Light is almost certainly the fastest thing around. So it makes sense that “light-based wireless communications,” or LiFi, could blow the theoretical doors off existing radio-wave wireless standards, to the tune of a maximum 224GB per second. [Edit, 2:40 p.m.: It does not make sense, and those doors would remain on each rhetorical vehicle. As pointed out by commenters, radio waves, in a vacuum, would reasonably be expected to travel at the same speed as light. Ars, but moreso the author personally, regrets the error. Original post continues.]
JFC is this really where you want to get your technology data from? Authors that clearly have no grasp of even the basest fundamentals in the physics involved? Really?
It’s a news site, don’t expect them to have science degree and them adding an edit note after they were corrected shows more integrity than 95% of other news sites.
shows more integrity than 95% of other news sites
Nah, there are many news sites that post corrections. This one was just so blatantly egregious that they had to put a stop to it before their entire corporation became a laughing stock. This isn’t just a ‘news site’. It is a Technology News Site. They had one job and they f’d it up. They shouldn’t even be hiring writers without a science degree let alone one that flunked highschool science.
They shouldn’t even be hiring writers without a science degree
As you mentioned, it’s a Technology News Site, not a Science News Site. Sounds a little arbitrary.
Light is almost certainly the fastest thing around.
why is that written as if it’s some sort of challenge
Isn’t this similar to the tech used in fiber optics cables? Or am I way off
But it is for wifi communication apparently. Unfortunately short wave lengths are absorbed more easily than longer wave lengths as the current radio/microwave solutions. That is the main physical limitations to overcome
Not only that, the longer wave frequencies also have a much narrower bandwidth meaning they cannot carry as much data. In order to improve communications over longer wave lengths, better compression algorithms have to be developed in order for more data to be carried.
This is exactly the issue, shorter wave lengths can carry more data, but they are blocked by literally everything between the source and the antenna… Longer wave lengths carry less information, but at least they are more reliable and can pass through many obstacles. It’s a compromised at the end
There is potential here, despite the early Wi-Fi-via-flashlight awkwardness. While you can’t turn a LiFi point entirely off, the signal has integrity at 10 percent room illumination (60 lux), and LiFiCo’s FAQ suggests future use of the invisible parts of the light spectrum.
Why didn’t they start with IR? IR natural sources? Because artificial sources are your TV remove and security cameras.
So the bulb works at low illuminations but what about light interferences? If you have other light sources, windows?
The best application I can image would be using them in street lamps to offer consistent coverage in public spaces. Not sure how viable that would be cost wise though.
Covert communications could also be an application. Just need line of sight and a signal could be sent undetected, and if anyone or anything above a certain size gets on position to detect it, their detection would be observed by both sender and receiver. The attempt would likely be noticed even before the detection, so the signal could be stopped until whatever it is that’s looking moves on.
Wouldn’t it be far more effective just to put Wi-Fi routers in said street lamps though? You’d almost certainly need far fewer of them for the same coverage.
but… the radio waves used in wifi are… already the same phenomenon as light
