Is Public WiFi Sustainable?
November 6, 2008 by Rico Mossesgeld
Filed under Ramblings of a Gadget Geek, Services
On a recent trip to Singapore, I was taken aback when a random Chinese guy approached me. He realized, through casual observation, that I was trying to access the public WiFi network, which was apparently accessible throughout the city. “Don’t bother”, he said with a thick accent, “it’s really slow, and good luck connecting”
That made me wonder: is free public WiFi sustainable? No doubt, it can be a great help for an increasingly net-savvy populace, and especially me right now, as I compose a post for this blog (offline on E71) while waiting for a my girlfriend. Public and free WiFi would’ve allowed to go online with my laptop, and write the post right on this blog’s admin.
But since connectivity is easily maximized (everyone’s into downloading nowadays), free WiFi isn’t sustainable. Whether supported by government money, advertisements, or even charity. That’s because as more people discover a “need” to be online on a regular basis, they start becoming addicts for connectivity. Imagine how attractive free WiFi is to this new breed of cravers. Read more
