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Ricochet (internet service)
Encyclopedia
Ricochet was one of the pioneering wireless Internet
services in the United States
, before Wi-Fi
, 3G
, and other broadband
technologies were available to the general public. It was developed and first offered by Metricom Incorporated, which shut down in 2001.
.
Paul Allen
took a controlling stake in Metricom in 1997.
Service began in 1994 in Cupertino, California
, and was quickly deployed throughout Silicon Valley
(the northern part of Santa Clara Valley
) by 1995, the rest of the San Francisco Bay Area
by 1996, and to other cities throughout the end of the 1990s. By this time, the original network had been upgraded, via firmware improvements, to almost twice its original throughput, and was operating at roughly the speed of a 56 kbit/s dialup modem; in addition, Ricochet introduced a higher-speed (nominally 128 kbit/s, in practice often faster) service in 1999; monthly fees for this service, however, were more than double those for the original service.
At its height, in early 2001, Ricochet service was available in Atlanta, Baltimore
, Dallas, Denver, Detroit, Houston, Los Angeles
, Miami, Minneapolis, New York City
and surrounding New Jersey, Philadelphia, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Phoenix
, San Diego, San Francisco, Seattle, and Washington, D.C.
Over 51,000 subscribers paid for the service. In July 2001, however, Ricochet's owner, Metricom, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and shut down its service. Like many companies during the dot-com boom, Metricom had spent more money than it took in and concentrated on a nationwide rollout and marketing instead of developing select markets.
sale. Service was restored to Denver in August 2002, and to San Diego in November 2002. Aerie sold Ricochet to EDL Holdings in 2003, who then sold it to YDI Wireless in 2004. YDI Wireless changed its name to Terabeam Inc.
, and Ricochet then operated as a subsidiary of Terabeam. Terabeam pursued a less ambitious strategy for Ricochet and announced no plans for expansion. In this phase of the technology's life, there were about 8,000 subscribers between the two markets. http://www.thefinalmile.net/blog/?p=39 During the bankruptcy, ownership of the Ricochet radio transmitters had reverted back to the municipalities where the radios were installed, so any expansion would have required Ricochet to renegotiate agreements with the cities or counties in question. In the meantime, wireless data services carried over the cellular telephone network had become increasingly popular (and available in most population centers worldwide), making the value of Ricochet technology unclear.
Ricochet notified its Denver customers on March 28, 2008, that service would cease the next day.
packet radio
, but differed from this technology in many respects: for instance, Ricochet used spread spectrum
(FHSS
) technology in the low-power "license-free" 900 MHz ISM band
of the RF spectrum. In addition to the resistance to eavesdropping offered by FHSS, modems offered built-in encryption
, but this was not turned on by default.
Throughput was originally advertised as equivalent to, and in practice was often somewhat better than, that of a then-standard 28.8 kbit/s telephone modem
. In addition, Ricochet could be treated as an "always-on" connection (in the sense that, once connected to the network, it could stay connected even when not in use without tying up scarce resources, unlike a dialup connection), much the way broadband is today. It was also marketed for a flat monthly fee (the original Ricochet service was $29.95 a month, less than the cost of dialup plus a second phone line). As a result, a significant number of users in the Ricochet service area adopted it as their primary home Internet connection.
Ricochet's main draw, however, was that it was wireless; at the time, there were almost no other options for a wireless Internet connection. Cellular phones were not as prevalent as today, and wireless data services such as GPRS had not yet been deployed on US cellular networks. It was possible to use specially adapted dialup modems over cellular connections, but this was slow (typically topping out at 9.6 kbit/s), expensive (per-minute charges applied), and often flaky. In contrast, Ricochet was fast, flat-rate, and very reliable.
FHSS
encrypted radio modems which respond to standard Hayes
"AT" commands. They include a packet-based mode of operation called "star mode", and it is possible to create a point to point connection or even a small independent network with data speeds greater than 256 kbit/s. Some of the infrastructure equipment used 900 MHz for the link to the consumer and used 2.4 GHz for the backhaul
link. (A third option, the licensed 2.3 GHz WCS band, was used only in heavily loaded parts of the network and is seldom mentioned in literature.)
Internet
The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve billions of users worldwide...
services in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, before Wi-Fi
Wi-Fi
Wi-Fi or Wifi, is a mechanism for wirelessly connecting electronic devices. A device enabled with Wi-Fi, such as a personal computer, video game console, smartphone, or digital audio player, can connect to the Internet via a wireless network access point. An access point has a range of about 20...
, 3G
3G
3G or 3rd generation mobile telecommunications is a generation of standards for mobile phones and mobile telecommunication services fulfilling the International Mobile Telecommunications-2000 specifications by the International Telecommunication Union...
