Wireless & Speed in South African Townships

by on December 24, 2006 at 10:30 pm

Although written a few weeks ago, I just came across this ZDNET article on South African township cell phone penetration. Having spent a chunk of time there, I know that locals use them frequently and have been ever since the growing bouts of violence – its important to always be connected. But in townships?

They mention Alexandra, a township not far from some of Johannesburg’s wealthiest suburbs. I remember seeing smoke hail from in the backyard of the home of my then brother-in-law in a nearby neighborhood. Smoke, noise and sirens were not uncommon in Alexandra at the time and I remember certain days more than others, since I spent many a day in their garden typing away on an old fashioned typewriter eating guavas and drinking tea. It remains one of the roughest townships and now, according to this article, you can use your laptop, a data card, read email and get wireless. It’s hard to imagine.

I learn that South African mobile operators Vodacom and MTN launched HSDPA (high-speed downlink packet access), wireless broadband technology that is five times faster than the first third-generation (3G) networks six months ago. parental blocker dns information domain dns server . list of domains . ip analysis . i cloud web archive . website down . apache web server word cloud . English to Armenian . Brasov . Restosundsecge . peta dunia satelit .