Published at LXer:

Slate has acautionary tale for public/private initiatives or 'how municipal Wi-Fi is such a flop'. This may shed some light on the failings of RHIO's:Today, the limited success stories come from towns that have actually treated Wi-Fi as a public calling. St. Cloud, Fla., a town of 28,000, has an entirely free wireless network. The network has its problems, such as dead spots, but also claims a 77 percent use rate among its citizens. Cities like St. Cloud understand the concept of a public service: something that's free, or near-free, like the local swimming pool. Most cities have been too busy dreaming of free pipes to notice that their approach is hopelessly flawed.The lesson here is an old one about the function of government. When it comes to communications, the United States relies on a privateer system: We depend on private companies to perform public callings. That works up to a point, but private industry will build only so much. Real public infrastructure costs real public money. We already know that, in the real world, if you're not willing to invest in infrastructure, you get what we have: crumbling airports, collapsing bridges, and broken levees. Why did we think that the wireless Internet would be any different?

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Good points. For exaple here we have an open costless (for the end users) wireless network that covers some areas, like downtown and university for example, and it seems to work all right. It's not the fastest one you can get here, but speedy enough and definitely something I would miss if it wasn't there tomorrow; a decent way of reading your emails with a mobile device (without paying huge sums just for a small email; telecompanies here surely know how to rip you off your money) when sitting at a downtown cafe for example (who does that? ), easy access to electronic map if you don't know where that certain shop is etc..

Of course it would be nice if it worked everywhere, but this is a good start. It works in the places where a lot of people spend their daytime, and you don't have to order passwords or such to use it, you don't have to be a local guy to get access to it..and guess what? People are happy.