Can Public Hotspots Make Money?

from the forget-it dept

With all the hype about Wifi hotspots lately, most people still don't think it's possible to make money by offering public Wifi access. The economics just don't support it, according to people in the industry. Some companies figure the best plan is just to focus on business travelers. However, some think that the "coffee shop" model, could work. By offering wireless access as a way to draw people into coffe shops and restaurants, it could be useful as a marketing tool to get more customers. I think a lot of the problem is that many people simply don't know about or understand Wifi right now. As more computers get integrated WiFi and people get used to using wireless access in the home, demand will increase for hotspots in more public places.
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  • identicon
    kensai, 12 Jun 2002 @ 1:28pm

    Of course...

    What's to stop someone from just standing outside and connecting?

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    David, 12 Jun 2002 @ 1:56pm

    what's to stop...

    passwords...like at starbucks, where i have to have a t-mobile account. even if t-mobile didn't charge me, they could make me get a password (a la free webmail) so that they could make sure that i at least had a relationship with them and they could count me as a user.

    buying the food/coffee is kind of like asking if i looked at the ads on hotmail...not often, but a 'sale' every once in awhile keeps the revenue flowing...

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Scleigel, 12 Jun 2002 @ 3:57pm

    Could work

    At the very least, they'd be attracting people who either can afford a laptop or are important enough to get one for work. Whether they're cheap bastards or not, they should at least be able to afford a cup of coffee.

    The question is, how much will it cost to set up and maintain these networks, and will they be easy to keep running. If you advertise WiFi and don't deliver, that's worse than not offering it in the first place.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 12 Jun 2002 @ 4:18pm

    PPFA protocol

    PayPal for Access Protocol

    Linux/*BSD .iso image, some spare hardware with
    two NICs + port 80/25/110 redirector.

    Customer walks in, turns on netstumbler, gets
    assigned an IP address, tries to browse, sees
    a page saying 50cents per 1 hour DHCP lease...
    please pay with paypal.

    build the image/solution and split the revenue
    with the access point/bandwidth/gateway hardware
    owner/provider. Probably have to use some crypto
    to keep the pirates from duping the idea by just
    changing the paypal destination account.

    Of course it would be even slicker if you reverse
    engineered the firmware for popular access points,
    accomplishing the same sort of solution and then
    war drived around installing it on unsecured
    access points. I guess you'd need one of those
    off-shore PayPal accounts then...

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 12 Jun 2002 @ 4:23pm

    Re: PPFA Protocol

    You know that's a really good idea...

    Sun keeps talking about the "network identity"...
    What a buch of crap. The only idenity that
    should be required on the net is the ability to
    pay.

    Authentication by Payment... I like the sound of
    that.

    link to this | view in chronology ]


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