Yes. Amateur RF is synonymous with low bandwidth. We have unique capabilities but it's with low bandwidth like 1200 baud, 9600 baud, 100K ID1's and hopefully soon UDRX at 56K+.
BBHN (Broadband hamnet, was HSMM) is generally more interested with connectivity than performance. Unfortunately too many experimenters there are new and not familiar with the lessons of 145.01 or 144.39... Even implemented with good RF design the MESH ad-hoc based system has compromises. I tried streaming the next episode of Torchwood from Amazon a couple nights ago and my NW-MESH (based on HSMM-MESH) home system wouldn't do it. I don't think that's even HD. :(
Precisely.
I think it is fine for radio hams to experiment with attaching some cool new experimental toy to the backbone, for whatever they want to do with it! Play with it and and have fun - that's what any hobby is for, and ham radio not the least..
But people really need to remember old the days of digipeaters on a single simplex frequency and make sure we don't return there, or at the very least
Ubiquiti M2/M3/M5 dual-chain AirMax nanobridges et al running on the ham bands are the new jesus.
Steve