February 5th, 2006
And we'll have FON, FON FON: Skype, Google to help fund global WiFi network
Skype, Google, Index Ventures and Sequoia Capital have invested over $21M in worldwide WiFI community Fon to build a global WiFi network.
The goal: one million hotspots by 2010.
"There is perhaps no more important goal for the industry than helping to make broadband Internet access available around the world," says Skype CEO Niklas Zennström. "FON has a great idea to help people share WiFi with one another to build a global unified broadband network, and we’re happy to lend support. Enabling more communities to tap into the power of the Web benefits us all."
Fon representatives say this announcement is significant because it will benefit both ISPs and consumers worldwide with constant connectivity. The expansion plan will rely on FON users, or "foneros," connecting to the Internet via Fon WiFi hotspots provided by other "foneros."
Just a little while ago, fellow blogger Om Malik posted some revealing comments drawn from an interview earlier today with FON CEO Martin Varsafsky:
He says, that if he could get Google and Skype to work together, then he can convince the ISPs, though he doesn’t think the “3G people are going to be happy. ” I am not sure if there is going to be an overlap, because the 3G usage patterns (as we will see in very near future) are going to be quite different from WiFi usage patterns. Varsavsky says the FoN network will be quite popular overseas, because unlike the US, the European and Asian countries are very dense and the populace tends to coagulate around urban centers. But he is hopeful that in US cities like New York, San Francisco, Chicago and Miami, there will be lot of Foneros.
Not everyone is convinced Foneros has an easy task ahead of them. Count Glenn Fleishman among them. Glenn, whose Wi-Fi Networking News is as authoritative as any blog on the subject, writes in part today that:
Because home gateways of the type they are providing software for initially—some Linksys models with Linux embedded operating system software—can’t produce much of a signal. Home users can provide service to relatively few other home users via these gateways. There’s only utility in the Fon network if you’re charging for service and a lot of people use a hotspot, or if you’re not charging for it and a lot of Fon locations exist in the places you travel to (around town or the world) for you to also use for free.
The investment capital they’ve raised signals that while their network might be extended on a peer-to-peer basis, they’ll be putting their money into seeding the network by putting nodes in well-trafficked areas, probably in the thousands.
Glenn also sees problems ahead between the Fon model and the ISP community. He says it would be a trivial task for ISPs to track Fon operators if the ISP bans Internet connection sharing.
As Glenn explains:
…it’s trivial for ISPs to track Fon operators if the ISP bans sharing an Internet connection. Fon has central authentication so even with encryption, the destination of Fon messages will be known. (Of course, if Fon uses a peer-to-peer model like Skype, they could tunnel authentication through peers making this impossible, but that’s not a reliable way to run a login system.) Speakeasy and Sweden’s GlocoNet have signed up, Reuters reports; Speakeasy is the only national ISP I am aware of in the U.S. that encourages sharing their connections
Glenn’s right. Fon and their new sugar daddies have a long, long way to go to come even remotely close to where they say they want to be.
To illustrate, thought I would show you some Fon WiFi coverage maps. Some of the coverage is thin, but with $21 mil and more to come, that won’t last for long.
First, New York:
Next, Fon’s one-hotspot Chicago coverage- a footprint sure to increase with this $21 million:
Finally, let’s go to San Francisco, where, with the help of $$ from Google and Skype, Fon will surely build on their quite modest, two-Hotspot array:
Like I said, a long long way to go.
Russell Shaw is an enterprise computing journalist, analyst and author based in Portland, Oregon. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
