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Cometa WiFi Hotspot Network To Shut Down
Glenn Fleishman writes "The folks who announced in Dec. 2002 that they would install 20,000 for-fee Wi-Fi hotspots across the U.S. within two years ago reached several hundred locations in 18 months before shutting down today. Cometa Networks was funded partly by Intel Capital, and had AT&T and IBM's involvement in building the network. The firm resold access to its network, and urged partners to charge low rates, like $3 to $5 per day or $12 per month for unlimited access. Cometa lost its best chance for a big network last month, when McDonald's picked Wayport to build out over 12,000 Wi-Fi hotspots in the U.S." There's now an official press release up, with the CEO noting: "We do not think this reflects on the strength of the Wi-Fi industry or value proposition."
1. Spend millions install WiFi hardware at thousands of hotspots ....
2. Give away free Internet access at these sites
3.
4. Profit!
The next Cmdr Taco duplicate will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush and see it early!
Well, as much as I love WiFi hotspots and being able to walk into a coffee shop with my laptop, handing out free WiFi probably isn't the best business model. Especially relatively unregulated like this. Imagine if someone had actually abused it!
I'm selling my K5 acct.
This is no different then free web space, free storage, or free internet. All of these glorious ideas have fallen by the wayside when people realized they could not be profitable.
Welcome, WAP, to this cruel cruel world.
http://jayceecorder.blogspot.com
Will make ya, or break ya. Sometimes profit is based on pure luck.
Life is not for the lazy.
No, fee is different than free. Even the /. write-up said "that they would install 20,000 for-fee Wi-Fi hotspots across the U.S. within two years". I think the real issue with the business plan was that they expected people to pay too much for too little.
I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
Everybody just read this dweeb's suggestion in yesterday's article!
- None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
1) Educate folks to build free community wireless netowrks
2) Help them build it
3) Tie them togther
4) Enjoy
Personal Telco Project
"Making tomorrows today yesterday"
Poor little clams! Snap! Snap! Snap! Poor little clams! Snap! Snap! Snap! Poor little clams! Snap! Snap! Snap!
This is no different then free web space, free storage, or free internet. All of these glorious ideas have fallen by the wayside when people realized they could not be profitable.
Welcome, WAP, to this cruel cruel world.
Fee, Fee Fee Foe Foe Foe....After rereading said post and getting some language lessons, I would like to strike my previous post from the record.
Good thing the story wasn't about applesauce and pork chops or I would have really been screwed.
http://jayceecorder.blogspot.com
Before even more people point out the flaws in their buisness plan, at least properly read the Slashdot post. It says for-fee, not for-free.
(Read the F***ing Write Up)
The hotspots were for fee, not for free. They were charging for wi-fi access.
Nathan
One problem we're going to have to deal with is that unless all hotspots are united under one brand, it's going to get kind of annoying to have to pay subscription fees to each different place you want to use, ie: $15 a month to Starbucks, $15 a month to McD's, $15 a month to Candlestick park. I'm against monopolization of any industry, but I'd take it here over having to subscribe to a different place everywhere I went.
in bed.
There are services that cost money to provide that are given away and the cost recouped either indirectly or as a markup in the overl price of other goods and services being offered.
With Free Community Wireless Networking the cost of backhaul and Equipment to cover a small area (commercial frontage, public use space, dwelling) can often be either recovered by increased biz or absorbed as the cost of being a good neighbor.
Just as Movie Theaters saw dramtic increases in summer time viewers with the inclusion of Air Conditioning so too are some biz and public spaces finding an increase base of use withthe draw of Free Wireless.
Living in Portland OR and being a part of the Personal Telco Project I can say this as a proven fact and not simply as some slashrot debate point. The places where we have nodes are seeing marked increases in their customer base. Several places we have put nodes in have become social centers for nomad laptop workers.
The problem with the Fee plans are that they simply will not wake up to the fact that customers will not pay for something that will quickly be seen on par with Lighting, AC, a glass of water, background music and those cool drink umbrellas.
Wake up Biz People....The writting is not only on the wall its on your bottom line.
Poor little clams! Snap! Snap! Snap! Poor little clams! Snap! Snap! Snap! Poor little clams! Snap! Snap! Snap!
