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Hi all -

Steve here in Portland.

I received the premier issue of Mobile Business Advisor magazine this week. It contains two articles on WiFi.

The first article is called, "Calling All Business Owners: Give Your Customers a Wireless Connection" written by Lee Barken, "IT Expert."

http://mobilebusinessadvisor.com/doc/11166

SUMMARY:

Why Wi-Fi? - More and more Wi-Fi-enabled devices shipping - Attract customers - Differentiate yourself from competitors - Will ultimately be a ubiquitous amenity

Business models: We'll leave the Wi-Fi on for you - Some hotels offer free Wi-Fi in public areas - Other hotspots charge for access

Legal Liability - Your connection can be used for good and bad - Paid plan safer due to login requirement -- one option is to have users sign up for free account

Don't try this at home - Talks about home-based node phenomenon & issues

Hardware and software solutions - Lists players -- Boingo, NetNearU, Joltage, and Cafe.com

Building your own hotspot - DIY hotspot and vendors including -- IP3Networks, Nomadix, FatPort, and Sputnik

Are you ready? - Article wrap-up

END

Hey guys,

I also just read the article in the Oregonian, and offer my fullest support. I, and all of my 6 friends, use the wireless connection you and Web Criteria provided in Pioneer Square. The connection really made Portland's Living Room a nice place to hang out and chill.

It's pretty distrurbing to see Starbucks and T-Mobile shove around you guys. You had the channel first, and to say that they didn't see any wireless activity is complete bunk! All I had to do was open up my laptop.

Again, I hope everything works out for the best on both ends. Long live free wireless!

-Cherz

[http://www.beefpile.com/cherz_beef]

Hey all

I'm Ben from the UK. I've just read about what Starbucks have been up to and just wanted to lend my support. I think there is room for both of you (and several more) in the market and I find it very strange that they didn't do a wireless survey first. Perhaps they want to have a standard Starbucks channel nationwide and don't care who else may have been on there first. Either way, it's just not acceptible for them to muscle in. I hope they see sense and back down by change channels, there's no reaon why you should and I hope this is not another case of the little guy getting ousted by the massive multinationals. Good luck!

Ben

Hi,

I'm magius from Rome, Italy. We're interested to develop a Community Network here. We also have a wiki site at

http://www.inventati.org/inventa

Can you help us, writing on it a brief user friendly tech-intro how-to (in english)?

15.06.2002

• Hey Magius, we're currently working a NewUsersGuide. We only just started and are currently trying to draft a table of contents so that the information can be filled in by many people. If you have specific questions that you'd like answered please feel free to add questions into the table of contents, or to add general comments at the end. Good luck with your community network! -- AdamShand.

[CategoryCommunity][CategoryPersonalTelco]