The encyclopedia · Software & IT · Technical decision · 1997–2003
Wi-Fi won by running in unlicensed spectrum, so anyone could deploy a network.
IEEE 802.11 chose the license-free ISM band, and Wi-Fi Alliance certification made any brand's devices talk to any router, so no one needed approval to connect.
Wi-Fi Alliance
the move
A wireless local network is only valuable if a lot of places can run one, and that is only possible if you are not gated by a spectrum license each time. The FCC's 1985 opening of the 2.4 GHz industrial, scientific and medical band for unlicensed low-power devices made license-free deployment possible.
IEEE 802.11, standardized in 1997, was built to live in that band, and the hardware and software to run it were simple and cheap. Wireless Ethernet became trivially deployable by anyone, anywhere, because no government approval stood between a user and a network.
Interoperability was still the problem: early products from different vendors often refused to talk to each other. In 1999 several companies formed WECA, later the Wi-Fi Alliance, and its certification stamp became a promise that a certified device would work with any other certified device.
The word Wi-Fi became a consumer shorthand for wireless networking that would just work, and the combination of license-free spectrum and certified interoperability let adoption spread from homes to cafés to airports without anyone needing permission.
why it works
- Unlicensed 2.4 GHz removed spectrum licensing, so the cost of deployment fell to hardware alone.
- Wi-Fi certification removed the fear that a gadget would not talk to the router already in the building.
- The same ISM band was available almost everywhere, so one product could serve the whole world.
- Certified interoperability made devices interchangeable, which is what a networking standard has to deliver.
what transfers
When a format's real cost is permission rather than technology, pick the channel that is already permission-free and certify the compatibility that removes the fear of buying in.
what came after
Wi-Fi became the default way to connect nearly everything at home, in offices and in public spaces, and the Wi-Fi Alliance's certification model and the ISM band choice were copied by Bluetooth and by a wave of subsequent wireless standards.
references
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