Google Plans to Offer Free WiFi in San Francisco

jacksonwest writes "What's been rumored for some time has now been confirmed -- Google has made a bid in response to Mayor Gavin Newsom's request for information. The details of the bid include citywide access, for free, at 300kbps. The plans dovetail into their location-based advertising and services strategy, and come on the heels of their recent VPN service rollout."

Comments

Doesn't SF already have enough free WiFi?

[Anonymous Coward]

Come on... share it! People in DC need free WiFi, too!

Re:Doesn't SF already have enough free WiFi?

[uttaddmb]

According to Wikipedia, New York is #1 and San Francisco is #2. #3, of course, is...Central Falls, Rhode Island.

They're in for it now

[metternich]

Big telecoms have a lot of political influence. Watch this to be denounced as unfair competition, Communist, unamerican, etc. Followed by FCC rules or laws prohibiting it.

Re:They're in for it now

[scenestar]

Telecom companies managed to stop MUNICIPAL wifi.

With google being a company there is no "tax payer's money" involved.

The only thing the Telecom companies can do is sue google for "dumping" their products.

There's No Such Thing As A Free Lunch

[slavemowgli]

And what does "location-based advertising and services" mean in reality? Free wifi is good, of course, but TNSTAAFL. Can I rely on my traffic not being inspected/recorded by anyone with this offer?

Re:There's No Such Thing As A Free Lunch

[rteunissen]

Can you rely on your internet connection at home not being inspected/recorded by the company offering the connectivity? Not to start folding tin-foil hats here, but there's not such thing as _real_ privacy over the internet. You just have to decide for yourself wether you want to use the service or not.

Re:There's No Such Thing As A Free Lunch

[timeOday]

Can I rely on my traffic not being inspected/recorded by anyone with this offer?

What ISP offers that guarantee? So far as I can see, the protections we all took for granted in the days of the telephone are dead.

Re:There's No Such Thing As A Free Lunch

[Dr. Spork]

Folding tinfoil hats? Gah, I though everybody knew you just tear off a strip of tinfoil slightly longer than the circumference of your head, wrap it around, and smush it down into a sleek (though crinckly) helmet-like shape. Smush, I said. Not fold. Why in the world would you say "fold"? Ah, unless you're FROM THE GOVERNMENT, trying to subtly undermine the effectiveness of our improvised protection systems!

Re:There's No Such Thing As A Free Lunch

[rtaylor]

Smush? Smush? Are you crazy? Do you know what kind of a radar signature a smushed tinfoil hat has? They'll see you from miles away!

A properly made tinfoil hat will bounce the brainscanning waves (and radar waves) at odd angles which would not send the signal back to the sender. Nice clean folds. They chould be straight enough that the foil does not touch the head in all locations.

regards,
    Agent Watson
    BSD (Brain Scan Department)

Free (Legal) WiFi

[Bob54321]

I get free wifi too. My neighbor doesn't secure his connection... its a bit low on signal strength though. Hopefully Google provide me with a better solution soon!

Location based Ad?

[CSHARP123]

While the initial use of location-based services might be limited to more-focussed and targeted advertising, the potential of location-based services is immense, officials said.

Location based Ad? Do they monitor the connections to their network. What about privacy?

Re:Location based Ad?

[YrWrstNtmr]

Don't need to monitor 'your' connection. Simply pump out ads based on access point.

Access point X uses ads A, B, & C. Access point Y uses ads D, E, & F.

They could also cross reference your Gmail ad hits with the WiFi access point you happpened to be connected to, and show you an ad for this tire shop, or that coffee house.

Don't have to do much more than they already are.

Re:How Long

[loconet]

The same thing is said every time Google releases a new service and I have yet to see a serious abuse from them.

Should we call it GooFi? [NT]

[Powertrip]

NT

Re:tremble moneymakers

[LordKaT]

What's the angle? Have you not been keeping track of what exactly Google is?

Google is, first and foremost, an advertising company. They are going to offer "service and location based" advertising with the free Wi-Fi.

This is just another service built on top of their advertising network.

Almost everything Google does is built on top of their advertising network.

What's in it for Google? A few million people being forced to see the Google Ads.

That's not a bad thing, in my opinion. A few ads for 300kbs wireless Internet connectivity in the United States? Sign me up.

Keep in mind that this is not like NetZero:

NetZero was trying to build an ISP out of Ad revenue. Google is trying to enhance their advertising network by offering an ISP.

