Instititutional Opportunities and Challenges of the Wireless City

Wireless communication is a core building block for the mobile government. The basic ingredients of the wireless communications include the wireless devices and the wireless infrastructure required for communications among the devices. Wireless devices have rapidly evolved and diffused world-wide. For example, mobile phones, which are common forms of wireless devices, have evolved from the traditional analog cellular phones to digital “smartphones” with internet and other capabilities (e.g. camera, location awareness). The growth of mobile phones is not limited to the developed world; they have become commonplace in the developing world, leap-frogging the landline phone connections. The wireless infrastructure for supporting communications between the devices has also advanced considerably. Several types of wireless infrastructure support have emerged in the recent years, including the Wi-Fi, WiMax, and Mesh Networks. The wireless infrastructure complements wired infrastructure in providing last mile solutions for data transmission as well as voice communications. The purpose of this chapter is to outline some of these key institutional opportunities and challenges of adopting the evolving wireless technology for abStract