I agree that the economic model which might make most sense is a
Telco/HW/consolidator venture such as Earthlink/??/Boingo. In that
scenario:
1. Telco provides their customers a DSL/Cable modem with WiFi AP
hardware built in.
2. Telco offers WiFi client cards to customers via a co-marketing
program.
3. Telco packages this as a "premium" service with the following
benefits:
a. Customer gets home WiFi in one small box
b. Customer gets roaming access to other Telco/consolidator
sites
c. Telco builds a network on their own bandwidth, reducing the
"theft" argument.
Potentially this opens a lot of possibilities for the Telco;
Voice-over-IP telephony, etc.
...dtw
-----Original Message-----
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] On Behalf Of Julian Bond
Sent: Saturday, September 21, 2002 11:45 PM
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: [BAWUG] node funding
Todd Boyle <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>Well, a CWN is not a global internet, it is a local apparatus
>that has an upstream (the internet gateways, which must be
>paid for) and it has a downstream (users of gateways and
>routes to reach them) and there is not going to be any CWN
>unless USERS are willing to pay a few bucks.
So the NoCat people should build a PayPal subscription system into
NoCatAuth? Or we all just use one of the commercial roaming systems like
Boingo/Joltage? [1]
The too free to bill approach actually makes quite a lot of sense in
several scenarios.
- So few people use my node that I won't bother. Anyway I'd pay for the
bandwidth anyway for my own use so it's not costing me anything extra.
- I'll just mark it up to advertising. I've only got to sell 3 extra
coffees a day to cover it and I'll use the bandwidth myself in the
evening anyway.
Where it might be a pain is in the first scenario except that your
location means that there are 10s of people using it all the time.
[1]There is a trick here that Boingo-Joltage have spotted and somebody
will make work, which is the global roaming system for the rest of us on
an MLM-franchise model. The T-Mobile-Starbucks-BT Openzone approach is
very capital intensive and will never get universal coverage. But some
tie up between a Telco and hardware-software manufacturers might be able
to put a package together where the operator made money as well. So
who's M$ going to partner with then?
--
Julian Bond Email&MSM: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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