May 23, 2007

By Jonathan Schlaffer

Let WiFi fry your brain or put down cables If the UK government has its way then any school with WiFi might not have it much longer. Look at what happened with Cell phone radiation, sure it might and I emphasize MIGHT give you brain tumors if you talk on it 24/7 every day of your life for 25 years but that isn’t going to stop people from using the tiny devices.

Cell phone radiation has been proven (to my satisfaction) that it is harmless and if you think otherwise, seek professional help because you are either a hypochondriac or paranoid, maybe both.

Even though WiFi signals are much lower in power than cell phone signals some are calling into question the decision of exposing young children to these signals in schools with WiFi connections. One school in particular has over 26 wireless access points and students are bringing their own personal laptops to school (though I doubt very much it’s to help with class work).

My college campus has tons of wireless access points, many more than 26 and I’ve never heard of students complaining about headaches, radiation or feeling sick because of it so it must be safe.

It is safe, trust me, but there will always be those few nutcase parents or governmnet officials who are not going to think so no matter what anyone tells them.

The Inquirer has a comment from a reader that I liked which says the UK government should either leave the WiFi be or give schools more money to lay down extra cabling for traditional LAN connections. Right. It seems that the existing ports in the school don’t work because the students have been jacking in just because like all things human, they are curious, I’d do the same thing.

I say, leave the WiFi be, with the things the way they are today, I think the students would rather have a brain tumor than give up precious WiFi… as long as the tumor is operable, I don’t think I would care either.

WiFi doesn’t give you cancer or tumors, if you think otherwise… just read the second paragraph.  Maybe just put up some warning signs, works for me.