Lets see.. I pay $50 / month for DSL. I also have to pay for a $20 / month "basic phone" line just to get the DSL. By basic, it's just a dial tone, no caller id, no features, even the ringer stays turned off so I dont have to deal with telemarketers. I could care less about it. I get free long distance, 400 anytime minutes, free nights and weekends, and free mobile-to-mobile minutes on my wireless phone. Plus voice mail, caller ID and I can take it anywhere. So why do I need a wired phone? Just so Bellsouth can establish DSL service. Yuck! It stands as an emergency 911 phone in case the wireless phone's battery is dead (if ever..).
That means I already pay $70 / month just to get DSL. I already have Verizon Wireless, so I might qualify for some kind of package deal discount.
The wireless phone I have is already a data-capable G3 phone. Possibly just a flash upgrade will enable the higher rates. So, I am probably out just a USB cable to get online. Anywhere, whenever. Hmmm.
Sounds like a good idea to me.
You know, it seems that where the telco's dropped the ball with fiber-to-the-curb, the wireless providers stand to prosper using RF
Don't make excuses you fucking idiot. You can't read.
ITS FEE
You stupid fuck, don't say you meant to write "almost free" or "for a small fee".
I'm surprised that the investors pulled the plug because they must have known, from the start, about the high cost of a nationwide roll-out. Thus, the investors must have learned that subcription volumes are too low to create a going concern. Giving that Cometa was had lower subscription rates, that fact bodes ill for commerical WiFi.
I'm especially surprised that Intel, one of Cometa's investors, let the venture go under. Intel seems to be giving away WiFi chips to help sell Centrino CPUs and would seem an ideal deep pocket to support a low-cost commercial WiFi network (road warriors with high-end Intel laptops see a win-win for Intel/Cometa). Either Intel thinks that WiFi does not need Cometa (because WiFi is thriving) or Intel realizes that WiFi is not going to generate sufficient returns through high-margin chip sales.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
Well, maybe not any more... but I know with the whole Raw Sockets debacle, they were very much talking like this guy is (of course grc.com has that story, I'm not sure how much credit people give him).
Makes me glad I'm not using wireless... How dumb do you have to be?
Great, leave your network open... Then when Comcast shuts down your internet connection 'cause people were doing illegal stuff on it, what are you going to say? "Ohhhh it wasn't me, it was some hacker!"
Sorry, Comcast, or whatever the ISP is, won't be giving your connection back. The fact is, the connection is in YOUR name financially.
Also, since I have cable with Cox, I have a monthly bandwidth limit... I wouldn't want someone taking advantage of my 400kb/s download all the time, I'd quickly run over my 30gb a month limit.
Anyway, this is extremely offtopic.
I've never used WiFi, so I can't really say anything about it. Guess I'll go do some work now, I'm feeling rather worthless after being done with classes for the semester...
1. Misread "for-fee" as "for-free" 2. ...
3. Profit!
Actualy, I made the same mistake as you, for what it's worth. But I was able to figure out what was going on by reading the rest of the blurb...
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Maybe if these places charged, for example $3/month or something it wouldn't be a big deal, but $12/mo for access to just one hotspot? Seems a little off to me, I mean sure buying access for one starbucks probably gives you access to all, but other starbucks employees, who's going to care?
What we need is some sort of profit sharing system, similar to how the cellphone system works. And it should be an open system, so that anyone can sign up to be a part. It would also be great in that anyone could make money simply by signing up and setting up WAPs, without worrying about how they are going to bill people.
And let me apologize, I don't have access to a spellchecker right now.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
...who usually have policies against this kind of thing. See Comcast's here (look at item ix). (If you were thinking of having them get some kind of business-quality connection that would allow that, remember that someone has to pay the bills for that. Maybe I'm being too cynical here, but the idea just doesn't seem very feasible.
I produce electronic music and write little games. Have a look.
We've just recently received FREE wifi via cometa at our local Barnes and Noble (ultra left-liberal book sellers). They've got a setup where they lease an IP to any MAC address for 2 hours per day. Great for sketchy p2p sessions w/ 1.8Mbit uploads.
