Singapore tests free Wi-Fi
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(InfoWorld) - Singapore's Infocomm Development Authority (IDA) is testing a free wireless Internet service ahead of the annual meeting of the boards of governors of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank, which take place this month in Singapore. Singapore's government is taking advantage of the IMF and World Bank meetings to showcase the country's advanced technology infrastructure, including the use of 3G (third-generation) mobile networks. The Wi-Fi trial covers part of downtown Singapore around the Suntec Singapore International Conference and Exhibition Center, where the IMF and World Bank meetings will be held, and includes five nearby shopping malls, the IDA said. Users will be able to surf the Internet for free in these areas at speeds of 512Kbps, it said, asking for Singaporeans to test the network and offer their feedback on the service. The month-long trial of the Wi-Fi service, called Wireless@SG, began on Friday and comes ahead of plans to roll out a free nationwide Wi-Fi service. The national Wireless@SG service will enter operation in Singapore during January 2007.
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Software allows users of personal digital assistants to make free calls using Wi-Fi networks.
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New mobile devices allow users to make free or low-cost phone calls over the Internet using nearby wireless access points, which range from cafes to private homes.
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A broadband wireless network is helping researchers at an important panda park in China.
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Blog: AT&T DSL subscribers will get free access to the carrier's Wi-Fi hotspots in airports and coffee shops around the country.
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Wireless networking startup Meraki plans to deliver free wireless Internet access, supported by advertising, across San Francisco by the end of the year, it announced Friday.An earlier&#160;attempt by Google and EarthLink&#160;to offer&#160;free city-wide Wi-Fi access in San Francisco&#160;foundered in August when&#160;EarthLink pulled out. They had planned a two-tier service, with faster, paid access provided by EarthLink and a more limited, advertising-funded service to be offered by Google. The search engine giant is also an investor in Meraki.Meraki will base the service on an existing project covering parts of the city, Free the Net, which has signed up 40,000 users over an area of 5 square kilometers since it began last March.To avoid the need for extensive cabling, Meraki will build the backbone of the network using a mesh network of solar-powered wireless repeaters installed on rooftops. The nodes will use some of their wireless capacity to offer Internet access to those nearby, and the rest to haul traffic back, via adjacent nodes, to the network&#39;s core.The company is looking for city residents willing to put a repeater on their roof. Those hosting a repeater will get free access to the service -- but so will their neighbors -- although for them, the signal may not be as strong. Although devices are shared, Meraki aims to deliver data rates of around 1Mbps&#160; to each user.Meraki will pay the cost of rolling out the service, and no public funds are involved, it said. Investors have offered the company an additional $20 million in venture capital to fund the move, it announced Friday.Ozone in Paris offers a similar wireless Internet service based on a network of wireless repeaters. Its service is only free for those who host repeaters, though: others must pay &#8364;18 ($26) a month.
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Officials in the city of Philadelphia said Thursday that tests for its citywide Wi-Fi project were successful, which means the city will move forward with deploying the network through the rest of the city.
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Portland's new free wide-area Wi-Fi network features content and ads provided by Microsoft.
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Several devices on the market will help you find a Wi-Fi network, but the same price doesn't mean the same performance. Product review by Daniel Terdiman.
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Meraki, a Silicon Valley startup, pledges to "free the net" and it will expand free Wi-Fi coverage beyond two San Francisco neighborhoods to an additional six communities within the city. With funding from Google and Sequoia Capital, and a lot of community volunteers, it might work.
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(InfoWorld) - Devicescape SoftwareÂ says it has a solution for the problem of using Wi-Fi hot spots with devices that don't have browsers. Devicescape's free software, formally unveiled on Tuesday atÂ the Demo conference in Palm Desert, California, lets users set up log-in information for multiple Wi-Fi networks and then get on those networks automatically from any supported device. Publicly available Wi-Fi networks, both free and subscription-based, are proliferating in airports, hotels and shopping areas and even around cities. Carriers and other service providers give users access at many hotspots through the same account, but that often still requires entering a log-in and password. That may be hard or impossible to do on a specialized device such as a phone, handheld game console, or camera. Devicescape lets users give their subscription information for all the networks they want to use and register their Wi-Fi devices. When they want to use a given hotspot, that data is exchanged in the background in a patented way before the device gets on the network, according to Glenn Flinchbaugh, vice president of products at Devicescape. Currently, if the user tries to get online in a place where they have more than one choice of operator, the device will automatically choose the network with the strongest signal, Flinchbaugh said. In the future, Devicescape plans to let users set priorities based on the cost of different networks or other factors, he added. Although the service is aimed at consumers, it doesn't conflict with use of a corporate VPN because the log-in process happens before the device goes on the public network, he said. The system works with many of the world's hotspots, including ones provided by AT&T, EarthLink, Google, T-Mobile, and WayPort, according to Devicescape. Devicescape is focused on North America today, but its system will work with network operators in other parts of the world, such as Orange in the U.K. and Softbank and NTT in Japan. The company doesn't need special arrangements with those operators to allow easy log-ins, but it hopes to set up revenue-sharing agreements with them for cases in which new subscribers sign up because of Devicescape, said CEO David Fraser. The San Bruno, California, startup is also working on licensing its software for non-PC devices, either built in or as an add-on. The software, currently in beta testing, is available now as a free download from Devicescape's Web site. It already works with Microsoft Windows XP PCs and Windows Mobile 5 phones, as well as two other devices: the NokiaÂ 770 Web tablet and the CiscoÂ Linksys WIP 300 VoIP phone. It's relatively easy to develop software for those two devices because of available interfaces, but most nonbrowser devices would require a licensing deal, Fraser said.
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Company pledges free Wi-Fi if people share their broadband connections, but service model violates U.S. ISP user agreements.
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Tired of new wireless technologies? Then stop reading. Because here's a story about a new wireless system that could someday eclipse the Wi-Fi service you've just begun to understand.
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Blog: AT&T DSL subscribers will get free access to the carrier's Wi-Fi hot spots in airports and coffee shops around the country.
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AT&T on Monday announced that its broadband Internet subscribers can now access any of its 10,000 Wi-Fi hotspots across the United States free of charge. The company offers Wi-Fi at airports, McDonalds restaurants, Barnes & Noble bookstores, coffee shops and sporting venues.
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AT&amp;T Inc. announced Monday that subscribers to its higher speed broadband services will have free access to its Wi-Fi hotspots throughout the country.
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The nation's largest municipal Wi-Fi cloud will blanket Philadelphia by the summer of 2006 &#151; with Internet access free in public parks and steeply discounted for low-income residents.