I was disgusted when I went on a recent holiday (with laptop of course) and unearthed an annoying trend; the more expensive the venue you’re staying in, the more they feel they can charge for the privilege of web access. Of course your businessmen just put it down on expenses and probably claim back a little more than they paid, but it really hacks me off. I wouldn’t have minded if I had international inclusive data usage, but I was sure as hell not going to pay £7.50 for 3G access in France when I pay £7.50 a month for inclusive data in the UK.

Probably a more viable and secure option for cafés and hotels is that the access point is keyed but the key is changed daily or weekly, and to get access you have to ask the counter staff for the key to get access. Of course it could be hacked, but if you go with a WPA-PSK key it’s as secure as your home network, so no big deal.

The funniest thing is I stayed at a small, family-run Hotel in France on the way back home, and I went to the desk and asked how much it’d cost to get a day’s access… To my delight they said, “if you have a room, it’s free” and promptly printed off an access code for their online portal. Five minutes later, I’m on the web. The chain of Campanile B&Bs across France mostly seem to have free wifi too, you log in with your room number and name and that’s that, though it’s a little bit slow. There’s a few Campaniles in the UK too, so might be something to check out. I’ve NEVER had a bad experience staying at a Campanile either, so maybe you should have a look round for one when you’re next on your travels!

I think extortionately-priced wifi is just one of those things the industry’s going to have to realise is unviable – once one big chain rolls out very cheap or free wifi, the rest will follow, but it’s annoying. Almost like stepping back into the dark ages if you have business stuff to attend to while you’re there! I totally get what you’re saying.

Hard making a living in a non-acoholic cafe i tells ya

It’s easy enough to set up a user/pass system wherein you hand out temporary credentials to anyone who is a paying customer: someone buys a cup of coffee, they get free Internet access while they’re there.

I just thought I’d clarify what I feel are a few issues. Otherwise, your article is pretty well right on.

If anyone wants to set up a free WIFI hotspot, here’s some Open Source software that will do the trick:

http://www.publicip.net/zonecd/what.php

As for the music industry, I feel like this goes back to community – give people a reason and a method to engage you up front (cash-free), and your fans will be more than happy to support what you’re doing by buying your product. Stop trying to charge for every little thing you own and make some friends along the way!

Give us the freedom to listen and share music and then use smart merchandising to take our money as fans?

This could very well apply to the DIY set too…Once you develop a fanbase by offering free music, use creative merchandising to offer various fandom goods to help generate income. (Live gigs are a given for making money)

There is a very good chance that this was not the moral but I took a stab at it none-the-less!

Excellent article!
J