I'm glad to see someone else lost it on this thread. I lost it when I hit the two minite limit for the third time. While waiting I added swearing to my comment thinking it would fail again. It didn't fail. I'm calmer now, but I'm not proud of using the f-word here. (for the record, it's different AC comment, only the editors can track it to me, I hope.)
Everything in the Slashdot comment section happens too fast. Posting early is the best way to get modded up. Using mod points early is the best way to have an effect. This leads to everyone rushing and being really stupid. If I want to write a long well written comment, no one will notice it. Bonus points don't help, because most people use every bonus they have with every post. I don't have a solution or I'd start my own Slashdot.
'SBEMAIL!' is better than a goat!!
i have to say that last summer, I was in NYC for MacWorld, and stopped in at a McDonalds to try out their new WiFi and stuff, got my value meal and a little card with a scratch off area and a access code under it, and went upstairs. I sat down, ate, and pulled out my PowerBook. It saw the AP no problem, connected right up, and when I launched Safari, it went right to my home page. no login or anything.
Now I know that it was a trial location, and this was possibly one of the reasons that McDs went with the other company, but I'm not so sure I'm sad that a company whose security on their APs was so lax to go out of business.
I mean, open APs are nice, but its really not in the public good, becuase they would have ended up getting abused for spammers and warez and such.
(and yes, it was Cometa, because the little card has their logo on it)
oh well...my $0.02
e to the pi i plus one equals zero
YOU FUCKING IDIOT!!!
Its not free, its fee you stupid fuck.
You can suck my balls for free, but if you want me to fuck you in the ass, I will charge you a fee.
We see that free free free does not work unless there is some viable way to make money money money.
I think their problem was that people kept seeing "for-fee" and thinking it said "for-free", and so they never got paid.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Now tell me what the competative advantage to having 3 sites with an average of 12 people in a location. I have never understood the advantage of building hugely distributed teams - I've worked in them... I have also worked on very localized teams (everyone on the same part of the same floor of the same building) - I have yet to see a distributed team that can match a localized team
I have mod points and I am not afraid to use them
What is needed is a sort of wi-fi roaming. Each hotspot could charge a base rate, and each "brand" could charge a monthly fee. If you see some new WAP, you can sign on with your provider's information, and they'll automaticaly be charged.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
2. Sell coffee, hamburgers, and assorted snacks at hotspot.
Gee- and then you have McDonald's- giving out 2 hours of access with an extra value meal.
SJW: a person who perceives an injustice, and while correcting it, commits a greater injustice.
The same thing seems to be happening with wireless data services - both wi-fi and cellular (3G anyone) - the bandwagon is rolling.
"If you think nobody cares if you're alive, try missing a couple of car payments." Earl Wilson
It seems a really odd press release.....I mean, it says:
"We've built a profitable business in the Seattle test market and to go national requires additional capital," Hellebust said. The company was unable to obtain the capital necessary for this expansion, and will wind down operations
If the business was profitable in the Seattle test market....why close it down? Why not just let reserves build up gradually and then expand organically instead of in a couple of giant leaps?
Methinks that it wasn't quite as profitable as they still claim...
Several cometes hosting rebel troops governed by evil and rebelious law were fretted by an unusual hungry BigMac. The 250 hotspots were digested within less than a second. BigMac's first comment: 'This was fun! Where exactly did you say that cluster of beowulfs is located? Buuurghrp.' The BigMac is now heading for McDonald's Plaza in Oak Brook, IL and dying to see Birdie. The extra-terrestial fresh quality of the Cometa, the main ingredient of McDonald's most popular burger, the Double Quarter Pounder with Cheese, Bacon and Eggs and Cometa, is a result of a unique process and BigMac's ability to eat the Cometa directly after catching.
Ah well, the new downtown Seattle library is opening this week, and they're supposed to have a free hotspot...maybe that will work.
He decided to just watch the government, and kind of scale it down to size, and run his life that way. --Laurie Anderson
Are the cell phone companies dumb? .. Why dont they get on this bandwagon?? They can make buttloads of cash and already own infrastructure.
.. the FCC won't let 'em.
Oh yeah that's right
Great now thanks to the FCC I have to pay for a cell phone AND internet access AND WiFi.
