| WEBbeams
welcomes new hotspots:
Espresso Love Coffee
Kukwonago, WI
Main Street Coffee House Co.
Warrenton, MO
River Dog Coffeehouse Café
Linville, NC
Hotch-A-Do
Milwaukee, WI
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Free Admission to Three Upcoming Tradeshows |
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WEBbeams will be at three upcoming tradeshows,
and we hope to see you there. We’ll be at
Coffee
Fest
in Seattle October 27-29.
We’ll
also be at two Fresh
Cup Roadshow
events: September 8-9 in Dallas and October 12-13
in Philadelphia.
If
you’d like free tickets to any of these
events, contact Ericka at erickarodriguez@webbeams.com
or 1.888.WEBbeams, ext. 6000 by August 31.
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Growth in Wi-Fi Phones Expected |
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According to Infonetics Research, the Wi-Fi phone
market will double every year from now until 2009.
From 2004 to 2005 the worldwide market increased
116% to $125.5 million. As corporations explore
Wi-Fi phones as a money-saving initiative, the market
for Wi-Fi phones would reach $3.7 million by 2009.
Infonetics found 58% of Wi-Fi phone revenue in 2005
came from single-mode VoIP handsets, with the remaining
purchases being dual-mode handsets. By 2009, those
figures will shift drastically, as 91% of revenue
comes from dual-mode handsets. |
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Palm Phones with Wi-Fi in Future; What About iPod? |
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Palm’s Treo smartphones have been a popular
product for some time, although many users have
commented on the need for Wi-Fi. Until this point,
according to a Washington Post interview with
Palm’s CEO, Palm hasn’t added Wi-Fi
to its smartphones because it feared a big drain
on batteries. In the interview, however, the company’s
CEO did admit Wi-Fi-enabled Treo smartphones are
in development, although no launch date has been
announced. Speaking of Wi-Fi, rumors have been
flying for months about Wi-Fi-enabled iPods. While
Apple has applied for several patents along these
lines, no official announcement has been made. |
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Wi-Fi: Technology We Can't Live Without? |
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According to a survey completed by Kelton Research,
80% of respondents said they would part with their
iPods before their home Wi-Fi, if they had to
make a choice. A similar amount of people said
they’d part with their home telephone lines
before home Wi-Fi. The study, which interviewed
adults 18 to 64 who have experience with wireless
networks, also found that Wi-Fi networks are changing
the way Americans work. Fifty-five percent of
people said they now work from home two or three
days a week; however, the availability of Wi-Fi
means they don’t need a phone office but
instead work in the living room, dining room,
or a nearby café. |
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Boston Globe Article Highlights Drain of Free Wi-Fi |
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According to a July 9 article in the Boston Globe
titled “Loiterers Can Be a Drag on Businesses'
Bottom Line,” unregulated free Wi-Fi can
actually hurt businesses. The article cites examples
of Wi-Fi users sticking around all day after making
just a small purchase or even sneaking their own
food into a café. The article includes
an interview with one café owner who describes
his frustration as “people would sit for
six or seven hours and not buy anything.”
Some café owners have tried to remedy the
situation by offering a fee-based service, shutting
off the signal during busy hours, or simply kicking
out loiterers. (The article does not mention managed
free Wi-Fi, something WEBbeams now offers its
hotspots.) Read
the article here.
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Work in the Midst of War |
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Even as Hezbollah rockets hit targets throughout
Israel’s northern city of Haifa in mid July,
Reuters reports Intel employees kept working –
in bomb shelters. The Haifa Intel R&D center,
which develops Centrino and other Intel chips,
has equipped its underground bomb shelters with
Wi-Fi. As the fighting escalated, only essential
staff came into the shelter, while other employees
worked using their home Wi-Fi connections. Read
the article here.
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