RSSChicago Decides Against Citywide Wi-Fi
By Ed Oswald | Published August 29, 2007, 12:20 PM
In a sure sign that the fervor behind municipal Wi-Fi is cooling rapidly, the city of Chicago announced Tuesday that it was canceling its plans to blanket the city with wireless Internet.
The city says it failed to reach an agreement with either AT&T or EarthLink, the two companies vying for the contract. Chicago first announced that it was considering citywide Wi-Fi early last year.
However, negotiations apparently didn't go as well as planned, The Chicago Tribune reported, and recent moves by EarthLink that it may be pulling out of the municipal Wi-Fi business probably contributed to the city's decision to pull the plug.
One of the main points of contention was the fact that city officials were unwilling to pay the companies to install the network. Instead, the city would have provided the infrastructure.
As good as it sounded, municipal Wi-Fi is not getting results. In many locations, the number of signups are only in the hundreds, and it cost millions of dollars to build up the networks. Add to this the fact that wired high-speed Internet like cable and DSL is available for the same price, and there isn't much reason for people to sign up anymore.
One Chicago official told the Tribune that the city did not want to lead the way when it came to city Wi-Fi. Instead, officials had much more interest in seeing what happened in other cities. With the recent news on the subject, Chicago's announcement isn't all that surprising.
"...In many locations, the number of signups are only in the hundreds, and it cost millions of dollars to build up the networks. Add to this the fact that wired high-speed Internet like cable and DSL is available for the same price, and there isn't much reason for people to sign up anymore..."
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They typically have not put themselves in an individual consumer's shoes, offering up too little bandwidth for too many $$$.
Various fixed line & cellular competitors offer "worldwide" hotspot service-- so why would an individual either, ditch a current carrier, or additionally purchase service limited to their immediate municipal area(which most leave to shop & commute to work / school on a daily basis) unless if the speed or reach(say inside subway tunnels) was state of the art.
Whoever is putting up municipal wifi needs to:
1. Go the wholesale & independent agent routes as well: sell space to isp's, cell carriers & utility companies worldwide-- so that for instance, a gas/electricy/cellular/satellite provider can then bundle internet service... any local ISP can offer a more valuable product...
Factor in additionally mutual territorial access/roam agreements, and pretty soon the coverage area extends way beyond the city to perhaps blanket the country & even other countries: a company like say, Virgin would love to be able to bundle a package encompassing national / international cellular & internet...
2. wire up subway tunnels & major buildings.
3. utilize the latest & fastest technology / equipment, no matter how expensive initially-- to make yourself attractive to both individual and corporate consumers.
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