Slashdot Mirror
The Case for Free WiFi?
lgreco writes "Recently I was trying to convince a business man who is about to open an Internet Cafe, to provide WiFi at no charge. I argued about increased business and royalty and proposed that the infrastructure cost these days is reasonable and the recurring cost, along with the amortized payoff of the initial investment, can be recovered by adding a few cents to each beverage, etc. In spite of the numerous discussions on the merits of free WiFi v. paid at coffee shops, restaurants, etc, I was interested in hearing what do you think about the issue and if there are solid examples of successful businesses that offered free WiFi." If you were going to argue for or against this issue, what arguments would you use?
"A lot of proprietors seem to be concerned about the maintenance issue. Not so much about the hardware maintenance than software: auditing etc. Some are also concerned about legal ramifications if their customers are caught downloading music or movies illegally.
I am not aware of any Internet cafe or similar business that got hit by our beloved RIAA but what if their lawyers subpoena a small proprietor for download records? If you are running a shoestring infrastructure with a cable modem with an Airport base station what kind of logs could you possibly proviide? If a kid walks in for a lemonade and starts downloading porn what do you tell the parents when they sent their lawyer to pay you a visit?
It would seem that if you let a provider offer the WiFi service at your place of business for a fee, they can deal with liabilities, maintenance etc, so this is one less thing to worry about when setting up the business. Yet expecting your customers to pay $6-$10/hr for WiFi is so ridiculous and such a turn off for them."
I am not aware of any Internet cafe or similar business that got hit by our beloved RIAA but what if their lawyers subpoena a small proprietor for download records? If you are running a shoestring infrastructure with a cable modem with an Airport base station what kind of logs could you possibly proviide? If a kid walks in for a lemonade and starts downloading porn what do you tell the parents when they sent their lawyer to pay you a visit?
It would seem that if you let a provider offer the WiFi service at your place of business for a fee, they can deal with liabilities, maintenance etc, so this is one less thing to worry about when setting up the business. Yet expecting your customers to pay $6-$10/hr for WiFi is so ridiculous and such a turn off for them."
I was interested in hearing what do you think about the issue and if there are solid examples of successful businesses that offered free WiFi.
Panera has the largest (or one of) free wifi network out there.
I have a friend who runs a bagel shop (coffee, sandwiches, bagels, etc...). He is moving to a larger location in order to provide free WiFi. The reason hes moving is because he experimented with WiFi before, and his old building was not big enough to accommodate all the extra buisness he recived when providing free WiFi. That to me sounds like a huge reason to provide free WiFi over paid. Ossus
The cost.... a WAP - a good one at that costs less than $300 US... a single terminal is at least that much. And then there's the fact that there is only one... and you have to maintain them. Laptops abound, let them just bring them in and use them.
Additionally I would say if you could do an automatically generated access code for paying customers then it definatly would outwiegh paid WiFi in the long run. Just look at it as this...
$5/hr - maybe 300 people use it all month... $50/Day
1000 beverages a day 10cents each.. $100 day...
Free wireless means you maintain just the router, which is generally a "turn on" situation. Everyone brings their own hardware.
I'd say that's a pretty huge difference.
That's what I did. The local pub had business Internet access, but was totally neutral whether or not he provided wireless access to his customers. He just didn't want the headache of setting it up or running it. So I purchased a nice cheap 802.11g access point for about $45 from the web about 15 months ago. I just gave it to the pub owner. I set it up, gave it an easy-to-remember WEP code, and that was that. He has never needed to worry about it at all since then. I have had free access there for 15 months now, so that comes out to $3/month for me, and $0 for everyone else. With the occasional beer someone buys me in thanks, I have come out way ahead.
Zyxel sells an access point designed for just this purpose: ZyAir B-4000. Much easier than implementing it yourself, unless there is already on Open Source solution based on NoCat or something similar.
s p
1 060053881&indexcate1=1085450334&indexFlagvalue=102 1876859
http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,1759,1650238,00.a
http://www.zyxel.com/product/model.php?indexcate=
Zigbee Central: A Zigbee weblog
A few months ago Tryst started a policy of not offering Wi-Fi on weekends, precisely because of freeloaders taking up all the sofa spots and being anti-social. They allow free wireless on weekdays because it helps them maintain volume through the weekdays, but on the weekend (when they're packed to the gills regardless) I think they'd rather have social (read: paying) customers instead.
/.er. Cheers!
However, Tryst is hands down the best hang-out coffee shop in the city, and perhaps even on the eastern seaboard.
Nice to see another DC
The Rise and Fall of Online Community
That's why my favorite coffee shop has some couches and tables designated as study-free zones. If an employee walks by and you have a laptop or textbook out, you'll be kindly asked to move.
I think this works out well for everyone.