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By Ryan Kim
San Francisco Chronicle
Originally Published May, 12 2007
The San Francisco controller’s office issued a favorable review Friday on a proposal by EarthLink and Google to provide the city with free wireless Internet access.
The report estimates residents could save $9 million to $18 million in Internet bills annually by having the option of choosing the EarthLink service, which will offer free access as well as a paid service that is cheaper than other broadband options like DSL and cable.
The report said the service will help the city bridge the digital divide, providing many residents with Internet service for the first time. It also noted it would be a boon to EarthLink, giving it a foothold in the San Francisco broadband market.
"I think this is one more reason for the board to approve free Wi-Fi as soon as possible," said Nathan Ballard, spokesman for Mayor Gavin Newsom. "It shows that Wi-Fi creates a favorable impact for the city."
Newsom said in January that the city had finalized language for a contract with EarthLink and Google to provide paid and free Wi-Fi service. EarthLink would pay the city $2 million over four years for the right to build, own and maintain the network. Subscribers would pay $22 a month for 1 megabit per second of broadband service or receive free service with speeds topping out at 300 kilobits per second.
But several city supervisors, led by Jake McGoldrick, have pushed for a municipally owned and operated network. McGoldrick has proposed competing legislation that could be heard by the Board of Supervisors later this summer at the same time as the EarthLink-Google deal.
Supervisor Chris Daly, who has supported a city-owned system, said he wasn’t swayed by the controller’s report. He said a city-owned network could provide even greater benefits than the EarthLink system.
A city-owned project "could potentially offer better service at lower rates for customers, and that might have a bigger impact on the economy and local businesses," Daly said. "That’s what we have to be thinking about."
The report by the controller’s office, which acts as the city’s auditor, comes just three days after EarthLink won approval from the San Francisco Public Utilities Commission to use its light poles to build a network of Wi-Fi antennas.
The EarthLink-Google proposal will be heard Monday by the Board of Supervisors’ Budget and Finance Committee before moving to the full board.
"We’re really pleased to have a city agency evaluate the deal with this level of diligence and look at the areas where we’d have an impact, whether it’s providing funds for digital inclusion or the impact on the economy and savings for consumers," said Cole Reinwand, vice president of product strategy and marketing at EarthLink.
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Note: Articles are posted for the purpose of generating ideas and honest debate on how San Francisco can live up to its full promise and potential. Posting of an article does not imply an endorsement by the author of Gavin Newsom for Mayor, nor an endorsement by Gavin Newsom for Mayor of the positions set forth in the article.
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May 13th, 2007 at 8:41 pm
The Controller uses a figure of $35 for DSL (vs 10-20) and assumes many people will drop their reliable wired connection which has not been the case in other muni wifi rollouts. Also DSL is 768 speed, the free wifi offered is only 300 speed. These assumptions result in wildly inaccurate savings estimates.
I believe it is likely that city does plan to issue a single source contract for government wifi based on Sunshine battles but they are waiting for the contract to be approved so that they can say they never put any money into the deal as a subsidy or tenant for the ‘At No Cost to the City’. Then they will do just that.
Here is another interesting story in the same Business Week issue about how the Digital Divide is going away as people who didn’t have internet access find reasons to have it, they get it.
http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_21/b4035061.htm
And then there is the PEW study just released showing that 50% of adults have little or no interest in additional Internet access. (basically the people who want internet access generally have it by now).
http://www.muniwireless.com/article/view/5983/
May 14th, 2007 at 8:18 pm
I just did a search in the controller’s document for the word “privacy”: 0 occurrences. I guess that’s how much we’ll get with this plan.
May 17th, 2007 at 6:51 am
Whatever you like or don’t like about free citywide internet access, it is great opportunity for SF.
I was just in the Kansas City airport and they offered free wifi. Maybe we should do the same at SFO. In some Asian airports they offer free use of computers too.
The coffee shops should love this, they will no longer have to maintain their own systems.
May 17th, 2007 at 9:49 pm
I do not know why some of the posters here are so negative about the proposed Google/Earthling Wi-Fi service which will cost the city nothing, and yet will be a great benefit for people like me who want it. It is like someone handing you a $100 bill and you saying you do not want it because it is wrinkled. I myself plan to drop my $50 a month Comcast broadband service as soon as the $22 Google/Earthlink Wi-Fi service becomes available. So all these Board of Supervisor delays are personally costing me about $25 a month while I wait. I have tried DSL in my apartment 2 times before, but have found it to be unreliable… maybe due to the very old phone lines in my building. As far as privacy concerns, if you are worried, then I recommend do not use ANY Wi-Fi system at all, and stick with a hardwired Internet connection. Besides using the Google/Earthlink Wi-Fi system for my home Internet access, I am also looking forward to using it to browse the Internet from almost anywhere in the city when I purchase an iphone.
May 31st, 2007 at 9:10 am
Like the Bicycle Plan, citywide Wi-Fi may or may not be a good idea, but, according to state law, the city still has to do some kind of environmental review of the project first. Mayor Newsom should instruct the Planning Dept. to do that. Again, like the Bicycle Plan, what’s the big hurry? Let’s take our time and get it right.
June 30th, 2007 at 4:34 pm
Folks,
Here is the simple answer. We should not go into business or contract with companies that have publicly stated they are tentative of projects they have been courted by the city to work on. Additionally, we also must know if there is solvency of those companies, that they will stick around long enough to finish and carry on the project especially when it needs constant maintenance. These concerns and others need to be part of the balancing test when making these long-term decisions on services the city is well equipped to provide and afford with little affect.
Whether we like the contract or not, we really have to pay attention to the winds of
change in the marketplace. Despite the want or need for this contract to be successful,
the market doesn’t wait for the public or government. It has investors and market
standing that is far more priority to leveraging their profits and cash flow. This may
mean for any good businessperson that a shift in strategy is essential, if not, imminent.
With that, we must keep our ears to the rails. Here is a major rumbling that we must not
discount on our issue at hand from the new CEO of Earthlink, Rolla Huff.
Respectfully,
Bruce
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http://www.informationweek.com/news/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=200000837
“The real question around municipal Wi-Fi is, ‘What is the economic model going to look
like?’ ” said Huff. “At end of day, we all have to understand what it’s going to take to
make money at this.”
If he decides the business modwl is cloudy, Huff said, he won’t hesitate to pull the plug — even on highly visible projects like the Google-Earthlink effort to build a wireless network for San Francisco. “To the extent I don’t think we have the capability to get to the point of profitability, I’ll make that judgment, too.”
September 23rd, 2007 at 8:57 pm
Well. I hope all you people who made statements like… “what’s the big hurry” are happy now. Earthlink has scraped it’s proposal to offer free Wi-Fi coverage in SF because it now says it can not make any money from it. Now our only hope for a free city-wide Wi-Fi plan is for the city to pay tens of millions of tax dollars to put in it’s own network… good going all you stonewallers out there… especially Chris Daly. If the city had not waited over 2 years to approve free Wi-Fi, we would have had it now. Earthlink is not pulling support from free Wi-Fi projects that got started early and are already mostly finished like the one in Philadelphia.