I mentioned the concept of WiMax as it pertained to megayachts awhile ago, and like many of us I’m still waiting for it (or something that looks just like it).

For those who haven’t kept up, c|net has posted a good explanation of the WiMax technology, how it compares to Wi-Fi and 3G, and why you should care. From the article:

“The WiMax Forum claims the technology can deliver 40 Mbps of capacity per channel, which can then be split ‘among hundreds of businesses, thousands of residences, and thousands of mobile Internet users.’ Specifically, the group believes the technology can offer 30 Mbps of capacity within a typical cell radius of up to 3 kilometers.”

Heady stuff, if it works and becomes widely adopted. That, of course, is the issue. Realtime speeds tend to be substantially less than the theoretical:

“By comparison, WiMax can deliver theoretical download speeds to individual users around 10 Mbps to 20 Mbps. But most people using a mobile WiMax service will get between 2 Mbps and 4 Mbps of bandwidth.”

Read the entire c|net article here.

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Of interest to me was learning that owners spend about $10,000 a month to get Internet connectivity at sea on one of these things, and the speed tops out at about 512 kbps (it comes down from a satellite). But like the rest of us, they’re waiting for WiMax to help increase their Internet speed and lower their costs.

The rich really are different, or are they?

Here’s a 130 footer in progress. BTW, it goes down below the floor as far as it goes up. Click the image to see a full-size view.

Yeah, that’s my buddy Johnnie standing next to it. Thing’s big enough to have a job.

And I briefly considered taking an IT job with him.

Working on those behemoths, which are actually chock full of cat 5 and cat 6 cable. You have no idea how advanced they really are… floating theaters. Except that the up and download speeds are agonizingly slow.

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