The IEEE stand are created by group of people that represent many different organizations, including academics, corporate bussiness, military, and the government. Because stadards set forth by the IEEE can have such an impact on the developments of technology, the standards can take many years to be created and agreed upon, althrough ratification of 802.11 standards seems to have accelerated greatly in the last few years, probably due to the extreme demand for 802.11 products.
