In a big win for a little Wi-Fi start-up called Fon, Time Warner Cable Inc. will let its residential broadband customers turn their connections into public wireless hot spots, a practice shunned by most U.S. Internet service providers.For Fon, which has forged similar agreements with Internet service providers across Europe, the deal will boost its credibility with U.S. consumers.
For Time Warner Cable, which has 6.6 million broadband subscribers, the move could help protect the company from an exodus as free or cheap municipal wireless service becomes more readily available.
Fon was founded in Spain in 1995 on the premise that people shouldn't have to pay twice — once at home and again in a coffee shop — for Internet access. At first, the company offered software that let its members, called Foneros, turn Wi-Fi, or wireless fidelity, routers into shared access points, but it took hours to get up and running.
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