DIY Mesh WiFi in Pittsburgh?
And it’s free? To celebrate the company’s first birthday, Fon is giving away free wifi routers to the first 10,000 people who apply. Really. I’d been hearing good things about the service, but since I have a router, I couldn’t quite justify buying a new one, just to participate. Now I’ve signed up and am joining the ranks of the Foneros.
What’s Fon ?
FON is the largest WiFi community in the world. Our members share their wireless Internet access at home and, in return, enjoy free WiFi wherever they find another Fonero’s Access Point.
It all started as a simple idea. Why should you pay for Internet access on the go when you have already paid for it at home? Exactly, you shouldn’t. So we decided to help create a community of people who get more out of their connection through sharing.
You can read more at their site , but wouldn’t it be cool if you could count on finding free wifi anywhere? I’d love to see this spread further in Pittsburgh. Looking at their map, I can see some hotspots, but there could be so many more.
If you already are paying for wifi, why not share it? Especially if you can then enjoy free wifi elsewhere. And if the router is free…
Unfortunately, most broadband internet providers explicitly disallow sharing one’s broadband beyond the walls of one’s domicile. Of course, this doesn’t stop most of us (my router is already an open network), but it’s entirely possible that Comcast and Verizon will bring the hammer down.
But it’s not like anybody ELSE uses my hotspot - out here in the burbs (and in a kind of impromptu retirement community), nobody else has wireless internet, and the houses are a bit too far apart for it to matter.
You could be right about the fine print - of course back when we first got DSL, Verizon did not allow installing a wireless router in our house, either. (I think they wanted to charge per machine connected to the network.) So the ISPs may change their terms over time to keep up with the technology.
What a great concept and implementation, We need such Initiatives back in bangalore…!!
Rajesh, I think the company is based in Europe. The service may be available internationally…