Philly blows another opportunity

Seems the famed Philadelphia wi-fi network, where the city was going to provide network access to enable poor people to get the same service as rich people, has ganged aft. This PC World on-line article has the details: "EarthLink next month will shut down its Philadelphia Wi-Fi network, the flagship of its now-dashed municipal wireless initiative, and then remove it from the city's street lights. The ailing service provider made the announcement Tuesday, saying it is proceeding with that plan after months of negotiations with the city and a nonprofit that had planned to offer free Wi-Fi on the network. The deal fell apart because of a disagreement among the city, the nonprofit and the group Wireless Philadelphia, EarthLink said. The carrier will provide a 30-day transition period, finally shutting down the network on June 12, and offer its Wi-Fi subscribers discounts on other EarthLink services. The idea was to make Wi-Fi available to residents and businesses throughout the city, reaching areas the city said didn't have broadband, and to offer the service at a subsidized rate to low-income residents to bring them online. But there were delays in rolling out the network and it never gained much traction. In court papers filed Tuesday, EarthLink said it had only 5,034 regular residential and business subscribers and 908 customers under the subsidized plan. EarthLink said it knew by late 2007 that the business was unsustainable.

Rico says be sure to read the 'Community Comments' at the bottom of the page; these are people who get it: "Philly is a sewer, and extremely corrupt."