One Week left for WiFi Philly

Chris Urban — Thu, 05 Jun 2008 17:15:24 +0000

Here we are, one week away from EarthLink pulling the plug on the Wireless Philadelphia Wi-Fi network, and we have not seen or heard anything further about it since the original announcement. Will some non-profit org come to the rescue? Will Gov. Rendell broker a deal? Will the city of Philadelphia sue Earthlink to keep its equipment in place?
What I find interesting is that Earthlink claims there’s 5,000 paying customers (I’m one of them). If we’re paying $20 a month for wireless access, that’s $100,000 a month, or $1.2 million a year. What exactly are the costs of maintaining the network, or more specifically, what are the top line items in maintaining the network? Staff, backup equipment, replacement equipment, utility bills? If securing customers is the issue, why not offer a cheaper rate to get more people to sign up?
I’m waiting to hear if Greg Goldman makes any sort of last-ditch announcement, or will this whole thing quietly fade away without even a whimper? And what about the free-to-the-public areas around Center City, do those get dismantled as well? Isn’t anyone else aghast at this prospect – not having free wifi around the Convention Center will be a major hassle for conventioneers, let alone the service it provides to center city tourists and residents.
Let’s hope we see something come up in the next few days….

Earthlink finally bails

Chris Urban — Tue, 13 May 2008 17:06:57 +0000

Received this nice note from Earthlink this morning:

Dear EarthLink Wi-Fi Subscriber,

This email contains important information about your EarthLink
Wi-Fi service. EarthLink will stop operating its wireless
network in Philadelphia. EarthLink is providing our Wi-Fi
subscribers with a thirty (30) day transition period through
Thursday, June 12, 2008. This means that your EarthLink Wi-Fi
account will terminate on June 12, 2008.

In addition, your EarthLink dial-up access and email account
that EarthLink provides with the Wi-Fi service will also
terminate unless you transfer your account to another EarthLink
Internet access service.

EarthLink values you as a customer and we apologize for any
inconvenience that this may cause. We would like to assist you
in transitioning to another EarthLink Internet access service.

We are making several special offers on our DSL and dial-up
Internet access services available to our EarthLink Wi-Fi
subscribers in Philadelphia to assist in this transition.
EarthLink will try to contact you by telephone shortly to answer
any questions you may have about your EarthLink Wi-Fi account
and to explain how you can transfer your account to another
EarthLink Internet access service. You may also call us at
1-877-WIFI-HELP (1-877-943-4435) with any questions.

Please Note: To avoid an interruption in your EarthLink
Internet access and termination of your EarthLink email account,
please contact us before June 12, 2008. If you purchased or are
renting a modem from EarthLink for your EarthLink Wi-Fi service,
our service representative will provide details on how to return
the modem at no cost to you. If you purchased your modem from
EarthLink, we will give you a refund of the price you paid to us
for the modem once we’ve received your returned modem.

When your EarthLink Wi-Fi account is terminated, we will credit
to your account any remaining time that you paid for. Depending
upon your credit card company or bank, this credit may take up
to 30 days to appear on your statement.

Thank you for being our valued Wi-Fi subscriber. We look
forward to providing you with Internet service for years to come!

Sincerely,

EarthLink Support

Nice! So much for this great service. This was such a useful feature of working in and around Philadelphia: the ability to log onto a half-decent WiFi network and gain internet access. I had previously tried the Verizon USB cell-modem with intermittent results an lots of connection dropping, for nearly four times the price of the monthly Earthlink access.

What remains to be seen: what about the ‘free’ nodes, like at the Convention Center, Love Park, Reading Terminal Market, etc.? Do those remain, or they going the way of the Market Street trolley as well?

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One Week left for WiFi Philly

Earthlink finally bails