> Can anyone explain why it is so? To my luddite understanding of
> communication/computer technology, wireless connections are akin to
> multiple cable/electrical outlets, or for that matter, water faucets -
> they give access to multiple users at the same time, but they must be
> connected to the mains. And somebody has to pay for that connection.
> That someone can be either the users of the service (e.g as you pay for
> water or electricity used by your household) or a third party that uses
> the purchased access as a leverage to obtain something from the user
> (e.g. as advertisers pay for TV programming beamed to your living room).
> Of the two, I'd prefer the former, because it reduces the volume of
> commercial pollution.
>
> Stated differently, I'd rather have a connection on the subscription
> basis, than one paid for by a third party and delivered to me "free" of
> charge, because the former allows a much greater end-user control. There
> is also a possibility that the third party in question is the government
> that represents bona fide public interest and uses taxes to finance it -
> which makes the latter a very attractive proposition due to the
> economies of scale - but unfortunately this country does not have such a
> government and is unlikely to have one in the foreseeable future. Ergo,
> subscription services are better than nominally "public" ones, at least
> in the US.
>
> Wojtek
>
There are Wifi servers and clients...a useful Wifi is one I connect to a DSL/cable connection and people in my vicinity can use. If I already have a DSL/cable connection that I only use a few hours a day, sticking a Wifi on it costs $100-200 in a onetime shot. Plenty of free ones exist already. Ham radio operators perform free services, people write free software - if it's cheap, people will offer services to the community for free.
If you have enough Wifi servers in a vicinity it's possible to jerry-rig them into an alternative network. You don't even need a DSL connection on each one, it's technically feasible to cover a neighborhood with say 50 Wifi devices and say 5 DSL/cable connections. This would be the real danger of an alternative network. Of course, if Time-Warner, AT&T and everyone bans interconnections off the bat, this sort of thing doesn't get off the ground in any real way. It's sort of like when MCI wanted to plug into Bell - MCI is mostly useless without being able to connect to the existing network. A similar thing is happening on the West Coast with alternative energy people - the electric companies don't want people plugging the solar panels on their house into the electric grid, even though they're having blackouts because they don't have enough electricity to send out.