Since the cell phone towers are already in situ, why not just add the WIFI to each of those towers? Same power, same ugliness, permissions already in place for radio wave emissions.
Why limit it to towers? It doesn't take much imagination to ideate satellites and devices having increased power and sensors to eliminate the current snags with satellite phones (rarely work in buildings or out of "line-of-sight" between satellite and device.)
The next big thing? Seems reasonable enough to issue everyone a unique ID for access (and payment.) You give up same privacy as when you have cell phone with GPS locator.
Not too much more effort to add webcams to those towers, either. I'm told in Japan and other Asian countries, folks often carry multiple devices for video, text, and voice messaging. London has some bragging rights on number of TV cameras in public places (how much more difficult to connect them all via internet?)
Twenty or fifty years from now, folks may have implants so they can be continuously "connected" with no worry about mislaying or losing the device.
No need to be philosophic about social ramifications of such changes - after all, wasn't it some honcho at IBM who couldn't envision why there would be a need for more than a few computers in the world?
In a certain definition, the internet has brought the IBM concept almost full circle - in a way, all devices attached to the internet can be considered as one giant computer. Some folks use the computing power of multiple connected computers to perform complex mathematical problems in their "spare" time (distributed computing.) Add in the various private networks (governments, organizations, etc.) and by use of the same definition, we really are back at "just a few computers."
Ah yes, Sunday morning musings when it is only 8 degrees Fahrenheit.
