Ad Sales On Muni Wireless Networks Yet Another Example Of Unrealistic Expectations
from the hype-hype-and-more-hype dept
Many of the hype-fuelled municipal WiFi plans made by various cities across the country involved free services supported by advertising. The party line was that businesses would love the chance to advertise to users in their immediate vicinity, while users would eat up the free services. Unsurprisingly, like muni WiFi in general, the actual deployments attempts at generating ad revenues have failed to live up to the inflated expectations. One of the biggest problems was that advertisers would have to do deals with individual networks, making it much more difficult to get make a wide ad buy than with other media like traditional web ads. That's starting to change, as a handful of companies are sprouting up to set up nationwide ad networks, allowing marketers to make purchases across multiple muni WiFi networks. That's a good step, but it's not a complete solution. Many networks have had teething problems that that have generated bad press and hardly encouraged usage, while the idea that businesses will pay a premium to advertise to local users may be oft-repeated, but remains unproven. One area where WiFi networks are seeing strong ad sales? Airports and hotels, where the attraction for marketers is a high number of business travelers. The different demographics of free municipal networks may not dictate the same level of demand.
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Muni Wi-Fi is a bad idea.
If private industry comes in and competes with several products at several different prices, the consumer has a choice, and if the product stinks, the consumer can drop it, no love lost. If muni wi-fi stinks, the government will throw more money at it, and outlaw any competition to boost their own image.
I don't care how much you doll up a piece of crap, it's still crap.
And people actually believe that muni Wi-Fi is a good thing... get rid of the big bad phone companies. Get rid of the big bad cable companies. Get rid of private Wi-Fi providers. I hate to say it, but having a choice is better than being stuck with crap. And wait... the government is going to start charging money when they can't make it work for free.
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Re: Muni Wi-Fi is a bad idea.
Brad, you seem confused. Nearly ever "muni-WiFi" deal is actually just a deal for rights of way for a private company to provide service. It's the same deal that most phone companies get. It's not the gov't providing the service, it's the gov't providing access for a private company to provide service.
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Wi-Fi
let the government save the money for better things
like feed the poor and keep them health.
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F.F.S. read a damn history book.
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Re: F.F.S. read a damn history book.
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what's the problem again?
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politicians and corporations teaming up to over promise and completely fail to deliver...
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