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Google to Offer Free Wi-Fi?
meaning writes "Business 2.0 reports on the possibility of Google building a national broadband network and giving Wi-Fi access to everyone in America. From the article: 'So once the GoogleNet is built, how would consumers connect for free access? One of the cheapest ways would be for Google to blanket major cities with Wi-Fi, and evidence gathered by Business 2.0 suggests that the company may be trying to do just that. In April it launched a Google-sponsored Wi-Fi hotspot in San Francisco's Union Square shopping district, built by a local startup called Feeva. Feeva is reportedly readying more free hotspots in California, Florida, New York, and Washington, and it's possible that Google may be involved.'"
...then I don't know what will.
I'll form my OWN solar system! With blackjack! And hookers!
these are the real times we will all need a tinfoil hat. Who knows how Google will broadcast ads using a nationwide network of Wi-Fi
do.what.promptcmds
Google to colonize Mars!
Google to build moon base!
Google to cure cancer!!!! OMG!!!
I'll believe it when I see it.
You raise a good point. Free as in beer, Free as in Speech, and Free as in Kool-Aid. Yes, we shall have to remember that for future arguments.
I wonder if it will be 10000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 00000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000 0?
Hah.
Next Google will take over horse farming. And give us all ponies!
Seriously people.
Prepare to toil in our underground sugar caves! Remarkably clean, usable, state-of-the-art sugar caves, but toil you shall!
Based on how much difficulty people have had trying to blanket even smallish cities, I have no idea how Google could possibly cover a country the size of America with WiFi. How many thousands of hotspots would it take?
What they should do is bring back Ricochet...
Lately there have been so many newly announced (and shortly there-after: denounced) rumours concerning Google, I'm proposing that Slashdot create a new category just for Google related rumours.
Seriously... are there people out there that have nothing better to do than speculate as to what new thing will come out of google's labs next?
And people say that I need to get a life...
/dev/random
The first and most obvious question is how Google would manage to support a huge wireless network without charging for service. Perhaps they'd sell ad space and coffee near the hubs?
The second question I had was how much damage such a network would do to existing local internet companies. If Google moves in and essentially gives their product away, how can the current ISPs cope?
As a user, I'd be glad to have reliable, free wireless service available. A country where the service was ubiquitous, much like the electrical system and water system, would be a dream (probably the network administrator's worst nightmare, though).
Jesus saved me from my past. He can save you as well.
I hope this happens. Google rocks.
Once they get big enough, I hope they will overthrow the governments of the world.
When they do, they will make it simple, basic, and easy to use. In addition they will offer free healthy lunches daily, plenty of fun activities, free healthcare and dental onsite, free gym access, a free gmail account, and the best ever... a Microsoft-free world. Whoops, I spilled the news about their secret G-OS
Sometimes free is bad. The WiFi is free, but the advertisers bombarding you with sales pitches know exactly where you are. If the network's security is cracked, a lot more people than just salesmen know exactly where you are! It would be even better for Big Brother than webcams!
The Uncoveror: It's the real news.
First it was VoIP, then it was IM, now it's Wi-Fi? Why does the news media keep reporting these *completely* unsubstantiated rumors about Google as if they were actually news? Why not wait until Google actually announces what it is going to do? It's not as if there won't be an interminable beta period between announcement and public release anyway. This rampant Google speculation that has gripped the tech media has moved past the "annoying" phase to the "just plain stupid" phase.
main(c,r){for(r=32;r;) printf(++c>31?c=!r--,"\n":c<r?" ":~c&r?" `":" #");}
And it doesn't sound like the author hasn't any further proofs or even rumors.
What if Google wanted to install cameras all over the world and call itself Big Google henceforth? What if Google launched a Mars mission and secured themself exclusive rights for the whole planet? What if they bought Blizzard and released the MMORPG World of Google where virtual elves can search a virtual Azeroth-Net for magic potions?
What if Google didn't anything that would cost more than their market capitalisation, instead concentrated on remaining a search engine with new searches for kitchensinks and lost pets and perhaps a cooperation agreement with some other companies (Apple, publishers for their library project, etc) along the way? Or is that last one too far-fetched?