, and other broadband
Broadband
The term broadband refers to a telecommunications signal or device of greater bandwidth, in some sense, than another standard or usual signal or device . Different criteria for "broad" have been applied in different contexts and at different times...
technologies were available to the general public. It was developed and first offered by Metricom Incorporated, which shut down in 2001.
History
Metricom was founded in 1985, initially selling radios to electric, gas, oil, and water industrial customers. One of its founders was Paul BaranPaul Baran
Paul Baran was a Polish American engineer who was a pioneer in the development of computer networks.He invented packet switching techniques, and went on to start several companies and develop other technologies that are an essential part of the Internet and other modern digital...
.
Paul Allen
Paul Allen
Paul Gardner Allen is an American business magnate, investor, and philanthropist. Allen co-founded Microsoft with Bill Gates...
took a controlling stake in Metricom in 1997.
Service began in 1994 in Cupertino, California
Cupertino, California
Cupertino is an affluent suburban city in Santa Clara County, California in the U.S., directly west of San Jose on the western edge of the Santa Clara Valley with portions extending into the foothills of the Santa Cruz Mountains. The population was 58,302 at the time of the 2010 census. Forbes...
, and was quickly deployed throughout Silicon Valley
Silicon Valley
Silicon Valley is a term which refers to the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area in Northern California in the United States. The region is home to many of the world's largest technology corporations...
(the northern part of Santa Clara Valley
Santa Clara Valley
The Santa Clara Valley is a valley just south of the San Francisco Bay in Northern California in the United States. Much of Santa Clara County and its county seat, San José, are in the Santa Clara Valley. The valley was originally known as the Valley of Heart’s Delight for its high concentration...
) by 1995, the rest of the San Francisco Bay Area
San Francisco Bay Area
The San Francisco Bay Area, commonly known as the Bay Area, is a populated region that surrounds the San Francisco and San Pablo estuaries in Northern California. The region encompasses metropolitan areas of San Francisco, Oakland, and San Jose, along with smaller urban and rural areas...
by 1996, and to other cities throughout the end of the 1990s. By this time, the original network had been upgraded, via firmware improvements, to almost twice its original throughput, and was operating at roughly the speed of a 56 kbit/s dialup modem; in addition, Ricochet introduced a higher-speed (nominally 128 kbit/s, in practice often faster) service in 1999; monthly fees for this service, however, were more than double those for the original service.
At its height, in early 2001, Ricochet service was available in Atlanta, Baltimore
Baltimore
Baltimore is the largest independent city in the United States and the largest city and cultural center of the US state of Maryland. The city is located in central Maryland along the tidal portion of the Patapsco River, an arm of the Chesapeake Bay. Baltimore is sometimes referred to as Baltimore...
, Dallas, Denver, Detroit, Houston, Los Angeles
Los Ángeles
Los Ángeles is the capital of the province of Biobío, in the commune of the same name, in Region VIII , in the center-south of Chile. It is located between the Laja and Biobío rivers. The population is 123,445 inhabitants...
, Miami, Minneapolis, New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
and surrounding New Jersey, Philadelphia, Minneapolis-St. Paul, Phoenix
Phoenix, Arizona
Phoenix is the capital, and largest city, of the U.S. state of Arizona, as well as the sixth most populated city in the United States. Phoenix is home to 1,445,632 people according to the official 2010 U.S. Census Bureau data...
, San Diego, San Francisco, Seattle, and Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
Over 51,000 subscribers paid for the service. In July 2001, however, Ricochet's owner, Metricom, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and shut down its service. Like many companies during the dot-com boom, Metricom had spent more money than it took in and concentrated on a nationwide rollout and marketing instead of developing select markets.
Aftermath
After bankruptcy, in November 2001, Aerie Networks, a Denver based broadband firm, purchased the assets of the company at a liquidationLiquidation
In law, liquidation is the process by which a company is brought to an end, and the assets and property of the company redistributed. Liquidation is also sometimes referred to as winding-up or dissolution, although dissolution technically refers to the last stage of liquidation...
sale. Service was restored to Denver in August 2002, and to San Diego in November 2002. Aerie sold Ricochet to EDL Holdings in 2003, who then sold it to YDI Wireless in 2004. YDI Wireless changed its name to Terabeam Inc.
Terabeam
Terabeam was a formerly Kirkland, Washington-based company that designed and manufactured free-space optical transceivers for Internet access in city downtowns. Through a series of acquisitions and reverse acquisitions in 2004, the company headquarters moved to San Jose, California and Terabeam...
, and Ricochet then operated as a subsidiary of Terabeam. Terabeam pursued a less ambitious strategy for Ricochet and announced no plans for expansion. In this phase of the technology's life, there were about 8,000 subscribers between the two markets. http://www.thefinalmile.net/blog/?p=39 During the bankruptcy, ownership of the Ricochet radio transmitters had reverted back to the municipalities where the radios were installed, so any expansion would have required Ricochet to renegotiate agreements with the cities or counties in question. In the meantime, wireless data services carried over the cellular telephone network had become increasingly popular (and available in most population centers worldwide), making the value of Ricochet technology unclear.
