Portland gets WiFi

Author: Brett Thomas
Published: 17th November 2006
Comments (8) Stumble
"Now with free WiFi!" - The city of Portland, Oregon is getting a new public service: Free WiFi.

"Now with free WiFi!" - The city of Portland, Oregon is getting a new public service: Free WiFi.

Thanks to improvements in technology and the unarguable usefulness of the net, WiFi has started to become an omnipresent technology. It's hard these days to buy a laptop or PDA without it, and even portable media players like the Zune sport it. This ability for technology on-the-go has created a recent interest in offering access as a public service - but who would spend money to give it away?

A company named MetroFi wants to do just that. MetroFi has been responsible for rigging up entire cities before, but this time the company is doing it on a much larger scale. The company will blanket the city of Portland, Oregon with free access, but a network this size would require a little more help. Fortunately, Microsoft happily stepped up to the plate to assist.

The two companies are installing the first, most central hotspot over Portland's Pioneer Courthouse Square, which will be operational before the end of the year. Shortly thereafter, they will add to the network until the entirety of the city has on-the-go access for free (the target is late 2008).

The adage of "you can't get something for nothing" is still true, however. The service is paid for with revenues from the company's adCenter program, which tracks your browsing habits to send you specific, targeted advertisements while you use the service. If adverts aren't your thing, you will have the option to purchase an ad-free account for $20.00/month.

Free WiFi? Why not? Is ad-based content really so bad when you're getting a service for it? Or would you rather pay the $20.00? Tell us your thoughts on this in our forums.
Quote DreamTheEndless 17th November 2006, 15:56
old news.....

but, only if you live here I suppose...

There are actually 2 outfits working on covering P-town with free wi-fi independent of each other - but the other has less funding.

That's in addition to Portland having a very high concentration of public hotspots at coffee shops, bars, restaurants, and hotels.

Portland r0x
Quote mclean007 17th November 2006, 16:03
Quote:
Is ad-based content really so bad when you're getting a service for it?"
Depends how it's done. If it asses around with my computer and requires installation of some lame pop-up machine, I wouldn't touch it with yours. If it offers free browsing within a frame of an unobtrusively ad-supported portal (i.e. it works through your browser with no software installation) I'd consider it, if it's usably fast and works with every site. Wonder if adblock will work?

In any event, would be useful for occasional access away from home, but not if it involves adware.
Quote DXR_13KE 17th November 2006, 19:01
nice... i hope this becomes a big trend all over the world.
Quote Steelez 18th November 2006, 00:06
Quote:
Originally Posted by DreamTheEndless

Portland r0x

True! B)
Quote Autobot 18th November 2006, 02:21
Its nice to be a Portlander. :)
Quote speedfreek 18th November 2006, 15:16
Like mclean007 said it all depends on delivery. Anywho it is a geat thing to have available, especially if the quailty of service is there.
Quote Godboy_g 20th November 2006, 15:27
Free WiFi is good and all, but I definately do not like the ad-based bit. Just make it completely free.... They have in my City.

The city here had upgraded their backbone to fibre. They realized at the time that they couldn't possibly fill all the bandwidth, so they decided to roll out a free city wide Wifi service.

http://www.fred-ezone.com/

I live in Fredericton New Brunswick Canada if anyone's interested :-)
Quote Cthippo 21st November 2006, 00:23
Maybe cities could make free Wi-fi a condition of granting Cable TV or telephone franchises to providers. One can dream...
Log in

You are not logged in, please login with your forum account below. If you don't already have an account please register to start contributing.





Stats: 0.055 seconds