Interesting to compare these guys to Truckstop.net. Currently have rolled out 420 or so hotspots in 5 months, with plans to get around 3000 locations. Of course, their typical customers are truck drivers (hence the name), but anyone with with wireless and proximity to a location can sign up. Also, they charge the user directly, instead of charging the location. Still, once you sign up you can use any Truckstop hotspot at all, which can be pretty useful if you are travelling.
You can get to a nifty map on their page that shows all current and planned locations.
I have no clue why Borders and T-Mobile think I would be willing to sit down with a cup of crappy Borders coffee and pay anything from $6/hour to $30/mo (with contract) or $40/mo (w/o contract) for wireless access.
For one, I'm already paying $30/mo for broadband at home, so I can just make my own coffee and use my own internet access. My kitchen has a better atmosphere, anyway.
For two, they are competing with a whole slew of independent or small roaster coffee shops that offer better coffee, are much more comfortable, and offer free wireless.
1. Spend millions installing thousands of WiFi hotspots
2. Give away free Internet access at these sites
3. Eliminate "Supersize" and reduce portions
4. Profit!
(thanks, McDonalds!)
what the hell does that mean?
For-fee wireless is going to die out very quickly. It can't survive at Starbucks and the like because free wireless is already becoming something that you can practically expect an independent coffee shop to have. It can't survive at McD's because some of its competitors are already offering free wireless at all locations, as are some restaurants. It can't survive at the park because once folks realize that they can get free wireless almost everywhere else, they'll go back to toying with their computers indoors and using the park for playing frisbee and such.
T-Mobile hotspot is NOT $30/month. T-Mobile offers unlimited internet anywhere from a cell phone for $30 a month, or $20/month if you also have voice service from them. Hotspot plans are $4.99/month or $9.99/month, depending on features. Both have unlimited useage.
I wouldn't be surprised but would be disappointed if Cometa's network was bought up by Wayport and T-Mobile. After using both services I've been left with a bad taste in my mouth for fee-based WiFi access. Both groups charge exorbitant amounts of money for access. Wayport charges $6.95 at most airports for unlimited access from the time you purchase until midnight, T-Mobile wants $9.95 for 24 continuous hours of connectivity. For month-to-month access Wayport charges $49.95 and T-Mobile charges $39.95.
If you bought access for a large group of travelers or were somehow able to use the hotspots for all of your high-speed access needs the prices might not be so bad. For me and I'd assume a lot of other people that is way too much damn money. I might be willing to pay $12 a month for unlimited access but there is no way I'd fork over more than $20 a month. I've got WiFi access at my house with a faster connection than most hotspots I've come across.
I'd sign up for a month-to-month contract is a heartbeat if it offered wide coverage and a low monthly cost. As it is I rarely use WiFi hotspots because of the price and inconvenience. It is really nice to be able to use WiFi internet access but I'm fine just listening to shared iTunes playlists.
I'm a loner Dottie, a Rebel.
I agree that it is convenient to have wi-fi connection at coffee shop, but since I have broadband up and running at home already and I don't go to coffee shop every freakin day anyway, signing up for one-year contract is too much to get such a minor benefit. In addition, I see people fighting over a limited number of wall outlets to juice up their laptop. Is this a good business model? I don't think it is. As a corporation Starbucks can't care less about WiFi because it's run by T-mobile, and regardless of success or failure of such extraneous service as this, they are the biggest coffee chain in the nation.
What Cometa should have done is to establish partnership with rival coffee chains (e.g. coffee bean) and sell hotspot to the chain (corporation) as a product that attracts more customers, instead of using coffee shops as a place to sell their product to individual customers. I don't know about other countries, but in the US, the number of free hotspots is very limited. If there is a coffee chain that offers free WiFi access, I would choose them over Starbucks. Being WiFi ready alone might pay off the connection fees due to the increase in the number of customers per day, month and year.
Unfortunately, I just subscribed to Cometa's AT&T offered plan two weeks ago. Seeing that the company was closing up and not wanting my credit card to get zombie billed by AT&T for upcoming months, I accessed the account management on Cometa and found that there is no option there for cancelling service--only changing billing info. And the site checks the billing info entered, so it wasn't like I could change my info to a non-valid number for it to dead-bill.
