Wired 11.09: START: Would You Like Wi-Fi With That?

Paul Boutin says in this Wired article that WiFi access really should be free, because it's too expensive to do the billing for it. In the article, he says:

"Sure, leasing a broadband connection with a Wi-Fi base is cheap. But add a billing system - secure login server, transactional database, credit card processing, tech staff, customer service operators standing by - and the outlay skyrockets to $30, $50, even $70 a day, particularly if there are lots of support calls. (Ironically, most of those calls will be about problems with the billing system itself.)"

Personally I believe that he's right. There is no business in providing WiFi access. People don't have a need to get email from a coffee ship, they don't have a need to get information anytime and anyplace. Most people don't even check their email more than once a day. While there will eventually be applications to stimulate that need, they won't become real until after the network is in place. WiFi can bring more business into your shop. If people know it's there and it's free it gives you a competitive advantage over the shop that doesn't provide WiFi. Yes, you'll occasionally get someone who comes in only for the WiFi, but then you have an opportunity to sell to that person, where you didn't have the opportunity to do so before. With coffee shops and the like, you can make up the cost of installing WiFi without the billing system by selling two extra coffee drinks a day. I believe that WiFi is like air conditioning. Although I haven't researched this, I wouldn't be surprised to learn that at one time it cost extra to eat in an air conditioned restaurant, or sleep in an air conditioned hotel room. Then as competitors started providing air conditioning in their restaurants and shops it became mandatory. Today, in the US it is unheard of for a shop to not have air conditioning. It's a cost of doing business. Yes, some people come into the shop just to escape the heat, just like some will come in to get the free WiFi. The thing to remember is that regardless of why people come into your business, once they are there you have the opportunity to sell to them. If they don't buy, it's not because they just wanted the WiFi, it's because you didn't provide a good or service that was compelling to that customer. I think WiFi should be like air conditioning, or lighting. Eventually everyone will have it, and those who get it early have the opportunity to grow their market share over their competitors who don't.