Saratoga News
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Photograph by Shaminder Dulai
De Anza College student Nhan Nguygen works on her laptop thanks to a low-cost wireless connection at Great Bear Coffee in Los Gatos. Joint Venture is hoping to create a wireless Silicon Valley and has set up a task force to explore the possibilities.
Wireless connection could be just a click away
Company hopes to create a wireless Silicon Valley
By Jennifer McLain
If you know where to look, free and low-cost wireless connection is provided around town. Yogurt Delight and the Black Watch on N. Santa Cruz Avenue have it, and on Main Street it's at Le Boulanger, the Los Gatos Coffee Roasting Company and the Town Plaza. For $5 a day, Great Bear Coffee offers it as well.
But Joint Venture: Silicon Valley Network's Smart Valley Initiative is exploring ways to making town-wide free and low-cost Internet access a reality.
"It's kind of a logical next step," said Seth Feary, vice president and COO for Joint Venture. "Silicon Valley has more hot spots than any other area in the country. People have asked why they just can't have wireless access everywhere. Now, we are working on that."
The vision of Wireless Silicon Valley is simple: provide a low-cost, high-speed, outdoor, wireless infrastructure that will be available on the streets and highways, in parks and plazas, at construction sites and businesses, and on buses and trains, according to the plan's overview.
But this is not just a town-wide vision. The task force, which was formed in 2005, hopes to apply this to 17 cities over the 1,500-square-mile wireless region.
Among the 17 is Los Gatos, which has so far invested $2,500 in the task force, said Pamela Jacobs, assistant town manager.
"It would be wonderful to provide that service to residents, and we would look forward to doing it as municipal services," Jacobs said.
There are different service options. While providing free wireless to residents is a possibility, users would likely have a slower connection and would receive pop-up advertisements. Another option is a faster connection that would be available for a cost. While the price has not yet been suggested--and certainly not finalized--Feary said a similar but smaller project in Philadelphia charges its residents $20 a month for the connection. This would be good news to Dave Gillooly, a Campbell resident who frequents the Los Gatos Roasting Company and Great Bear Coffee for their wireless hookups.
When he is not at the coffee shops, he is online at home, paying almost $50 a month for his wireless connection.
"If you could use it everywhere, $20 is pretty reasonable," he said of the potential regional wireless fee. "Now, you could spend a lot of money just to be connected."
Los Gatos Mayor Diane McNutt said compared to the outdated technology of three years ago, wireless connection is today perceived as a basic human need.
"We are a very technological savvy community, and this service is needed. What we need to figure out is how best to go about this," McNutt said.
For starters, the town council will hold a study session on June 19 to discuss the methodology of applying the wireless, its potential and a projected timeline.
Meanwhile, Joint Venture will prepare to submit the request for proposals to different providers. Other cities, such as San Francisco, have already chosen a provider.
"I believe there is hope by the end of the calendar year to have chosen the providers," Jacobs said.
But Feary acknowledges there are a few hurdles Joint Venture will have to jump over, including rapid changes in technology, technological glitches and the potential inability for signals to penetrate some natural and artificial barriers.
"But there are ways of solving some of these problems," he said.
Other cities participating in the task force are Campbell, Cupertino, East Palo Alto, Fremont, Gilroy, Menlo Park, Milpitas, Morgan Hill, Mountain View, Palo Alto, Redwood City, San Carlos, San Jose, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Santa Cruz and Sunnyvale. Saratoga expressed its interest earlier, but information technology analyst Ben Cheng said the city is no longer participating.
Meanwhile, organizers remain optimistic and excited at this evolving opportunity.
"We are becoming a more and more global society and economy, and we want the Silicon Valley to be one of the first places to become a truly global society," Feary said.
