El Fon Blog

Reviews are coming in from Portland OR, USA about the quality of WiMax service launched there by Clearwire. Most of what I am reading sounds positive.

I mentioned Clearwire in my previous blog. They have been offering a sort of “pre-WiMax” wireless broadband service in major cities across the USA.

Clearwire and Sprint had intended to partner under the Xohm name, and roll out WiMax throughout the USA. Austin, TX had been one of those target cities, and I was very excited! To make a long blog short, Sprint is not doing so well, and the partnership dissolved, leaving Clearwire to attempt a more limited roll-out on their own.

Here is their handy little WiMax/WiFi router. This device marries a WiMax modem in an USB dongle with a small WiFi router equipped with an USB port. Doesn’t that sound familiar?

It’s dissapointing that Fon’s Fonosferat Program has avoided thinking of La Fonera 2.0’s USB port as a WAN interface. With WiMax and WiBro dongles available for a year already, Fon could have achieved the WiMax-Fon router by now. Perhaps they are still looking for a way to deliver Fon CEO Martin Varsavsky’s vision of *providing* WiMax service via a Fon device which is tethered as usual to DSL or cablemodem?

This is a new option to join T-Mobile’s “Mobile Broadband Max” cellular data plan, available wherever T-Mobile reception is found in the UK. You can use up to 3GB/month of bandwidth before T-Mobile throttles you, or contacts you about adjusting your plan. It also includes unlimited access at T-Mobile Wifi Hotspots. Skype and other VOIP calls are permitted using the service.

You can pay £2/day or prepay for a month and surf the web for as little as £.67/day! Compare to Fon Wifi at €3/day. Access is provided by using compatible T-Mobile handsets as a modem, or a USB modem/memory stick costing £49.99.

T-Mobile says a contract is not necessary, but mentions 12-24 month contracts, credit checks, and 30-day cancellation requirements. It’s possible this is simply a try-before-contract deal, but the rates are almost the same under contract.

This is a compelling alternative to Fon and other for-pay wifi providers. Though there may be an up-front cost for the modem, the daily usage fees are far lower, and service availability is guaranteed much higher.

It would be wonderful to have this in the USA. I would not hesitate to join a service like this, to have the freedom to bike out on the trails with my laptop, headset and modem. I’d do a little telecommuting work while sitting under a cedar tree on a cliff top overlooking the river valley. Our beautiful Barton Creek area is surrounded by upscale homes, so cellular reception there is excellent. Of course, i’d experiment with ways to boost my signal, just for the geeky fun of it.

As my eyes rest upon my shelf full of blinking Fon merchandise, I am wondering what Fon will do to respond to this new service? Lower their rates? A new Fon E-Partnership with T-Mobile or AT&T?

I’ve also had my eye on the Fon hotspots in my city. Since I last checked, most of them have gone dead! I’ve been visiting my closest Fonero neighbors and learning why this is. I will blog about this in the near future.

Update: Thanks b250, for pointing out that I used € where actually £ is indicated.

Today Fon and JoikuSoft announce their collaboration in a software addon for Symbian phones, called “JoikuSpot”. You can buy it in their JoikuShop at an introductory price of €15. It uses 3G or GPRS as your Internet backhaul (WAN), and built-in wifi for the hotspot (possibly in peer-to-peer mode instead of AP mode), so you too can share your bandwidth wherever you go!

My first thought, of course, is how this is excellent news for homeless Bills who have been encumbered by the extra weight of a La Fonera router, cables, and battery packs. Now, when they sell wifi at the train station, they only need to carry a single device with them! Hopefully, Fon can partner with a major cellco and negotiate a discount on their unlimited data plans for this charitable purpose.

JoikuSpot supports the following cellphone models (with an appropriate carrier, “unlimited” high speed data plan providing 3G/GPRS, and carrier provisioning to enable wifi on the phone):

JoikuSpot Premium also includes a VPN client to secure your connection to a home or corporate VPN server. JoikuSpot Premium does not force visitors to a default landing page, and is also 100% customizable for operator whitelabeling and licencing.

More information here:
Joikusoft and FON work together
Joikusoft and FON Unveil Wi-Fi HotSpot Software
Joikusoft and FON unveil Wi-Fi HotSpot software
Joiku, FON to offer premium mobile hotspot software
FON and JoikuSoft Introduce FonSpot Mobile Wi-Fi Hotspot Software

Here’s a little project I actually did some months ago. I hope it inspires a wave of (legal) guerilla hotspot activity. Milk your wifi and bring affordable Internet to a hotel or cafe near you!

Some people have discussed tapping a USB connection for 5v DC. You can also tap a PS/2 keyboard port (if you have one) for 5v without any additional circuitry. The tap I have wasn’t entirely built by me. It was provided by Logitech to supply power to an old webcam. It can connect to both large and small keyboard connectors, and has an extra side wire where the 5v is split off. I stripped the wires and determined which one was + and - by trial and error. The power connector was cut off from some other transformer. I keep lots of small parts like this.

Here is a photo of a PS/2 connector showing which pins you need to tap:

Here is a photo of my La Fonera resting comfortably with it’s new power connector:

Here is La Fonera behind my trusty old laptop, showing that it is indeed working with the laptop keyboard port as power source, and Ethernet jack as Internet source. Sorry it is underexposed, I wanted you to see the glowing LEDs better. I hope you can see, on La Fonera I have power, Internet and WLAN lights all working, and also the link light on my Ethernet jack. Click photo for larger version:

Finally, it was necessary to enable Internet Connection Sharing (ICS), which is included with most versions of Windows. Alternatives and equivalents exist for every major operating system.

My Internet source is my WPA encrypted Linksys router, and I need to share it with my La Fonera, which is connected to the Ethernet jack. Sharing can only be enabled for one network device, and it is automatically assumed that every other network device will be bound to it. Note that ICS does not appear as a menu choice unless your computer has at least two enabled networking devices. Under Network Connections, I select the wifi adapter, NOT the Ethernet jack, and enable ICS on the Advanced tab:

Now, what can you use this for? Perhaps you are unable to run an Ethernet cable out to your La Fonera, but are within range of another hotspot which you are permitted to access. Perhaps you would like to provide a Fon hotspot for a group of people, and have a cellular data, WiMax or other wireless modem device to supply the Internet connection. It may even be possible to pay for a connection to an expensive commercial hotspot, and spend a day making some positive income by reselling it at Fon’s cheaper rates to everyone else there. You could even use an existing Fon hotspot; pay for a Fon daily pass, and then resell another Bill’s wifi for your own profit (please get his permission first)!

This arrangement should work to supply at least a basic Internet connection, for WWW and email. It is probably a poor substitute at best, for true WDS meshing, to extend the range of your wifi. Performance will certainly suffer due to latency and the effects of performing NAT behind another NAT. Lastly, ICS does not always recognise unusual network devices, especially ones which require special drivers. Some ISPs may require such drivers to help enforce their one-computer-per-customer Terms of Service.

I’d love to hear from anyone who has milked another wifi hotspot like this.