Meraki WiFi Data Report Has Baffling Categories

This Meraki “census” (probably not a good descriptor) has gotten good blog pickup…

Meraki Wireless Census Reveals Bold Shifts in Type and Number of Wireless Devices in Use in North America

But, quite frankly, I can’t make heads or tails of what they are measuring. What, for example, does their “Apple” category represent? It looks to me like Meraki is throwing everything with an Apple label in that category. So, it includes the MacBook, MacBook Pro, iPhone and iPod touch (and maybe even iMac and Mac mini computers connected via WiFi). That makes no sense at all to me. In the same chart they have a catgory named “Intel-based”. What does that mean? And, does it includes modern Macs which are all Intel-based? And, just what is that mammoth “Other” category that represents 49.3% of all WiFi-capable devices in their categorization scheme?

Their last chart breaks out “Major WiFi-Capable Handheld Devices”. This category includes just RIM (BlackBerry) and Nokia. Um, what happened to the iPhone?

I’m sure Meraki’s data has something interesting to tell us. But, the items in their press release simply leave me baffled.

I’m going to point their PR person to this blog item and give Meraki an opporunity to sort this out with me in a possible future podcast. This firm says they manage wireless networks that serve millions of users in over 10000 networks in more that 130 countries. Their data have interesting stories to tell. But, this isn’t one of them for me.

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