Muni-wireless 0wned...

There is a great discussion going building on the Muniwireless blog.
As always Esme Vos is proving herself in cutting straight to the bone of the great Muni-Wireless debate.
She does not shy away from controversy in her observations and this is atracting the comments from some quite knowledgeable people in the business.
For those who do not know what I am talking about; There is a fierce debate raging regarding who should own a municipal wireless network. Should it be left to the incumbent telcos with their deep pockets to extend their monopolies in this market? Should the municipal governments own and run the networks? Or should it be done through a private/public partnership where the municipality owns the network but a private company manages it?
Of those three options my vote would go to the last option. The munipality should own it to ensure that the network is used to provide best value & services to everyone and that it will also serve as a conduit for service providers and a private company is more experienced and better qualified to run & manage such a network.
For examples you can have a look at the networks currently deployed in Tempe, AZ, St. Cloud, Fla and Philadelphia.


E.