You know those WEIRD glass sheds in New York? They'll be replaced with Gbps WiFi

New York City could replace its payphones in five boroughs with Wi-Fi hubs, to build a superfast city-wide wireless internet network. If approved by city officials and built, it would be the largest municipal Wi-Fi network in the world, we're told. The plan was drawn up by NYC Mayor Bill de Blasio and a consortium called …

[Gene Cash]

Riiiight...

> The group claims the plan will not require any taxpayer funds

Uh huh. And I'm Queen, I am!

> 10,000 of the city's little-used phone booths will be uprooted and replaced

Over how many decades?

Considering the amount of vandalism to hardened public payphones I've seen, I don't think a tablet's going to last more than a week.

And if you connect and hack the State Dept, how do they track that? If you take care to spoof your MAC address, of course.

The FAIL icon has never had a better calling.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Riiiight...

"And if you connect and hack the State Dept, how do they track that? If you take care to spoof your MAC address, of course."

I hope you don't think that I can only use your MAC address to track you .... Mr Cash

[John Brown (no body)]

Re: Riiiight...

"And if you connect and hack the State Dept, how do they track that?"

Even the "free" calls will require your ID card. And hidden, always on webcams like cash machines (NSA sponsored T&Cs).

Papers please citizen!

(About time we brought that meme back - or maybe not)

[wdmot]

Re: Riiiight...

Considering the amount of vandalism to hardened public payphones I've seen, I don't think a tablet's going to last more than a week.

This. And not just the tablet, but the charging station and the large digital ad display. Even if it's monitored by camera, someone can easily vandalize and not get caught. But who knows, maybe it'll be a few months before they're all vandalized.

[PNGuinn]

Re: Riiiight...

Or pwned.

Free ads ... I mean porn....

At least it'd be a new tourist attraction.

[Anonymous Coward]

Cynic

This looks bloody marvellous but may need some careful thought.

For example I think if you start putting free wifi up all over the town then the locals may possibly abuse it unless it is the intention to replace all those paid subscriber accounts with a freely supplied civic one.

Anyway: good luck to them. It looks good on the face of it and could be fantastic.

Cheers

Jon

[Gannettt]

Puts me in mind of the time BT tried to replace the phones in phone booths with clunky text terminals and then internet booths that nobody used. At least with wi-fi you can just use your own device. I can't see the network operators liking this very much, though - corporations are very nervous of municipalities muscling in on their territory (look at municipal utility districts, municipal ISPs, and the case of the town that tried to sell petrol.

[RegGuy1]

Puts me in mind of the time...

What an excellent post. Have an upvote for at least the YouTube vid against Prop 16.

Makes you realise what a load of bollocks 'land of the free' really means.

[PNGuinn]

re " "

BYOD.

BOFFFFF!!!

What's not to like?

[Hud Dunlap]

Not even sure it is legal

Before Bell was broken up, they were required to have x number of pay phones per y population with out a phone. This meant that everyone had access to a phone. After Bell was broken up the requirement went to whatever phone company handled that area. I haven't heard of the law being changed. Not everyone has a cell phone or wants one.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Not even sure it is legal

"they were required to have x number of pay phones per y population with out a phone."

Well, Ma Bell had best get cracking and build some more then. I suspect NY plc can do what they like with derelict structures on their land.

In the UKoGB we also have some crazy laws but ours generally involve rights regarding sheep worrying on certain days whilst wearing a certain fruit. Such rights stretching back to the 10C and unfortunately suffering from a mistranslation in the 15C and downright myopia in the 18C.

[wdmot]

Re: Not even sure it is legal

Their website says "Free phone calls anywhere in the U.S." so it should still serve as a public pay(free) phone. Don't know what app they'll use, and if you don't want everyone around to hear your entire phone call you can use your own headphones.

[Badger Murphy]

Where will Clark Kent change clothes??

[Ole Juul]

Where will Clark Kent change clothes??