Don't think of it as a flame---it's more like an argument that does 3d6 fire damage
For those wondering how offering Free WiFi could possibly make sense from a business perspective:
From TFA: Google could stand to save millions of dollars by having an end to end network of its own instead of carrying its traffic over major ISPs (TFA states that Google is also buying up dark fiber).
Now, there are also some interesting ways Google might earn revenue from this system:
1) Imagine having to view a short ad before full access is granted
2) Imagine a special browser or access program you would need to download before use. The program could show ad words content or other ads
3) Of course, there's always "Get 24 hrs DOUBLE THE SPEED for only $9.99!"
Anybody have any other ideas for how Google could generate revenue from this?
I like Google. Excellent search engine, great news aggregator, webmail done right. But I'm getting more than a little uncofortable about the reach of the company. I have been cutting them a good deal of slack, but I'm gradually coming around on that. They have enough data on me and my habits that they probably can map my relationships better than I can myself. They can know my interests, my taste, my foibles, probably what I'm working on, and the only thing standing between potential knowledge and actual mining of it is a non-binding, pretty vacuous "Don't be evil" statement.
And while free Wifi is great and all, that risks becoming another chokepoint - who will be able to compete in practice if the lazy, easy way is to connect to Google Wifi to access your Gmail account and get the latest news in the Google aggregator or perhaps do some comparison shopping with Google. And finding the store is easy - just click the Google maps link and you'll see exactly where it's at.
If the company ever does decide to be evil, they have a huge amount of subtle control over their users at their disposal.
Oligopolies or monopolies are bad, no matter who is holding it.
Trust the Computer. The Computer is your friend.
You're forgetting Free as in Herpes.
got standards? --- http://www.w3.org/
This is what I've been waiting for: private companies providing free access instead of tax payers paying for it.
Capitalism does work!
-Nick
"A plan fiendishly clever in its intricacies"- Homer Simpson
By supporting a variety of products and exploring countless different potential businesses, Google keeps its core nebulous. Anything is a potential target for Google to diversify into. This gets them a lot of free coverage for products they may or may not even be associated with, but the "Gee-Whiz" factor is still there.
Whether or not its an actual strategy per se, or pleasant happenstance, I don't know, but it's done damn well in either case.
--mOperandi
Assuming you still haven't compiled mozilla-firefox... it really DOESN'T affect you.
Special Thanks To
The Bryant Park Wireless Network is proudly sponsored by Google.
An Indian-American Hindu committed to non-violent thought/speech/action alarmed by the global explosion of radical Islam
1. Offer free wi-fi
2. Offer free search
3. Guarantee that every human being who uses them will see ads
4. Massive profit
Fixed it for ya
Give a man fire, and you warm him for the night. Set a man on fire, and you warm him for the rest of his life.
The negativity on this board is a little depressing. I, for one, am tired of getting gouged by; baby bells, cable companies, cell phone companies, etc., etc. The hope that Google, of all companies, will come in and save us from the ongoing rape of consumers of communications, is something that makes me hopeful. I know without a doubt that all these services can be provided by one vendor instead of three, using one communications technology instead of four or more.
Europe, Japan, and other countries have better services for less money. If Google can shake up the status quo in the United States of Greed, I'm right there with them. Hooray for Google.
Best regards.
Yes, there are.
Sergey - Skynet is fully functional.
Larry - Time to take full control over the unwashed masses.
Let's take a quiz. Which of these countries has "America" in its name, and would therefore be most likely to use "America" and "Americans"?
Dominion of Canada
United States of America
Estados Unidos Mexicanos
Republica de Guatemala
Republica de Honduras
Republica de El Salvador
Republica de Nicaragua
Republica de Costa Rica
Republica de Panama
Republica de Colombia
Republica Bolivariana de Venezuela
Co-operative Republic of Guyana
Republiek Suriname
Republica Federativa do Brasil
Republica del Ecuador
Republica del Peru
Republica de Bolivia
Republica de Chile
Republica del Paraguay
Republica Argentina
Republica Oriental del Uruguay
I believe that covers everything on the two American continents (French Guiana not being a country). I can go through the island nations in this hemisphere too, if you'd like.
