quote:
a british city known for its concrete cows is set to become one of the most technologically advanced in britain after it said it would to be the first uk town to boast a high-speed wimax wireless broadband network.

telecoms firm pipex, in a joint venture with chip maker intel, is to blanket parts of milton keynes with wimax, a medium-range sibling of the popular wi-fi technology covering kilometres rather than metres. both use radio frequency rather than conventional wires to beam the internet.

a source close to pipex told reuters the company would announce the launch of its plans in around four weeks.


http://today.reuters.com/news/articlein ... ;type=qcna


tip of the hat to middltn for pointing me in the right direction with this next part.

the choice of "city" is actually a really smart move. there are technical problems with the supply of broadband in milton keynes - aluminium phone wires rather than copper in many cases, and the way that the network was laid out in a grid (mk is a "new" city) means that a lot of the cable runs are just too long to support it.

so it's captive audience and there is no competiton (not even a cable company - they designed their own network in the 1970's). it will also get pipex very much on side with central government, and in particular with the people that decide who gets and who doesn't get a wimax licence.

open up this page and scroll down (or search for) " mr. mark lancaster" (mp for north east milton keynes) and see what he has to say about it:-

parliamentary debate (html)