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Comment by BenjiWiebe | Hacker News Reader

There's still (rural US) markets where 4G isn't reliable. WISPs can do great in those areas yet.

I always thought the use case for WISPs was for places that have at best the fiber line built for "a cell tower" but are otherwise cut off from more solid ISPs who want home internet or for places that are best have shitty ADSL. That of course means people in distant nowhere.

I never thought of WISPs existing elsewhere as it doesn't make nearly as much sense if you have access to "real" broadband. I suppose this niche was wider at one point?

20 years ago, wireless was the only affordable way for us to serve residential customers faster than ISDN or in some cases dialup in a lot of small towns. We could get FR or ATM to a business, but we couldn't make it affordable for most homes.

For sure! I drive right through the mountains in the ADK often. Unless you're in a well populated village, there is no cell service at all. Break down on the road and you're walking 10+ miles.

That also leads to slippery-slope politics with the Adirondack Park Agency as to why cellsite adoption has been so slow and frustrating.

Speaking as someone who used to live in Long Lake and had to drive to the edge of the hamlet down at a bridge just to get a single bar to check back in on family, I certainly wish the APA would loosen up a bit more on just letting towers go up.

Yes, this. There are areas where 4g isn't great, let alone 5g.

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