We've been talking for a few years now about how the femtocell industry keeps declaring that this will truly be the year of the femtocell, only to find those ambitions crushed by carriers. Femtocells, which route cell phone traffic over residential broadband connections, help carriers by easing tower congestion and consumers by improving in home cell reception. However, ISPs like Verizon and AT&T seem intent on sucking all the value out of the devices by overpricing the hardware, or implementing pricing plans that eat consumer minutes. According to the latest information from the femtocell industry's femtoforum, 2011 will be their year. And they mean it this time:While it's true Verizon started offering a 3G femtocell back in October, it's still not a particularly impressive unit. While some carriers smartly give the device away for free to retain customers in low signal areas, Verizon's $250 unit has a number of shortcomings, including failing to give you full security over who can access the device. It also still eats consumer voice minutes, meaning you're paying Verizon extra to use your own already-paid-for bandwidth, while easing congestion on their local towers.

Unless carriers like Verizon wise up on femto pricing, 2011 will be another no show for the technology.