It seems the capital city of Taiwan, Taipei, is well on its way to become the largest city in the world to have a citywide wireless network. Managed by a private company under the aegis of the city government, the network features over 3,000 access points to cover half of the city's 106 square miles for its 2.6 million residents. According to city officials, the project will cover 90% of the city by the middle of this year.

The story also mentions that the network will succeed because nearly 9 in 10 Taipei households have at least one PC and over a third of the population is familiar with wireless Internet service. As a result, there's no need for a large learning curve and users will be able to take immediate advantage of the network. As with many U.S. citywide networks, there has been pushback from the phone companies who have lobbied city and state governments to keep these initiatives from getting off the ground. But just like anywhere else, the demand is just too great to keep down.