For an optimist such as yours truly, the importance of this week's event is that it gets us closer to a world of affordable connected devices. But critics now charge that we have a surfeit of wireless protocols. In their mind, we're in great danger of babelizing this new frontier. Other naysayers feel that we're too optimistic. They say that it took nearly ten years for USB to gain some kind of mainstream acceptance and many implementations still leave much to be desired.
Critics are right to suggest moderation.
You can't really buy BlueTooth devices at Fry's today, and therefore, BlueTooth doesn't exist, yet. And, yes, the great thing about standards is there are so many to choose from, as Larry Tesler, a former Apple Fellow once joked. The news is mixed. If you read the specs, one calls itself 802.11, the other 802.11b. Let's hope it does.