Wi-Fi Direct Bypasses Your Router On Its Way To Kill Bluetooth - New P2P standard mak

[Da-Chief]

The Wi-Fi Alliance (a 300 member group including heavyweights like Apple, Intel and Cisco) has announced Wi-Fi Direct, a new peer-to-peer wireless networking approach that aims to simplify the way consumer devices connect. According to the Alliance's press release, the new specification will allow Wi-Fi devices to connect to one another without joining a traditional home, office, or hotspot network. Turning gadgets into mini access points will certainly help the technically challenged, and the standard will be built into a bevy of consumer products. Most hardware, meanwhile, should be upgradeable with a simply software update.

"Wi-Fi Direct represents a leap forward for our industry," proclaims Wi-Fi Alliance executive director Edward Figueroa. "Wi-Fi users worldwide will benefit from a single-technology solution to transfer content and share applications quickly and easily among devices, even when a Wi-Fi access point isn't available." "The impact is that Wi-Fi will become even more pervasive and useful for consumers and across the enterprise."

There's of course a slew of possible chained repercussions here, including what specifically such a product does to home Wi-Fi (or 3G or Wi-Fi) router sales, Bluetooth (some of that functionality appears mirrored here), or a variety of growing home networking standards. It's an interesting and more efficient evolution of the standard formerly just codenamed "Wi-Fi peer-to-peer."

The Wi-Fi Alliance says they'll be publishing their peer-to-peer specification soon, and will begin certifying devices for the Wi-Fi Direct designation in 2010. Expect a growing cacophony of PR for the standard in the coming months.
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