Behind a cloud.

[Anonymous Coward]

Clarke Kent changes

Spin like wonderwoman?

[CrashMarik]

Replace ? Booths ???

The article says they are going to preserve 3 phone booths on the west side

http://www.scoutingny.com/the-last-phone-booth-in-new-york-city/

Seems there are only four left so that should read NYC to replace phone booth.

[solo]

Landlines are doomed

Find a phone-booth Neo, with a landline. No.. no, throw that cellphone out.

[Anonymous Coward]

Lawyers sharpen your pencils

The Cellphone carriers will not take this lying down. They will sue and sue and sue to make sure that this never happens.

Then there seems to be a thread in the the US psyche that equates anything Public and Free with communism.

Sad state of affairs really.

nice idea, more than likely it will fail.

[John Robson]

Don't trust USB

Whyever not...

I just use my USB cable which comes without the data pins connected.

[Nifty]

Re: Don't trust USB

So you roll up at a booth and plug your iPhone in charge it.

Now, do NOT tap YES on "Do You Trust This Computer"

It will charge.

[Juan Inamillion]

Lovely idea, very altruistic.

As others have said here I'm sure 'ISPCorp' NY will have something to say about free wifi being available in all those subscriber areas.

Meanwhile, back in the UK... BT (for it is they) have plans to rip out the remaining phone boxes and install 'wifi stations', which will be range-limited to 1 metre and bandwidth limited to 2Mbps - inline with the 'Superfast' national broadband average that us Brits enjoy.

Oh and access will be limited to 10 minute stretches with an hour in between logins. Unless of course you sign up and pay for the BT 'Maxiwifi' ™ service, which will allow you to log on for 30 minutes at a time for just £14.99 per month (landline required).

Maybe they should convert those SuperLoos you see around the West End of London. At least then you could have a emergency five knuckle shuffle while perusing a jazz site (before the door automatically opens of course...)

[John Brown (no body)]

New jobs?

I wonde what the net total of new jobs will be after the phone company makes all those guys redundsant who maintain/fix/empty cashboxes for the current phones?

Great idea on the whole, but I do wish these sorts of announcements would stop trumpeting big numbers of new jobs and "forgetting" all those poor buggy whip makers who will starve if they can't get on the re-training scheme..

[TheProf]

Re: New jobs?

Can I suggest 'buggy-whip makers'? Unless they are riddled with bugs in which case carry on!

[PNGuinn]

Re: New jobs?

Perhaps the OP WAS discussing the hygene habits of whip makers.

Why should free wifi in NY affect the sales of whips? Enquiring minds need to know etc.....

[Mystic Megabyte]

Dumb

In my experience* New Yorkers are so dumb they couldn't tie their own laces. When their apartment catches fire they will run up to one of these booths and start yelling at it, "Fire! Fire! Fire!" whilst waving their hands around in a suspicious manner. Then someone will shoot them**.

*Two tours of Europe with NYC musicians.

**Another Darwin award!

[Francis Boyle]

If the equipment's supplied by Apple they'll be fine

unless they have a Scottish accent.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Dumb @Mystic Megabyte

THERE's the problem. NYC Musicians are not representative of the population of NY. You had the "entitled retard" group with you for two tours. Let alone they were from "Downstate" where all the communists thieves live (Sorry, some are in Albany). NYC cops are not representative of the population of NY State either. They don't know how to shoot straight, they would rather choke you to death. Come to Upstate NY, as long as you are not a criminal you have nothing to fear.

[strum]

Minor quibble

>creating 150 new manufacturing, technology and advertising jobs for the city as well as 650 new jobs for those who would provide support services once the stands are installed.

Would that be in addition to the guys who used to maintain the phone booths? Or instead of?

[Dave 32]

Re: Minor quibble

What is this "maintain the phone booths" item you speak of? Are you sure that it exists in this Universe?

Dave