If you are an ISP, you should do the following this year.
Enable HTTPS on your website. I see many ISPs who do not have HTTPS enabled on your domains. The biggest reason to do this is so google will “crawl” your site.
Apply for IP space from your local RIR. For North America, this is ARIN. It’s easier than you think and is still available.
Have contact info on your website that is easy to get to.
Mention your service areas in detail. I see too many companies not list the states they cover. If you cover a town called Washington, which one of the 88 “Washingtons” in the United States do you cover? Also, have text descriptions. Search engines are still a big deal.
Automate your Social media and blog. Not everyone uses Facebook. Not everyone uses Twitter. Not everyone uses both. Some tools can instantly post updates to your social media from one platform. I use WordPress plugins on the blog to do this. An up-to-date web presence engages with potential customers and current customers.
Update your contact info with critical resources. ARIN WHOIS comes to mind.
Spin up your own DNS resolvers
Rollout IPV6
Cleanup your Monitoring
Offer Voice, even if it’s just to businesses. This can open doors to broadband funding.
Start collecting and categorizing data. Centralize log management, know who visits your website, what keywords they use, and network-related data are just a few things you should know.
Create a centralized Management network to increase security and flexibility.
If you need help doing any of this, I have some time available on a consulting basis to help. Reach out to me here. I have a special going on for hours of time. These are extremely limited, though.
A small milestone, issue #10. The weather outside is quite frightening. The wind chill is -37 here in Indiana. I want to extend a Happy Holidays greeting to everyone. Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah Perfect time to catch up on documentation and the newsletter. Submit any news here.
•13 More states grab NTIA BEAD grants. California, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Oklahoma, Oregon, Texas, Vermont and Wyoming were among this week’s awardees
•BEAD and Wireless Delivery. Today, leading organizations representing the wireless industry sent letters to broadband offices in all US states and territories, urging them to allow for maximum flexibility in choosing the right mix of broadband technologies to meet their policy goals with Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) funds.
Welcome to issue #9 of Packets Down Range. I am a little behind because a deer decided to jump in front of my car on a recent trip to Texas. There wasn’t much damage, but almost all the airbags were deployed, which caused the car to be a total loss. As a result, I am behind and need those sponsorships. :-). Submit any news here.
•Lumen looks to add 6 million miles of new fiber by 2026. Lumen’s work will focus on its backbone network rather than its metro or residential assets. CTO Andrew Dugan told Fierce its newly announced target is part of a nationwide upgrade project Lumen has been chipping away at for the past five years or so.
•Bluebird acquires Missouri Telecom’s Middle mile network assets.This strategic acquisition of MTI’s network assets will expand and strengthen Bluebird’s existing fiber network throughout Southwest Missouri and is part of the company’s overall growth strategy across the Midwestern United States.
•Do you have your 6GHz OET experimental license? Cambium talks about their ePMP 4600. In the article, they have a guide on obtaining your 6GHZ OET.
Podcasts & Videos
•Wireless Myth Busters Episode 2. The myth we’re busting in this episode: “With federal funding abound, why not all fiber, all the time” Come along to Scotts Bluff, Nebraska where we join Vistabeam to see how they’re leveraging Cambium Networks product line to wirelessly deliver connnectivity to their customers across 40,000 square miles through out Wyoming, Colorado, and Nebraska.
Some of you may have noticed a subtle difference in the title. In many of my previous posts and articles, wISP was written as WISP. Note the capitalization of W. This represents a shift from Wireless Internet Service Providers (WISPs) becoming a more hybrid approach to service delivery. What does this mean? Are Wireless providers going away? Read on, dear reader.
Mainly due to government definitions of what broadband is, speeds being delivered by service providers are being increased. In 2015 the FCC defined broadband as a download of 25 megs and an upload of 3 megs. Several wireless equipment manufacturers were able to come out with new point-to-multipoint radios in unlicensed and 3.65 frequencies to meet this demand.
Fast forward to the “Covid years.” Demand for broadband increased. Working from home has become more mainstream than it ever has. This is the time many WISPs shined. These operators could service up new areas and increase bandwidth in existing coverage areas quickly. As with many governmental dealings,
What does this mean for the wISP? wISPs will be transforming into an overall service provider to satisfy several needs and regulations. Delivery speed will be the number one focus on all new build-outs. Many politicians and government regulators are already suggesting a 100 meg service tier.
So how are wISPs evolving? Let’s jump into it.
