Time Online focuses on Wi-Fi's hot spot potential: The article tells the story of Larry Brilliant in greater depth, and notes a very useful number: IBM made $1 billion in Wi-Fi services, which is primarily installing WLANs in enterprises and then maintaining those networks. Eighteen months ago, that number was about $150M -- given out in a talk by the head of IBM Global Services at the first 802.11 Planet conference.
The author describes 802.16a incorrectly near the end of the article, positioning it as competitive with 802.11 flavors for omnidirectional access. 802.16 is backhaul: bandwidth across the final mile or final 30 miles. Many folks think 802.16 will be the connection between hot spots and the Internet, reducing the cost of deployment for T-1 scale infrastructure.
In the article, the writer says 802.16a covers 1 square mile -- actually it's one linear mile and potentially much more. (To quote from the WiMax forum site: 802.16a...is a wireless metropolitan area network technology that will connect 802.11 hot spots to the Internet and provide a wireless extension to cable and DSL for last mile broadband access. It provides up to 31 miles of linear service area range and allows users to get broadband connectivity without needing a direct line of sight to the base station.)