Ricochet notified its Denver customers on March 28, 2008, that service would cease the next day.
Technology
The technology, deployed by Metricom Inc., worked as a wireless mesh network: packets were forwarded by small repeaters (typically mounted on streetlights, for the use of which Metricom negotiated agreements with municipal governments) and might "bounce" among several such units along the path between an end-user's modem and a wired internet access point; hence the name of the service. The wireless ISP service was an outgrowth of technology Metricom had developed to facilitate remote meter reading for utility companies. It was originally inspired by amateurAmateur radio
Amateur radio is the use of designated radio frequency spectrum for purposes of private recreation, non-commercial exchange of messages, wireless experimentation, self-training, and emergency communication...
packet radio
Packet radio
Packet radio is a form of packet switching technology used to transmit digital data via radio or wireless communications links. It uses the same concepts of data transmission via Datagram that are fundamental to communications via the Internet, as opposed to the older techniques used by dedicated...
, but differed from this technology in many respects: for instance, Ricochet used spread spectrum
Spread spectrum
Spread-spectrum techniques are methods by which a signal generated in a particular bandwidth is deliberately spread in the frequency domain, resulting in a signal with a wider bandwidth...
(FHSS
Frequency-hopping spread spectrum
Frequency-hopping spread spectrum is a method of transmitting radio signals by rapidly switching a carrier among many frequency channels, using a pseudorandom sequence known to both transmitter and receiver...
) technology in the low-power "license-free" 900 MHz ISM band
ISM band
The industrial, scientific and medical radio bands are radio bands reserved internationally for the use of radio frequency energy for industrial, scientific and medical purposes other than communications....
of the RF spectrum. In addition to the resistance to eavesdropping offered by FHSS, modems offered built-in encryption
Encryption
In cryptography, encryption is the process of transforming information using an algorithm to make it unreadable to anyone except those possessing special knowledge, usually referred to as a key. The result of the process is encrypted information...
, but this was not turned on by default.
Throughput was originally advertised as equivalent to, and in practice was often somewhat better than, that of a then-standard 28.8 kbit/s telephone modem
Modem
A modem is a device that modulates an analog carrier signal to encode digital information, and also demodulates such a carrier signal to decode the transmitted information. The goal is to produce a signal that can be transmitted easily and decoded to reproduce the original digital data...
. In addition, Ricochet could be treated as an "always-on" connection (in the sense that, once connected to the network, it could stay connected even when not in use without tying up scarce resources, unlike a dialup connection), much the way broadband is today. It was also marketed for a flat monthly fee (the original Ricochet service was $29.95 a month, less than the cost of dialup plus a second phone line). As a result, a significant number of users in the Ricochet service area adopted it as their primary home Internet connection.
Ricochet's main draw, however, was that it was wireless; at the time, there were almost no other options for a wireless Internet connection. Cellular phones were not as prevalent as today, and wireless data services such as GPRS had not yet been deployed on US cellular networks. It was possible to use specially adapted dialup modems over cellular connections, but this was slow (typically topping out at 9.6 kbit/s), expensive (per-minute charges applied), and often flaky. In contrast, Ricochet was fast, flat-rate, and very reliable.
Equipment
Ricochet equipment can sometimes be found on the surplus and used market. The consumer equipment uses license-free 1 W 900 MHzISM band
The industrial, scientific and medical radio bands are radio bands reserved internationally for the use of radio frequency energy for industrial, scientific and medical purposes other than communications....
FHSS
Frequency-hopping spread spectrum
Frequency-hopping spread spectrum is a method of transmitting radio signals by rapidly switching a carrier among many frequency channels, using a pseudorandom sequence known to both transmitter and receiver...
encrypted radio modems which respond to standard Hayes
Hayes command set
The Hayes command set is a specific command-language originally developed for the Hayes Smartmodem 300 baud modem in 1981. The command set consists of a series of short text strings which combine together to produce complete commands for operations such as dialing, hanging up, and changing the...
"AT" commands. They include a packet-based mode of operation called "star mode", and it is possible to create a point to point connection or even a small independent network with data speeds greater than 256 kbit/s. Some of the infrastructure equipment used 900 MHz for the link to the consumer and used 2.4 GHz for the backhaul
Backhaul (telecommunications)
In a hierarchical telecommunications network the backhaul portion of the network comprises the intermediate links between the core network, or backbone, of the network and the small subnetworks at the "edge" of the entire hierarchical network...
link. (A third option, the licensed 2.3 GHz WCS band, was used only in heavily loaded parts of the network and is seldom mentioned in literature.)