'Wi-Fi Police' Stalk Olympic Games

schwit1 writes with news from London that Olympic venues are being patrolled by so-called "Wi-Fi police," who seek out and shut down unauthorized access points and hotspots. BT is the "official communications services provider" for the Games, so access points other than the ones they set up or approve have been disallowed. A picture tweeted from the Olympics shows a gentleman carrying a portable direction antenna that can localize sources of transmission and interference. "One possible aim of shutting down such WiFi access points is to cut down on interference with essential wireless communications being used by those refereeing, reporting on and working at the sporting events. ... The news of the WiFi crackdown has angered many of those following the Games online, who were already upset at Olympic authorities' attempts to limit the use of social networking tools at the Games at certain times. The London Olympics had been billed as the first 'social media Games,' but organizers have been accused of bungling the effort to seamlessly integrate popular technologies like Twitter and Facebook into the event."

Comments

Short translation

[dkleinsc]

"We want more money."

Actually, a good portion of human activity can be explained by that simple phrase. In this case, it's about enforcing rules guaranteeing BT certain amounts of money.

Re:Short translation

[metrometro]

The cognitive dissonance occurs when people realize that the world's premier global festival is a "private" event in which the incredibly rich can exclude citizen participation for no better reason than it does not make them more rich.

When exactly did we sign up for that?

Re:Short translation

[Beardo the Bearded]

"We want more money."

Actually, a good portion of human activity can be explained by that simple phrase. In this case, it's about enforcing rules guaranteeing BT certain amounts of money.

BT paid to be the sole wifi provider of the Olympic games and at Olympic Venues, if the Venues are private property they have done nothing wrong.

THEY ARE NOT PRIVATE PROPERTY! The games are paid for with public coffers.

All that infrastructure wasn't paid for by BT or McD or Coke or the IOC, it was all the local municipalities or provinces or federal government. It took Montreal 30 years to pay off their Olympic debt, British Columbia is four billion in the hole after 2010, and the same will happen to London in two weeks.

The 30th Corporate Games

[MickyTheIdiot]

You have to wonder when the hell they will just sell naming rights and be done with it.

Re:Other Olympic blackouts

[Hatta]

Is there anything about the Olympics that isn't corrupt and disgusting?

"We want more money"

[circletimessquare]

1. by working hard and providing attractive product: ok

2. by embedding yourself as an oligopolisitc rent seeking parasite on the political landscape: not ok *

* but by #2 cloaking itself falsely as a capitalist force like #1, and spreading propaganda to that effect, riling up fools who believe that nonsense, such as with healthcare insurance, we can remain embedded in the body politic, and siphon off cash in a noncapitalistic way, all the while protected by idiots who think they are championing capitalism

Re:Suck it up.

[shutdown -p now]

Somehow, we managed to have games without all that corporate bullshit up until late 80's or so. And not all of them were held in Berlin, Moscow or Beijing.