Not that I expect you to even read this, being a troll and all. But still.
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum sonatur.
There's an old saying... The most expensive gift you can get someone is a Free Puppy.
Similarly speaking... I'm not sure I can afford to get "Free" Wi-Fi access from Google.
I'm just a whee bit tired of being innundated with advertising, and the cost of product purchases going up to pay for all of it. You know, I'd be willing to spend a little bit of money to just get the things I want and need, rather than paying for everybody else to get stuff they never asked for.
I use Gentoo; how does this affect me?
It won't--you still won't be able to get your wireless card working.
And the only prescription is MORE COWBELL!!!
Linux - Because Mommy taught me to Share.
You have to put up so many access points to cover even an average sized office building, nevermind a whole city. You'd practically have to deploy one on top of every street light or telephone pole, and even then it wouldn't cover everything.
Unless, of course, they got a license to use high gain antennas and transmitters, which they wouldn't because Verizon and Friends (c) would cry.
To cover anything but the top 8 big cities would take hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of WiFi access points.
New long-distance wireless tech shows some promise, but we'll see how well it works and if anyone deploys it. In my opinion, until any broadband technology starts to reach into the rural areas, it's not successful. NYC and San Fran already have so many broadband options that adding one more doesn't even count.
Plus, this whole article is silly anyways. Just because Google sponsers a hotspot doesn't mean they are planning on deploying WiFi on a wide scale.
- It's not the Macs I hate. It's Digg users. -
I am sick of the word "consumer".
I agree. Not only that but haven't you noticed how business has moved away from the term SERVICE in the past decade or so? Now it's "support". Or "Customer CARE". I laughed my ass off the other day on a plane as the CEO of Continental Airlines explained on the recording how he was happy that Continental could offer me a "product". Yeah, air travel is a "product" now. Maybe I can re-sell it. What do I do if it breaks, can I take it back?
SERVICE as in SERVITUDE as in the CUSTOMER is the important part of the equation here.
But no, you are a "consumer", a mindless statistic that only exists to fulfill the income projections of the business. I'm glad I only work here, "stealing" a US job.
end of rant.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
In other news, a 14-year-old daytrader announced today that Google is giving out free blowjobs.
Really, this kind of vapid rumormongering is tapping out all the useful wishful thinking that a real Bubble can harness to fund real companies. Indulging every possible fantasy just proves that we've learned nothing from the Bubble Pop, and very little from its inflation. Do we really need Jim Clark to run everything, just so some real engineers can just get paid for a few years?
--
make install -not war
OHMYGOD I just heard that GOOGLE is about to come out with a new CPU ARCHITECTURE and it's going to run their own OS and it's so ungodly fast it's like a quad Xeon box but the basic model's only going to be like $500 or you can lease it for a year for the cost of having it shipped to you and it's so damn amazing and after they're done with that they're going to come out with their own distribution of Linux that will be a lot like Google's OS but faster and open source. Oh, and they're going to be giving away free cars in Central Park on September 4, so totally be there, and they're going to use the proceeds from all of this to bring back the dinosaurs - I swear to God! - and it's so cool because they're giving all this shit away for absolutely nothing but they're still making money hand over fist from it. Honestly, this is all true. They're like the coolest company in the world or something.
From what I understand, Google already pays next to nothing for transit. It seems like everybody peers with them anyways. If anything they are using the new dark fiber to link up their datacenters and for internal uses to ensure that they can get more data to the enduser with less hassles. Google Earth alone has to eat up an insane amount of bandwidth.
-nick
That was reported here on August 13th. Which means, we'll have to wait for another day for it to be reported.
More than mere navel gazing.
