Whether or not this technology leads to laziness on the part of the carrier is definitely a valid debate. Personally, I don't think it does. It's in everyone's best interest for carriers to have full coverage and I don't see this stopping Sprint from putting a cell tower wherever they think one needs to be.
As I commented on the Gizmodo post, I think the real debate is over which approach is better, WiFi/UMA or this mini-cell concept. With either, you have to buy some piece of new hardware. On the surface, the femtocell is a cleaner solution since you're not really adding any new technology. You buy the base station and you get the benefit of it working with all existing handsets. With WiFi, you're probably going to have to buy a new phone which will probably cost more than a $50 base station. What I don't think people realize about WiFi though is that it represents an arguably universal communication standard. In a country where most phones are locked to their home network, being able to use something that generic is a hugely important evolution.
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Whether or not this technology leads to laziness on the part of the carrier is definitely a valid debate. Personally, I don't think it does. It's in everyone's best interest for carriers to have full coverage and I don't see this stopping Sprint from putting a cell tower wherever they think one needs to be.
As I commented on the Gizmodo post, I think the real debate is over which approach is better, WiFi/UMA or this mini-cell concept. With either, you have to buy some piece of new hardware. On the surface, the femtocell is a cleaner solution since you're not really adding any new technology. You buy the base station and you get the benefit of it working with all existing handsets. With WiFi, you're probably going to have to buy a new phone which will probably cost more than a $50 base station. What I don't think people realize about WiFi though is that it represents an arguably universal communication standard. In a country where most phones are locked to their home network, being able to use something that generic is a hugely important evolution.