Telecoms in Afghanistan

Telecoms and Wireless in Afghanistan: One Year Later is a nice brief report on the state of telecommunications infrastructure in Afghanistan. It features 2 interesting stories about the development in the past year, and about a possible path to follow in the future.

Specifically the article entitled, "Telecommunications in Afghanistan: The Road Ahead" makes a claim that WiFi is the only way to provide a useful communications infrastructure at an affordable price.

Unlike today's wired network, a WiFi network requires little more than an Access Point, or AP. We all understand that access to a wireless-based service doesn't require an expensive connection to each user -- there's no need for running wires to each building, or for the installation of a satellite dish. WiFi technology is also far less expensive to deploy than the limited wireless technologies of existing cellular service providers. And, because in most countries it operates in unregulated spectrum, anyone can deploy a WiFi access point. Basically, every WiFi access point is nothing less than a broadband network.

I couldn't agree more ;-)