The ISP side of Google can simply be a loss leader in order to obtain a wider understanding of their audience. Hey, it adds a ton value to AdWords, which means they can charge a premium for that service over Yahoo! or MSN, and still remain a dominant force in that market.

If they roll this out nation-wide, this is going to make Google a ton of money.

location-based advertising and services

[spectrokid]

Every wifi access point has its unique code. When you browse, you get a commercial for the shop lying just around the corner. They don't need to inspect your traffic, they know (+/-) where you are. Smart, damn smart...

Ain't Gonna Happen

[rmckeethen]

Frankly, I'm not buying it. I think the whole S.F. = Free Wi-Fi deal isn't going to happen. Newsom talks big, and he looks good in front of a camera, but when it comes to running the city, I'm not in the least bit impressed. This isn't gonna happen.

I live in San Francisco, less than three blocks from Union Square, and I'd just be happy if local government could keep garbage and human feces off the damn streets. Free Wi-Fi from the same mayor who pulled the whole 'Care Not Cash' scam on us, the one that was supposed to bring in all the vagrants off the streets yet hasn't done a damn thing that I can see? Yeah, right... Even at 4:45 a.m. I get hit-up for change on the streets here. Yeah, Newsom's gonna give us free Wi-Fi. Please. Give me a break.

San Francisco can't even route the stupid buses around the city with any sense of sanity; how are they going to route packets any better? Sure, Google knows what they're doing, but they're down in Mountain View, where local government is small and generally sane and they don't have the geographical problems San Francisco has. I think we're going to see a lot of press releases and a few public talks, and then Google will spend millions trying to squeeze packets between the numerous hills and tall buildings the city sports all over the place. They'll get a few hot-spots going, realize that it will take lots more money than they want to spend to totally unwire the city, then they'll quietly shove the project into some closet somewhere, never again to see the light of day.

Sure, it sounds like a good plan; blanket the city with free Internet access for residents and tourists alike. But San Francisco has so many more pressing issues to deal with that this just feels like another one of Gavin's 'feel-good' moves. I'm not holding my breath, and I'm not giving up my cable modem either.

Re:Ain't Gonna Happen

[ghost-maker]

Its soo nice to see human compassion here...your first priority is to get homeless people out of your view? Not education. Not cheap and reliable health care. Not better, effective and more efficient policing methods. Real estate development that is not damaging to the existing residents, environment, and beneficial to more than just the few. No...your first priority for your public official is all about you. And what you see. WHich is not to say you're any different from any others in America. Not that I am saying that this GOogle free wifi deal with the city of SF was meant to rectify or solve any of the things that are more important issues facing SF and any city. But it has an apparent beneficial result regardless...maybe. It could and probably would allow more people access to information. What they do withthat information...is a guess better answerd by someone who totally understands the power of information and access to it on a society. It may drive prices down for related and competing services or force them to offer a much more compelling package than they do now. Which in turn will get more people online. WHich may have an effect and may not in the city. Its just I can't shake the sense of deja vu of people complaining that electricity really had nothing to offer to improve their real lives and was just a novelty. Which was true for awhile. But look at us now. Without access to electricity in today's society, you are definitely (for the most part) disadvantaged from the start. So in my eyes...I will be judging this cautiously as a good thing. The cities I think that get internet access to the level of electricity or water the earliest I believe will be in better shape years from now.

google google everywhere

[ezzzD55J]

Just to show that I got the reference, and for those wondering.. "from the google-google everywhere dept." is a reference to The Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner by sir Samuel Taylor Coleridge.

The Mariner tells a story of a ship adrift for so long they ran out of drinking water, after the 'hero' of the story shoots an albatross (bad luck)

Water, water, everywhere,
And all the boards did shrink;
Water, water, everywhere,
Nor any drop to drink.

So. That's that.

port 80 restrictions?

[matt me]

I hope Google would be better, but does anyone know if they plan to restrict access to port 80 only, like some other "free" (strange definition) wi-fi. That would mean the only internet applications that work would be web browsers. You wouldn't be able to send/check email, unless, you were using a webmail service, such as... GMail! Similarly, IM, p2p and everything else that isn't on :80, although many apps can get through firewalls, they lose speed.

Not free

[Duncan3]

It's adware.

Not theat the press ever gets anything right ;)