Fred,
Contrary to your characterization of WLD's questions, I don't think that they are dumb at all. And while I have no skin in whatever decision is reached with respect to stage mics, I think the question asked deserves more respect and consideration than you've allowed. That said, I hardly think that the types of delays that you alluded to, which are commonplace in traditional VoIP applications over wide area networks today, would apply in a wireless mic situation. I make this point NOT because of the propagation times imposed by the WAN, but because many of the signal processing stages that are usually required for VoIP (when used over the Internet or WAN) would be obviated in local settings where hop counts were minimal to non-existent, and distances never exceeded a few tens of meters.
For example, if mics were to be properly designed and adapted with IP, there would be no pipe-lining to speak of, nor would there be very much variability in propagation times across randomly picked routes, such as occurs today over the Internet. There would be, in other words, no appreciable path delay or jitter, hence there would be little or no need for queuing or buffering on the send side, nor would there be a delay penalty incurred due to packet re-ordering and de-jitter buffers on the receive side. In total, a couple hundred milliseconds could be shaved directly off the top of typical VoIP delays, which ordinarily would reach into the hundreds of milliseconds. We would instead expect to see something on the order of 20 to 50 milliseconds, depending on the type algorithm employed by the coder-decoder (codec) that is used.
Your point concerning the need to maintain performance that is consistent with the needs of real-time communications has merit, IMO, witness the thought you've inspired about it already. And in the end, that's all this is. A thought experiment. Isn't it? However, your reply evaded the fundamental question that was asked related to the class of device that is represented by a wireless mic, or a walkie talkie, for that matter, in respect to their relevance in matters related to network neutrality, despite such issues as delay and the like.
Network Neutrality may or may not make any sense, but it is nevertheless something that is with us today, and it looks like it's going to be around for a while longer, at least. So I suspect it is something we'll have to deal with it for as long as it remains an issue. I also suspect that, with the proliferation of wireless-enabled consumer products, the question that was asked about wireless mics may become commonplace over time for other devices as well.
FAC
------ |
