You know I never gave WiFi networks a thought until I started doing webmaster work for the Council on Wireless Technology Impacts. I myself was thinking isn’t this great, I can be connected anywhere I go with new wireless networks.
With Google and Earthlink trying to create a big WiFi hot spot in San Francisco and Google celebrating the first year anniversary of covering cover about 12 square miles and 25,000 homes serving approximately 15,000 unique users, I am wondering now what the health tradeoffs will be by going wireless in public spaces. Are we polluting ourselves with electromagnetic radiation and simply thinking what we can’t see can’t hurt us?
We all love technology, our kids are all tuned in to it too. If you haven’t seen the technology used on university campuses now, you just wouldn’t believe it. Our kids in college now have piped in cable, high speed Internet, WiFi spots and some campuses going totally WiFi. The libraries have more computers that you may see in a year, and many campuses even offer free computer tech services to students for their own computers. Every college student now needs a laptop and teachers upload their class notes and lectures to the Web.
With this new push for technology and being online all the time, are we trading off our health? Are we polluting our air with radio and microwaves that we can not see but may be causing health issues down the road? I am not sure myself what the answer is, but I have to say after having read the papers and documents that I am posting for this client, I am starting to wonder whether the trade off may simply be too big or whether we should have more definitive research before we push more wireless networks.
Tell me what you think, by leaving your comment below.