Automation Automation saves money. Saving money allows for more devliery devices, whether they be Access Points, OLTs, or switches). Automation makes customer interaction faster and more efficient. From signups to support ques, automation is becoming the key to optimizing these interactions. Companies like SBR Consulting LLC provide automation. Other companies like RemoteWinbox can automate managing your large Mikrotik network.
Add on services and vertical markets. Most government grants require you to provide Voice as part of your offerings. Why not let companies like Atheral take this load off you. You can then concentrate on acquiring customers. Video services like Realchoice can make sense if your network supports their unique data demands.
Network Quality of Service Modern access customers are demanding. Technology is always evolving, and so are data flows. Preseem and Cambium QOE are two companies that can apply policies to flows and data endpoints as well as other traffic manipulation. This allows you to optimize your network. Latency sensitive items such as VOIP can benefit from a QOS/QOE soluiion.
High-Speed multipoint wireless Fiber takes time to build and is costly. Wireless makes sense in so many places. 802.11-based systems are still a viable option for rural and less dense areas. However, MU-MIMO systems from the likes of Tarana and Cambium Medusa are the next generation of fixed wireless systems delivering higher bandwidth. LTE players such as Nokia have solutions for the growing wISP.
Hybrid Networks As customer demands increase, there have to be bigger pipes pushing bandwidth to the towers and aggregation points. Licensed links are pushing more and more bandwidth. Fiber-fed towers are also becoming a thing. This means the wISP is possibly building their own fiber infrastructure to support the gigabit and muti-gigabit clusters being installed on towers. One natural progression is , as the provider passes homes, it makes sense to use strands to provide some sort of Fiber To The Home (FTTH). This is an easier cost to absorb as it can be both revenue generating and business supporting at the same time.
Peering and Interconneciton Internet customers tend to consume much of the same data repeatedly. Pulling this from geographically close locations speeds up the customer experience while reducing latency. Internet Exchange Points (IXPSs) bring more resiliency to a fragile Internet. Companies like FD-IX and Ohio-IX are independent exchange points.
these are just a few things the xISP (wISP, fISP, etc.) can look into to migrate their networks to the next level. Many of them mentioned are at WISPAPALOOZA 2022 in Las Vegas this week.
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New on Californias Net Neutrality Law California’s net neutrality law is similar to the federal rules repealed under former FCC Chairman Ajit Pai. California prohibits ISPs from blocking or throttling lawful traffic. It also prohibits requiring fees from websites or online services to deliver or prioritize their traffic to consumers, bans paid data cap exemptions (so-called “zero-rating”), and says that ISPs may not attempt to evade net neutrality protections by slowing down traffic at network interconnection points. https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2022/04/isps-cant-find-any-judges-who-will-block-california-net-neutrality-law/
Mikrotik releases 7.3Beta37 *) bonding – fixed LACP flapping for RB5009 and CCR2004-16G-2S+ devices; *) bridge – fixed packet marking for IP/IPv6 firewall; *) dot1x – improved server stability when using re-authentication; *) fetch – improved full disk detection; *) gps – fixed minor value unit typo; *) l3hw – improved offloading for directly connected hosts on CRS305, CRS326-24G-2S+, CRS328, CRS318, CRS310; *) led – fixed QSFP+, QSFP28 activity LEDs when using 40Gbps modules (introduced in v7.3beta33); *) lte – disabled wait for LTE auto attach; *) mpls – fixed MPLS MTU and path MTU selection; *) ovpn – fixed hardware offloading support on CHR; *) ovpn – improved Windows client disconnect procedure in UDP mode; *) ovpn – moved authentication failure messages to “info” logging level; *) ppp – added warning when using prefix length other than /64 for router advertisement; *) ppp – fixed “remote-ipv6-prefix” parameter unsetting; *) ppp – fixed issue with multiple active sessions when “only-one” is enabled; *) routerboot – properly reset system configuration when protected bootloader is enabled and reset button used; *) rsvp-te – improved stability when “Resv” received for non-existing session; *) sfp – improved QSFP/SFP interface initialization for 98DXxxxx switches; *) switch – fixed missing stats from traffic-monitor for 98DXxxxx and 98PX1012 switches; *) system – fixed RouterOS bootup when wifiwave2 package is installed (introduced in v7.3beta34); *) system – fixed rare partial loss of RouterOS configuration after package upgrade/downgrade/install/uninstall; *) user-manager – improved stability when received EAP attribute with non-existing state attribute; *) vpls – fixed “pw-l2mtu” parameter usage;
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