The article is rather bad at proving anything. It is really just speculation -- poorly thought out speculation at that. Some of their facts seem wrong as well. $60 per megabit!? No way it could be that expensive. Also, saying Goggle will provide FREE Internet all across America is really presumptuous. They have a duty to their stockholders, you know...
no kidding--this is why i have "flamebait" articles modded up to five--they're the funniest comments on slashdot.
Not to defend a troll, but using your own logic, what would you call the whole of the following combined parts?
North America
Central America
South America
Parent was correct, whether your fuzzy logic likes it or not.
0110100100100000011000010110110100100000011000100
Uh, I would call that "The Americas" Plural...
Ever get to that point where you have seen a word so many times it begins to stop looking like a word, Or at the very least, looks spelled incorrectly?
Web Developers: Celebrate to our roots! Animated Gifs and Tiled Backgrounds, dont let our history die!
me too!!!!
SlashSig Karma: Excellent (mostly affected by moderatio
No, your example sucks. Just like there is no country of South America, there is no country called Africa. Shortening the United States of America to America doesn't lead to confusion with a continent.
Maybe the original ranter would like it more if when referring to North and South America, people just said the Americas. I'm fine with that. North, Central and South, all in one tidy name.
You know what?
I am, of course, assuming that they would use 802.11.
How would they get around the problem of interference? I work for a small wireless ISP, and we have enough problems with interference in very small towns. I can't imagine dealing with the amount of interference in a large city.
Of course, I don't know how Ricochet was able to do it using just unlicensed frequencies, so I guess with enough money and the right technology it could be done. However, didn't Ricochet use proprietary client hardware?
...wifi.google.com. Yes, it returns an error. But the host resolved, as opposed to, say, porn.google.com.
Interesting.
BytesTemplar.com
From their latest Quarterly Report:
"the main focus of our advertising programs is to provide relevant and useful advertising to our users, reflecting our commitment to constantly improve their overall web experience, and therefore steps we take to improve the relevance of the ads displayed on our web sites, such as removing ads that generate low click-through rates, could negatively affect our near-term advertising revenues."
Just because they're a public company, doesn't mean they can't run an ethical business. Especially if its part of their image. And considering their shareholders have realized gains of 300% over the past year, they don't have very much to complain about, do they?
In fact, when it gets down to it, maybe - just maybe - you can run an ethical and a profitable business.
Way over there.
Web Developers: Celebrate to our roots! Animated Gifs and Tiled Backgrounds, dont let our history die!
Not really, no. The Wikipedia entry isn't really correct when it suggests that usage of the term "Americas" is simply disambiguation. There is no single continent named "America". There are two distinct continents differentiated by the prefixes "North" and "South". When referring to both together, the only logical form to use is the plural "Americas". When one says "America", it's patently obvious that one is not talking about the pair of continents. About the only argument that can really be made over the appropriation of the term "America" by the USA is that the dominant country in South America should have had an equal chance at it-- but then, which country would that be?
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.
I'm fairly certain they're reading the signs wrong here:
Any WiFi involvment on google's part is most likely some sort of GoogleMaps-intergrated hotspot finder for finding other (free and 3rd-party-commercial) hotspots.
On the other hand, TFA mentions google acquiring bits of dark fibre. IMO, this makes very little sense for building a WiFi ISP, as I would imagine that the fibre isn't exactly located in the sorts of places you'd want to put a hotspot. This could be some sort of project to connect their datacenters using private lines.
On the other hand, this could simply be a capital investment on their part. It could be an attempt to spark some life into the dormant telecom markets. Sure, the fibre's cheap now, but the increased attention Google will get from this will drive up interest, thus driving up prices, allowing google to sell the lines at a nice profit.
That said, AT&T left a heck of a lot of dark copper and fibre lying around. It'd be a shame to see it not put to use.
-- If you try to fail and succeed, which have you done? - Uli's moose
Google may be a $billion+ company but they seem to do things differently. I'd rather have them as my ISP than Qwest (the shitty provider who's DNS servers are down five minutes of every hour).
Frankly, they have shown time again again that they appreciate innovation and a new business model. Keyhole used to charge for satellite picture - Google bought them and gives us the service for free. It's the same with lots of other products.
