Oversubscription is commonly accepted practice in the ISP industry. There are a couple reasons for that. One is that not everyone will be online at the same time. The other is that even when people are online at the same time not everyone uses 100% of the available bandwidth all the time. Someone browsing the web or checking email doesn't take up a constant data rate or a very high one. Many of those 16 million will only browse the web and check email so they make up an almost insignificant number in your bandwidth figure. You'll have a few power users who like to run torrents which may eat some bandwidth, and others who use streaming media which will be a bandwidth user (Although it won't need a gigabit). It will be a long LONG time before the average user uses anything near a gigabit and I'd bet by then that international bandwidth will be upgraded. I find that probably 60 percent of residential users could honestly get by on a 1.5x256 internet connection and still have room to spare. The only reason they don't is because here in the US the marketing ploy is always to tell people they need MORE. Also keep in mind that in many cases the servers you're connecting to won't have a gigabit connection so you won't be able to download that ISO at true gigabit speeds. Thanks Eric

So the question I have is does anyone know what the WI-FI transmit power is on the IPAD? I didn't see it on Apple's site and don't seem to be finding it anywhere? Are we talking a full 1 watt?

I'm curious, is this a requirement that the local NWS office has put in place or is it that the local RACES organization runs the net most people participate in and they won't let you play in their sandbox unless you're RACES? Nationally there is no requirement to be a member of RACES or even a HAM radio operator to act as a storm spotter. If it's just that the RACES folks won't let you play in their sandbox run your own Skywarn nets and make arrangements to relay info back to the NWS on your own. Around here our local ARES EC runs most of the Skywarn nets but any are welcome to check in if they have information to report although we do encourage the NWS Storm Spotter training it's not a requirement.

I'm not sure you're actually correct that thousands of hams provided the only communications out of Haiti after the earthquake and all fo the tactical coms. While there were a few messages coming out of Haiti over amateur radio there wasn't much. Cell phones were brought back up pretty quickly and a friend of mine who was in Haiti doing relief work after the quake (Specifically as a comms officer for a relief org) said that he had very little use for HF as satellite connections were brought up pretty quickly. He did say there was some use of VHF to establish local communications between relief orgs and various med stations etc but that other communications came up quickly enough that amateur radio didn't play as big of a role as many would like us to believe. If you want a great technical hobby where there's a lot to learn and an opportunity to make friends all over the world become a ham. You might get an opportunity to help out in a disaster, but if your main goal is to help out in emergencies, get trained in CPR, Search and Rescue and other such, but don't count on being a ham to put you in the "Most needed" category. There is a place for amateur radio in disaster relief, but it's as a backup, not a primary communications method. The fact is the pros can do a better job than we can.