More on Free-fi

Glenn Reynolds on the free-fi debate. In particular, I think the following quote is misleading.

"Wireless Internet access is cheap and easy to provide (I have it at home, and so do countless other Americans)..."

There is a flaw in Glenn's logic here. Wi-fi is cheap and easy for a residential connection. But, scale it up to a hot spot and it becomes more costly and complicated. The more populair the hot spot becomes the more strain is going to be put on the pipe. The more strain on the pipe the worse data rates will be. With deteriating data rates, the hot spot looses popularity and it's appeal. Try and sell a business owner on a plan that involves sinking more and more money into it, or become a flash in the pan.

Again and again, I keep coming back to the freenets of the 90's. And I don't see how this will end up any differently. May be if Glenn or Doc or Dave or someone can explain how wi-fi will escape the freenet syndrome I'll be more accepting of the utopian idea. I'd love to get proven wroung on this, but I fail to see the point of getting my hopes up untill this issue is dealt with.