Rose Cantine

Now that EarthLink’s plan to deploy a citywide wireless broadband network is officially dead, who’s going to pick up where it left off? It appears that Meraki, a mesh equipment provider funded by Google and Sequoia, has come up with a plan to create a Wi-Fi cloud throughout the city by getting residents to install solar-powered mesh nodes on top of buildings and homes. The goal is to provide free Wi-Fi access to residents.

Unlike EarthLink, Meraki relies on grassroots support, meaning it does not have to go through the San Francisco Board of Supervisors and get stuck in local politics. Residents install Meraki repeaters in their houses to extend the signal (a model similar to FON). But the Meraki plan does have challenges. Read more on Muniwireless.