The Wireless Broadband Alliance (WBA) predicted on Thursday that seamless WiFi offloading solutions will begin deployment within the next 12 months, allowing better access to USENET anywhere you go.
Early trials of so-called “Next Generation Hotspots” have successfully been completed, paving the way for the technology to be rolled out over the next twelve months.
What’s a Next-Generation Hotspot? For years, portable online devices have had Wi-Fi and some cellular connections, with users able to connect to either network if needed. But while a cellular phone can automatically identify and authenticate itself on a cellular network, logging onto a Wi-Fi network generally requires entering a username and password, or at least clicking an authorization of the terms of service.
A Next-Generation Hotspot will allow the phone’s cellular SIM to not only authenticate the phone to the hotspot, but also allow it to roam to the hotspot in the case that the network is congested, or that the user just wants additional performance, allowing them to access USENET newsgroups practically anywhere!
One of the biggest benefits of NGH will be its support for complex roaming arrangements. No operator is going to build Wi-Fi hotspots in every cranny of the world, so they will need to partner heavily to either share capacity or buy it from third parties. NGH will be able to negotiate those multi-leveled agreements, allowing devices to not only connect to multiple networks seamlessly but also prioritize which networks they connect to.
