2005 10
FON in Sweden
Published by MartinVarsavsky.net in Fon with No Comments
Tomorrow, we’re launching FON in Sweden. Right now, I’m at the SIME scandinavian conference on the Internet. Sweden is an interesting case because people here are fascinated with the idea of FON, but not because you can earn money through FON nor because you can save money. Here, bandwidth is very large and very cheap. What Swedes seem to really like in FON is the idea of having a unified WiFi network with large bandwidth. They say that 3G was simply not good enough. There are companies here that offer fiber-optic connections in your home at speeds of up to 100Mb for only 30 EUR. Una locura, as we say in spanish. These are the only connections I’ve seen where the bottle neck is WiFi at 54 Mb.
This Friday, i asked to have a demonstration on how it is to surf at those speeds. For me, it’s a little like someone who’s going to go for a spin in a Ferrari.
2005 9
Linksys router WRT54G/GS
Published by MartinVarsavsky.net in Fon with No Comments
As I’ve written earlier, the fact that FON only works with Linksys WRT54G/GS routers is bugging some foners. To be sure, only 15% of pre-registered foners already have a compatible Linksys router. But believe me, these routers are amazing. In reality, they’re are like mini Linux computers on which you will be installing open software that will evolve very rapidly as new updates and plug-ins appear.
Right now, we’re negotiating a deal with Linksys to buy routers from them. As I’m writing this, the best price we found was 70 EUR but we hope to have them for 55 EUR at the SIMO launch for the first 1000 foners.