By Allan D. Francisco
This Christmas, Manila Bulletin combines the best of Christmas history and tradition with the latest in wireless connectivity technology to come up with something uniquely fitting for the holidays, a season of giving. First launched in Christmas 2003 by the country’s biggest newspaper publishing company, the WiFi Christmas tree at the lobby of Manila Bulletin’s main office in Intramuros is envisioned to offer free wireless Internet access to students within the immediate surrounding areas.
Missed Chance for World Record
Standing 30 feet tall, the Christmas tree would have been the first of its kind if not for the tree unveiled by Internet company Yahoo! a couple of days earlier three Christmases ago at the Herald Square in New York City. Equipped with SMC access point, this year’s tree will provide WiFi signal around the Manila Bulletin building and as far as the Intramuros walls near Muralla Street.
While the tree settled for runner-up honors in the world category, it certainly established itself as the first WiFi-enabled Christmas Tree in the country; perhaps even the rest of Asia.
Wireless Tidings of God’s Coming
There is something appropriate and fitting for the season in combining one of Christmas’ most recognizable symbols with a communication technology designed to overcome the limits of wired connectivity. While some of the early Christians objected to the use of a tree as a means of commemorating the birth of Jesus, finding the idea of adopting a pagan motif too repugnant perhaps, the tree was nevertheless gradually accepted as part of the holiday festivities and tradition.
On the other hand, WiFi is a relatively new technology designed to wirelessly connect computers and other devices to the Internet, a wired network or with each other.
The WiFi Alliance’s Web site (www.wi-fi.org) says "WiFi networks use radio technologies called IEEE 802.11a, 802.11b, or 802.11g to provide secure, reliable, fast wireless connectivity. WiFi networks operate in the unlicensed 2.4GHz and 5GHz radio bands, with an 11Mbps (802.11b) or 54Mbps (802.11a) data rate or with products that contain both bands (dual band)."
Christmas Updated
Already set to be overshadowed, if not replaced, by faster and farther-reaching wireless standards, WiFi stands for the technology sector’s efforts to breach the limitations set by wired connection. It more than updates a much-loved and comforting Christmas symbol for the digital age; it expands the season’s message of giving and putting other people ahead of oneself.
With wireless technology, the tree acquires a new aspect, a new dimension. One that highlights the season’s call for each of us to strive with all our might to overcome barriers, all those silly and petty differences that we put up between us and keep us apart, and make us strangers to each other. Walls that keep us from becoming truly human, and prevent us from regaining the child-like qualities and attitudes we have lost to become what we are now—caricatures of the best possibilities of what we can truly be.
Christmas is supposed to be a season for sharing. No wonder most people, especially the children, wish and pray it could be Christmas everyday--that it could last forever. A Christmas tree coupled with Wi-Fi connectivity is no longer the curiosity it used to be three years ago.
Nevertheless, the things it stands for and represents—peace and equality, generosity and understanding, and bridging of differences—remain valid and valued as aspirations for men and women of goodwill during and beyond the holiday season.
Have a Merry Christmas and a Blessed New Year!
|
