Don't Get Too Excited About That Free Google WiFi
from the strings-attached dept
There's been a lot of excitement about the Google-Earthlink bid to build citywide WiFi service in San Francisco, particularly Google's plans to offer a free, ad-supported service. Now, the two companies are planning to team up in another city, but Earthlink's CEO says the free services will be much more limited, since he thinks it will be hard to generate the $7 per month per user needed to break even. All users will be able to access are area web sites and Google's local search -- which should put a damper on people's enthusiasm. While the idea of free citywide WiFi sounds great, it looks like it's something that's difficult to deliver: remember, too, that Philadelphia officials first talked up the idea of free WiFi there, and now it's become $10 or $20 per month. This isn't to say that municipally-supported WiFi networks are a bad idea, but rather just that they may not provide the free connectivity some people are expecting. Update: A new survey says that people don't want to pay for public WiFi, which would seem to go against what the Earthlink CEO says -- but more people say they don't use public WiFi because they don't need to, which would validate what he's saying. Pricing and business model are things that can be adjusted, but convincing people both that they need to use WiFi networks then getting them to pay for it might be a tough task.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.
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Re: Free Internet Access
This is nice for someone that needs to be mobile, but if it isn't 100% open and free, it sounds like there are too many drawbacks.
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Re: Re: Free Internet Access
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makes sense
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why...
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Why should it be free?
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Philly was never free
Also, philly already has $20 wi-fi, at acceptable speeds. Its called Closed Networks. Its not too bad if you don't mind GREAT upload speeds, decent download speeds and signing a contract.
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There is no
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$20 wifi
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Well...
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Re: Well...
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Re: Well...
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City Wide Wi-Fi
The alternative to providing city wide access is to use either standard 802.11 or MMDS. With MMDS you need a large receiving antenna, a trasnceiver, and a modem which offers virtualy no portability. Not to mention a license from the FCC which sprint has almost exclusive rights too. With 802.11 you have to worry about interferance and SSID authentication. As you move about with your standard 802.11 card scanning for that SSID to connect to, you'll more than likely connect to the same SSID from several transmitters. Knowing which transmitter to connect to is determined by signal strength. So if you're in between two transmitters, and singal strength is fluctuating it's liekly your connection will continualy drop and reconnect between the two.
So in order to provide a free service to a wide coverage area that is more practical and cost effective than walking into a starbucks, or piggy backing off a random unsecured router, means having equipment that can maintain a continous link with the end user. Seeing as the equipment needed to support a semi-Line of Sight system, that can blast through all the skyscrapers, cars, and whatever other microwave absorbingreflecting objects scatter about a city is pretty costly, I wouldn't expect to see any FREE WiFi service anytime soon.
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Re: City Wide Wi-Fi
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Funny
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land of the free, eh?
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http://www.smartriverside.com/
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Most complain, some take action...
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I Don't Like to Pay
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I Don't Like to Pay
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I cant believe no one has said
Whats so different? Its just a new generation of ad supported "free"...
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Free WIFI is great !!!
They are great and seems to be everywhere !! we dont need no st*nkin Earthlink paid WIFI
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Oakland County, MI, has WiFi
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Google-Earthlink??
Is that why TimeWarner(AOL) has made a deal with Google to EXCLUSIVELY use Google search for the AOL software/browser INSTEAD of any other search engine (notably MSN)???
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More hotspots
from: http://www.darrenbarefoot.com/archives/2004/12/kamloops-the-bastards-gets-wifi-everywhere.html
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Free? WiFi
Thing two you won’t loose your local home network. You will simply set you computer to act as a gateway to your router
With the price of dsl and cable now running at close to $35.00 a month (come on forget the lure you in specials) $20.00 dollars a month sounds very reasonable for universal access. This will be a good deal
Just think of the new Voip wireless phones. Screw your cell bill.
Daniel McNerney Comcast at home, Att at work. I pay for both
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I wish
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Google Needs to Provide WIFI everywhere
Google therefore should be working on capturing the WIFI world with uncapped everywhere access for under $20.00 per month.
This will require major Capex and partnership building.
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FREE WIFI COMES AT A PRICE
FREE THEIR COMES A PRICE THE GOVERMENT SHOULD PAY YOU SAY!
WELL MY FRIEND THE PEOPLE THAT FUND THE GOVERMENT IS YOU, WEATHER IT IS LOCAL,STATE OR FEDERAL HOW CAN PEOPLE BE NAIVE. BOB PAWLUSIAK
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