Speakeasy Allows Customers To Sell Their Own Wireless Broadband

from the creative dept

Tue, Jul 1st 2003 4:41pm — Mike Masnick

Found over at Glenn Fleishman's Wi-Fi Networking News, and apparently not yet picked up by any media outlets is the news that Speakeasy, the DSL ISP famous for (get this) actually being customer friendly, is letting customers sell their own bandwidth. Speakeasy already encourages people to set up WiFi networks and to use as many computers as they want (unlike the big name companies that want you to pay extra for every computer you connect). Now, accepting the fact that the bandwidth they sell you is your bandwidth, they're making it easy to turn around and resell your own bandwidth to your neighbors. You set the price, and they handle the billing. They also provide email addresses and other features like access to the Rhapsody music service. You split the revenue 50/50 with Speakeasy. While I think most people would probably just as soon let their neighbors use their bandwidth for free, it's very cool to see a company admit that the bandwidth is yours to do as you please. Every day, Speakeasy looks like a better broadband provider. As the big cable and DSL providers get more and more restrictive (while raising their prices) it's cool to see a company that is letting customers do what they want. Clearly, they stand to benefit as well (taking 50% of the fees!), but whereas other broadband providers would see this as "theft" Speakeasy is being smart about it and seeing it as an "opportunity".

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

10 Comments

If you liked this post, you may also be interested in...

Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread

Anonymous Coward, 1 Jul 2003 @ 11:27pm

No Subject Given
I may never take advantage of this offer, ever, but I love my ISP that much better today.

And that may be the beauty in it. They'll get a half-dozen people that pump their own internet package up there and resell to their neighbours, but the PR this generates is golden.

How I wish for the day when Speakeasy crushes the big bad bells.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
thecaptain, 2 Jul 2003 @ 6:06am

I wish they were in MY area...
I'd pay more just to sign up with them...not that I want to share wifi, I don't have a wireless network...but I feel that that kind of attitude should be rewarded.

As it is, I have to hide my home network whenever the tech has to come over (which thankfully isn't often).
[ link to this | view in thread ]
David, 2 Jul 2003 @ 9:29am

Speakeasy WiFi Reseller program
How does Speakeasy see your purchase of a wireless account as your own bandwidth when they are asking for 50% of your resell accounts? The person posting the article and praising Speakeasy for recognizing that it is "your own" bandwidth does not see clearly. If that were true, we'd be able to sell our bandwidth and make all the profit as would be our bandwidth to do as we please.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Mike (not that Mike), 2 Jul 2003 @ 10:10am

Re: Speakeasy WiFi Reseller program
From the link: "... complemented by a suite of Speakeasy services like email, dialup, news and excellent add-ons (such as Rhapsody Radio Plus)! The Admin selects the monthly service fees for their customers, and Speakeasy handles all the billing.."
Speakeasy does all the work, you setup an access point and start selling. Add in the normal services they provide at a "reduced cost," and you've got a deal.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Mike (profile), 2 Jul 2003 @ 10:46am

Re: Speakeasy WiFi Reseller program
How does Speakeasy see your purchase of a wireless account as your own bandwidth when they are asking for 50% of your resell accounts? The person posting the article and praising Speakeasy for recognizing that it is "your own" bandwidth does not see clearly. If that were true, we'd be able to sell our bandwidth and make all the profit as would be our bandwidth to do as we please.

The 50% charge is for handling all the billing and service and additional options.

If you wanted to sell your bandwidth without going through Speakeasy, they wouldn't complain either.

The nice thing about this is that they make it easy.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Don, 2 Jul 2003 @ 11:11am

Re: Speakeasy WiFi Reseller program
Another funny thing is how would they know you have sold any of your bandwidth anyway? My wireless network is behind a NAT firewall Nexland Pro 800 turbo router, all inet requests are masked and only show one source. I would imagine that it would be tough for them to tell if more than one person is using it. Other than actual traffic I do not think they can. Also although I agree that they are not letting you do "what you want with your bandwidth" since they want 50% of whatever you take in, it is at least a step in the right direction. I think looking ahead they may have to do this, and more ISP's may follow suit, cause right now I could offer that fro free in my building if I wanted and my ISP would not even know it.

[ link to this | view in thread ]
Voxel, 2 Jul 2003 @ 11:36am

Re: Speakeasy WiFi Reseller program
They can tell if you are using NAT or not by looking at port number patterns other TCP/IP identification schemes.

There is actual software designed to do just this. Find NAT users so DSL companies that state this is not acceptable can terminate your service.

Certain DSL companies that prohibit this have entire divisions established to hunt and destroy NAT users as this violates their terms of service.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
DenisATDimickDOTnet, 2 Jul 2003 @ 11:54am

I love speakeasy
Had a problem with download speeds.. Called up tech support, explained my NAT and firewall set up, the "first level" tech understood what I was talking about and was able to solve the issue. Speakeasy is Linux friendly, so if you run Linux, you may want to look at them.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Speakeasy Customer, 16 Sep 2003 @ 10:02am

Re: I love speakeasy
I just want to say that I'm a very happy Speakeasy customer myself. Not only do they offer great customer service, they also offer great DSL service. Not only do the say "go ahead, use your bandwidth for whatever you want.", they just LOWERED our monthly DSL bill by $10. Now, that's a company that knows how to treat (and keep) it's customer base.

Heck, any ISP that offers an "administrator" package where they let you run any servers you wish (minus IRC and News) and gives you 2 static IP's is good in my book!
[ link to this | view in thread ]
matt, 25 Apr 2009 @ 4:43am

you mean the service credit they give
speakeasy does not actually give you any money for selling your wifi. they only give you a service credit. Read the fine print.
[ link to this | view in thread ]