Fast action important on wireless
http://www.journalstar.com/articles/2006/06/25/editorial_main/doc449dd2c276876652132559.txt
Lincoln will have to move fast if it wants to stay up to speed with other cities that are setting up municipal wireless Internet networks.
The Lincoln City Council wisely voted this spring to explore the burgeoning field with a work group headed by council member Jonathan Cook.
Quick work is essential. A growing number of cities have set up wireless networks in private-public partnerships. The field is evolving rapidly.
A typical approach is for the city to award a franchise on the basis of competitive bidding.
Frequently this results in subscriptions for high-speed wireless Internet that are lower than the connections for regular broad-band service.
Some cities also have required bidders to offer special rates for low-income groups. Some cities have even set up special districts where users can have a few free hours of wireless access every week.
Now an entirely new business model has emerged, according to the Wall Street Journal.
Portland, Ore., and San Francisco have contracts under which commercial providers will offer high-speed wireless for free. Instead of subscription fees, the providers will rely on advertising to generate revenue.
The development prompted Sacramento, Calif., to scrap its planned contract with MobilePro Corp. Under that proposed contract residents would have paid about $20 a month for wireless Internet.
It’s unclear at this point whether the advertising-based business model will succeed. MobilePro believes that the city of Sacramento’s expectations are unrealistic. “What the city wanted was out of the question,” Jay Wright, MobilePro’s chief executive officer told the Wall Street Journal.
But the business model seems to be gaining momentum. In Sunnyvale, Calif., wireless Internet provider MetroFi made the switch on its own, reasoning that it would attract subscriptions more quickly. The company, however, declined to say whether it is making a profit.
In San Francisco, Google and Earthlink have teamed to offer a hybrid service in which users of free wireless Internet get slower speeds than paying customers.
In Portland, users can choose either free wireless Internet with a half-inch banner in their browser, or pay $19.95 a month for service without the ads.
Insistence by Sacramento city officials on free wireless Internet has dealt a setback to its plans. MobilePro has dropped out and city officials will have to restart the bidding process.
Meanwhile municipal wireless networks are multiplying. Boulder, Colo., Minneapolis, Madison, Wis., are among the more than 250 cities that have deployed or are planning to deploy municipal wireless networks.
If Lincoln doesn’t move quickly, Nebraska’s capital city will find itself falling behind.
