decade ago, jointly by Indian and Canadian engineers.

Why it has not become the preferred choice for wireless connectivity in the developing countries is perhaps because - other than the scientists and engineers who developed it - MILTON has had no angels backing it, no 'stakeholders'.
Furthermore, since it is not an 'in-house' production of the telecom companies, there's no one to help line bureaucratic pockets and assure political kickbacks to make a determining decision in its favor.

Svasti!
xxxxxxx
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MILTON Info URLs:

1. http://www.bittyurl.com/?1cbe09

Title: "Canada Launches New Partnership with India for R&D Into Wireless Broadband"

Quote: "Researchers in Canada and India will soon be ... looking at the potential uses of a new technology developed in Canada called a Microwave-Light Organized Network, or MILTON. This technology... distributes broadband Internet wirelessly over an area of several kilometers... (in) rural and remote areas...."

2. http://www.bittyurl.com/?830b8a

Title: Milton HomePage

Quote: "The Milton system is a cognitive radio network that sense(s) the radio environment for interference to provide bi-directional, cost-efficient, high data transfer-rates telecommunications services at license-exempt bands that have been identified for world-wide use by the World Radio Congress of 2003... Designed to be a low-cost community wireless radio network (it) has the capability to identify poor quality radio links.. (and change) to provide high-capacity Internet to regions of the world with underdeveloped or older telecommunications infrastructures."]