According to The Metro newspaper on Friday (2/29/2008), “The construction of the city’s wireless Internet network has officially come to a halt.” I’m not surprised. Why? Because as a friend of mine had said, “Philadelphia is where technology comes to die.” Don’t get me wrong, I love Philly in some ways, and have been living in the area for over 20 years. But it’s no surprise that Earthlink has decided to sell this over-publicized, under-achieved network set up under former Mayor John Street. It had experienced scheduling setbacks and technical issues from the very beginning, and the layoff of half of Earthlink’s workforce back in August of 2007 didn’t make Philly Wifi look like a promising venture either.

Wireless Philadelphia said Thursday it has connected close to 1,000 digital inclusion customers to the wireless network since June. That’s far from its original goal of 10,000 in the first year.

Who’s going to buy up this lost cause? Have they even set up those purported “Eye in the Sky” surveillance cameras yet in an effort to help reduce crime? Let’s face it, the closest thing to cutting edge technology in Philly was probably used in making my Dunkin Donuts coffee this morning.

Submitted by: RayAna Park, Web Developer
on March 03, 2008 - 10:54 am

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