I tried calling Cometa's number, but although it rings into Cometa's answer and call routing the destinations--help, AT&T account service, etc. are already "your call could not connect."
I tried to go into AT&T Wireless' goport site, but it doesn't recognizne the cometa routed account.
Anyone know who the heck to call in this case?
look here to see for yourself. 29.99 a month on annual contract, 39.99 monthly....
There are folks, a small number but still some, who READ the TOS before buying things like backhaul and make a EDUCATED choice to spend thier cash on ISPs who allow, yes allow , being a good neighbor.
Here in Portland OR we have Easystreet, Spirtech, Integra, Speakeasy and a bunch more who have put down policy to allow folks to use what they buy as they see fit.
Yea I know its not for everyone, I know most would rather stay stupid and smile a big cheesey white glitter tooth for the mass consumption media.."have another happy meal everything is ok just keep paying for a service we wont let you use"
Super Size your Comcast service? Well sure pump it up to a t3's worth of backhaul...but dont do anything listed in the tos or your criminal bad person...
Live free or die
Bang bang Have a nice day.
Poor little clams! Snap! Snap! Snap! Poor little clams! Snap! Snap! Snap! Poor little clams! Snap! Snap! Snap!
From a business perspective, here are the problems I see with Wi-Fi:
i. Too many competing WAPs (i.e. wireless providers) basically means that you can't roam. This problem exists in the cellphone world as well but they are trying some things to overcome. For Wi-Fi to take off, it would be desirable for people to roam between stores without paying for each one. Note: I am only talking about non-free (possibly low cost) Wi-Fi here. Obviously if it is free, this isn't an issue.
ii. The second thing, which is probably the biggest, is that the number of people using Wi-Fi has to increase. In other words, more people need to be carrying around notebook computers, (future) PDAs, etc. Right now, I don't think enough people have portable computers for this to really matter. Granted, professionals and IT people, along with some computer-savvy people, may carry their notebooks all the time, but most don't. At best, wi-fi will only be a small market for now. Until more people starting using portable computers with wi-fi capabilities, it won't take off. The fact that McDonald's is rolling this out will have little impact IMO since most of their customers don't carry notebooks around. Lastly, if only a few people benefit from wi-fi, then the cost will always be too high--critical mass won't be reached.
Having said all this, I am NOT saying wi-fi won't take off. I do expect it to become popular in 5 years or so, especially when wi-fi is a standard for home networking and workplace too. All I'm saying is that whoever that uses wi-fi now will not make any money. Those in the market will probably lose money for years but will definitely get some technical advantage.
Sivaram Velauthapillai
Seeking the meaning of life... @slashdot of all places
Sometime in the last 2 years they started offering the service free. Guess what, a lot of people came in with their laptops, like me, and used it and purchased coffee. I might even stay a couple hours while doing work and then purchase lunch. And I would go to this coffee house over a couple others because of the free access. They probably paid half their BW bill a month from me alone purchasing additional goods.
Now there are several other coffee houses that offer the same free service. So I pick based on which is closest. Same with Hotels. Its a cheap way to offer high speed access to many guests. I know its something I look for in business travel.
But none of these services give away the service or get revenue directly from the wifi access, however they do get additional customer loyality and usage because its there.
"The problem with socialism is eventually you run out of other people's money" - Thatcher.
Guess Wi-Fi will become a big thing in the years to come. Its use is not again for individuals though .. it is for offices, corporations, hospitals and stuff.
I guess in the heat of the moment, we often forget that Wi-Fi essentially is wireless LAN. Think of a place like India say, where the majority of computerisation of organisations is still to happen. Don't you think that if I company were to take up the business of providing Wi-Fi solutions to organisations, even to users who want a wireless home, they could be hitting a really huge market.
I would say that thinking that Wi-Fi is just an add-on is myopic. I think it can be the basis of a wireless future for mankind.
Starbucks could've locked down the coffee shop market even more had they gone with a cheaper provider (not that they really needed to). Well, at least this gives local, independent coffee shops a chance at competing by offering free Wifi. I wonder if Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf is going to do something chainwide-