I was “recently interviewed”:1 about the recent “FON and Time Warner Cable announcement”:2 by Jason Fry for his Wall Street Journal Online column “Real Time”. FON and Time Warner Cable recently came to an agreement to allow TWC subscribers to set up FON hotspots. Much about this deal is unclear, including how the revenue sharing is working from FON to TWC (FON is surely paying TWC in some way).
Here are some excerpts from “my interview”:1:
bq. …
bq. Dana Spiegel, executive director of NYCwireless, is skeptical of the deal’s impact, seeing it as little more than a public-relations move for both companies. Fon’s network, he says, is “to be perfectly blunt, tiny” and predominantly residential, making it not particularly valuable in public places. Ms. Rees says Fon has 60,000 Foneros in the U.S., though she acknowledges that Fon may not have the visibility of, say, T-Mobile with its Starbucks locations. While she maintains Fon’s footprint will be more effective over the long term, “over the short term we have to be strategic.” An example of that strategy: a “Fonbucks” campaign in which Fon has given away free La Foneras to people living near coffee shops.
bq. Mr. Spiegel calls Time Warner Cable’s deal with Fon “a parasitic billing system … I’m paying the same amount of money for less service and Time Warner Cable is getting more money from what I’ve already paid for.” His volunteer group’s members create free hot spots in New York City parks and public spaces and help bring free wireless Net access to underserved communities. In his view, NYCwireless’s approach is better: “Instead of taking a reduction in my value and handing it back to Time Warner, I’m taking that value and spreading it out among my local community.”
bq. Then there are efforts by cities and towns to offer cheap or free Wi-Fi. The most celebrated such efforts are taking shape in Philadelphia and San Francisco, but many other cities and towns are pursuing that goal, motivated by a desire to bridge the “digital divide” between rich and poor and eagerness to bill themselves as tech-friendly.
bq. One thing Mr. Spiegel and Ms. Rees seem to agree on: It’s too simplistic to see muni Wi-Fi as a threat to the aspirations of big ISPs and other wireless providers. Rather, muni Wi-Fi is likely to be complementary to such efforts. “What municipal offerings do is raise the baseline,” Mr. Spiegel says, contending that such services will primarily convert those left behind today. “Today’s baseline is dial-up. When municipal networks roll out, you’ll see a move from dial-up” up to a new baseline.
bq. …
bq. “When first introduced, [air-conditioning] was a luxury item,” Mr. Spiegel notes. “Stores that installed it saw a benefit. As it became more available, more and more stores added it and it became more of a cost of doing business.”
bq. So it will be with wireless. And as with air-conditioning, we’ll be startled to find ourselves going without now and again. We’ll even feel nostalgic about it.
[1]http://online.wsj.com/article/SB117743976135380805.html
[2]http://www.prnewswire.com/cgi-bin/stories.pl?ACCT=109&STORY=/www/story/04-23-2007/0004571121&EDATE=
Filed under: Interview, Muniwireless, New York City, News, NYCwireless