Telcos have gotten used to raping us on prices. DLS subscriptions have maintained their $40/month price for years now while the product just gets cheaper to provide.
Franlky, I'd take anybody who wasn't one of the current telcos.
World Changing - News for Humans, Stuff about our planet
Google - Nintendoogle....err I guess not.
Co-Editor, Open Sources
Open Source Program Manager, Google, Inc.
Actually, as I was informed by my college Spanish professor who spent several decades living in Columbia, calling the USA "The United States," or "Los Estados Unidos" in Spanish, is not a particularly useful term, because there is more than one "Estados Unidos"--Mexico being Los Estados Unidos de Mexico, or The United States of Mexico, if you prefer.
Eagles may soar, but weasles don't get sucked into jet engines...
You mean Nipponjin, not "niponese" right? And even there it's not rock solid. In almost all casual situations, it's Nihon, not Nippon. And how many Germans in Germany do you know call it Germany?
So Google is kind of like if the Yellow Pages and the Phone Book were published under one cover with the one subsidizing the production costs of both.
Whether or not they're making enough through ad sales to pay for the whole parade as it currently stands is questionable, but if you can convince enough investors that Google is worth pouring zillions of dollars into, then fine. Whatever.
So basically, Google is sitting on a big pile of investor money at the moment, with perhaps a modest ad based revenue. However, Google has also hired a lot of programmers and project leaders and they're doing a lot of interesting and expensive stuff, which I suspect isn't quite covered by Google Ad revenue. The water leaking in is more than is being bailed out. Google right now sounds a lot to me like one of those tech-boom start-ups swimming in IPO cash.
This means, I suspect, that expansion into new sources of revenue is probably fairly high on the To Do list around Google's board room at the moment.
How they do this is up to them. I doubt somehow, though, that it involves 'free' microwave pollution to every corner of the U.S. --Though, doing that certainly sounds reminiscent of some of the dumb things those crazy tech companies tried back in 'The Day' when investors were insane and huge gobs of IPO cash were free to any who asked.
I just hope they don't set up any microwave hot spots in my neighborhood. Cell phones are already a plague which I never agreed to.
-FL
Are you completely certain they're false? It's common in politics for people to deliberately leak what they're thinking of doing just to test public opinion about a controversial idea in a deniable way.
It's also possible that the occasional idea is leaked by an employee or ex-employee who doesn't like the proposed strategy and wants to raise alarm bells early enough to do something about it.
I'm not saying either of these is in play in the various situations with Google we've seen recently. But they are ever-present possibilities.
Kent M Pitman
Philosopher, Technologist, Writer
If it's free as in free beer, does that mean you will give me an antenna, an AP, a laptop with a wireless card so it's free to me? probably not. You'll ask me to pay for my kit, pay for a share towards the central infrastructure (backhaul costs, your server etc), and once we've got this in place we can exchange packets for free, this is probably what I think we mean by "free".
Thats easy.
1) Buy a few Senators
2) Buy some more Congressmen
3) Continue campaign to outlaw public wifi
4) Buy lots of lawyers
5) Patent the air we breathe and a method of transmitting data through it (f**k marconi etc)
6) Buy/Bribe a President or two
7) Sit back and go down with the titanic
The only Phone Co to survive would the the one that got into bed with Google and did the deal to be the carrier of choice.
I'd rather be riding my '63 Triumph T120.
The question swings both ways. Since when does Latin America get to decide the definition of a continent? The isthmus of Panama is 20 miles narrower than the isthmus of Suez, yet Suez is enough to demarcate two continents and Panama isn't? With the exception of Japan and Iran, the rest of the world sees the Americas as two continents. Calling it one continent makes about as much sense as calling Europe and Asia two continents. The problem is that it's an issue chock-full of politics rather than one of simple geography. By the strict definition there are technically only 4 continents (Afrasia, Antarctica, America, Australia), but that one clearly over-generalizes.
If a job's not worth doing, it's not worth doing right.