Florian Hollender | floho.com

The latest upgrade of the FON network and the website FON.com finally gave me an incentive to go ahead, get out that old WRT54G, install the FON software on it and start running my own hotspot! FON, founded by Martin Varsavsky, is a community-driven approach to build a global network of WiFi hotspots. Right now they are giving the routers away for €/$ 5 (plus VAT+shipping though)! You simply hook them up, register the hotspot, and off you go. The geniality of the FON idea is that everybody profits. And by everybody, I include ISPs:

FON provides clear benefits for ISPs:

• Generate additional revenue through sharing Aliens’ revenues
• Provide free WiFi roaming and a social networking platform at no extra cost
• Differentiate their service offer from the competition
• Increase broadband penetration especially in small businesses
• Use of the FON platform to launch wireless services
• Reduce churn and attract new customers by benefiting of the brand association with FON

All this at no extra costs for the ISP! FON is not about Free Internet for all!

• FON increases broadband penetration

• FONeros have to have broadband connection to share it
• Alternatively, they must pay for usage, and prices are designed to avoid cannibalization of ISP products

FON enhances the value of ISP network by offering global connectivity in all FON Hotspots at no cost for the ISP or the user

FON prevents anonymous access as every session is registered and trackable

(Source: http://en.fon.com/biz/isps_friends.php)

This seems to be the key success factor: ISP collaboration.

There are three ways of being a FON user - you can be an Alien, a Linus or a Bill. As Alien, you do not share your own internet connection through a FON hotspot, so you are just a regular user who wants to have internet access. You pay either $/€ 3 for 24 hours of access (where you can switch between FON hotspots as much as you want to), or you buy 5 days for $/€ 10, which makes only $/€ 2 per day. This clearly undercuts existing commercial hotspots. As Linus, you share your internet connection through a FON hotspot. In exchange, you can use every other FON hotspot around the world - free of charge! The money Aliens pay when accessing your hotspot goes to FON. As Bill, you monetize! You also share your connection, but you get 50% of the revenue whenever an Alien signs up for internet access through your hotspot. When you want to access other FON hotspots as a Bill, you pay the regular rates.

Short and simple: I love the idea, and I love being a part of it.

[tags]FON, Martin Varsavsky, hotspot, WiFi[/tags]

It has been a long time since I actually saw a “down for an upgrade”-screen on a website*, but today big things are happening over at digg.com:

(Don’t pay attention to the Plug-In-Warning, that’s just the vanilla firefox talking).

Digg is ramping up version 3, which is to incorporate five new categories and some changes in the design. Valleywag talked about it, Techcrunch talked about it even more, and the challenging Netscape Beta is probably just getting a big headache. It all looks promising - I am sure looking forward to use the new digg, and I’ll keep you posted.

*: Actually, Studiverzeichnis.com is down irregularly a lot recently, but I really don’t know if it is capacity problems, updates or something else. I only know that it sure annoys me because the downtimes are never announced beforehand and tend to occur in the middle of the day:

[tags]digg, Techcrunch, Studiverzeichnis, Valleywag[/tags]

This day I got off on the wrong foot. I say that up front so that you don’t wonder why this posting has a cranky tone. Of course, I know that there are a lot of good things going on with the German web startup scene - (openBC users, look at that list!). But some things I see just make me wonder what is wrong with the Germans.

See, I talked a lot about studiverzeichnis.com. Although they got themselves at least a logo, they are still nothing more than a copy of facebook.com. Not that it is a bad thing - of course I’d prefer the original, but then again facebook is owned by Rupert Murdoch and the Facebook founder Tom Andersen seems to have a low social IQ - so hey, at least studiverzeichnis is working well and is slowly catching up in functionality.

What makes me dislike some German startups so much? Some of them just don’t smell right. See myvideo.de for example. Nothing wrong with hopping on the YouTube bandwagon. But why is the company based out of Rumania? Why is there only a “representative”? Why is nobody responsible? Oh, wait. I know. Because they fear copyright violations and lawsuits. Thank god they hired a great PR guy - Tilo Bonow, who also worked with Jamba before and seems to be incredibly multi-talented. How come they don’t even talk about traffic figures? Go figure. Yes, I am sarcastic here (German links in this sentence). I want companies to have a real and honest face. I want them blogging, I want to see them, I want their names on what they do. I want authenticity. Isn’t that part of what the “new” web is all about?

Good example: Hitflip. Germans, mostly dry business school people even, but still able to connect with customers and business partners (the latter is a really great idea that I have not seen anywhere else so far) and have their names under what they do. That’s the way I like it.

[tags]Studiverzeichnis, Facebook, MyVideo.de, Hitflip[/tags]