The problem with Helium is that there's virtually no demand for LoRa protocol's super-low datarates. Cellular is a different story. There are already 3rd-party cellular towers operators who profitably provide data service to handsets on behalf of the big network providers. Tokenomics could work for cellular with carriers providing demand-side token consumption. However, cellular wasn't Helium's initial target, and watching them migrate to multi-band / multi-protocol has been a bit cringey.
Where I am, Helium is would be the cheapest way to get data from a-b without draining batteries.
I can dump sensors anywhere in the city and they should just work.
But
When I last looked, it was really convoluted to buy data, you had to either buy them off a miner, which sounded dodgy, or mine the tokens yourself. I just wanted to buy $25 worth of data transfer and have done with it, but I couldn't figure out a way to do it at the time
> The problem with Helium is that there's virtually no demand for LoRa protocol's super-low datarates
yet.
FTFY. Personally, I'd love to relay my home weather station readings over LoRa - then many other things too, if it's cheap enough! (say my TPMS - why not? Then I can retroactively track my car to cross correlate where I went shopping)
Helium business model that's paying for the deployment of a worldwide network on a free-to-use band is brilliant: it will replicate Wifi except with a worldwide coverage + full control of the network.
Wifi may at first have seemed equally useless, but the network effects from the ubiquity of it's presence and the unification of standards have replaced so many things I've only heard of in tech history books like DECT
That makes no sense. LORAWAN is very, very limited by airtime, which is why the data rates are so abysmally low. You're never going to see a huge amount of traffic on it.
To you maybe. But it does to me, and apparently also to a16z :)
> You're never going to see a huge amount of traffic on it.
And I don't need lots of traffic!
If we talk about say the TPMS information for 4 tires once per hour, that's not a lot of bytes.
The value is in being able to send 24/7 with a very wide coverage, and no per-network setup (like asking for Wifi passwords- I pay for LTE just to avoid the hassle)
What they realized is that they could extract returns way earlier than the traditional exits of IPO or acquisition. They told at least one of these companies they didn't care if they ever made money. I'd be willing to bet my 1 BTC that A16Z knowingly participated in "scams", knowing that they would never get in trouble because they can operate in the gray zone and get away with it. They only believe in it because they can get the greenbacks out.
If your car never leaves your driveway, or the reach of your home wifi, sure! That's not the case for most people though.
Also, you can't do that if people don't cooperate, while it may be in your interest (ex: to track customers across the city)
As for the weather station, it involves you having a home internet - many people just have cellphones. A device that would ask for wifi passwords etc or require bluetooth pairing or worse would be complicated. Something that works worldwide with no setup would be a hit!
It's very easy to not perceive an opportunity which doesn't apply to you - in this case if you have say LTE in your car + on every device + at home.
