If you think that files and physical media were the only things you can share from a PC, think again! Time Warner Cable has filed a lawsuit against an apartment complex inNew
York for illegally sharing and reselling its high-speed Road Runner broadband connection to its residents. They operated as iNYC Wireless and shared their broadband connection over a Wi-Fi network to its residents. The lawsuit aims to bar iNYC from further redistributing the service and seeks damages caused to Warner Cable by the pirate service.
Wi-Fi experts say that this is likely first of its kind and a straight forward "breach of contract". Many broadband providers discourage broadband sharing from its service such as over a Wi-Fi network and Road Runner customers have previously received letters asking them to not share their accounts with unauthorised users. Then again, selling broadband over Wi-Fi does not require running any cables or much work to setup and other broadband customers may try earning a little revenue by following what iNYC Wireless were doing.
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Time Warner's Road Runner subsidiary recently accused iNYC Wireless and residential apartment owner London Terrace Towers of violating its terms of service, which ban subscribers from reselling access to their accounts. Wi-Fi experts say the case--perhaps the first of its kind--is a fairly straightforward "breach of contract" dispute that's unlikely to push legal boundaries. The suit does, however, throw a spotlight on the broadband industry's terms of service, which are by and large hostile to unfettered Wi-Fi usage. Many broadband providers discourage subscribers from running open Wi-Fi access points, and Road Runner customers in the past have received letters from the company asking them to keep unauthorized users off their accounts. A few, such as EarthLink and Speakeasy, take a different tack by advertising contracts friendly to those with Wi-Fi. These companies hope a laissez-faire attitude will make their services more attractive to subscribers. Up for grabs is the question of whether liberal or conservative Wi-Fi policies make better business sense for broadband companies. The question gets even more interesting after the lawsuit. So far, open Wi-Fi access points are largely available for free, in many cases without the knowledge of the account holders themselves. But some entrepreneurial subscribers are beginning to smell a business opportunity in actively reselling their bandwidth. Even before the warning shot from Time Warner, such experiments had run into trouble. Start-up Joltage hoped to build a profitable business by helping residential broadband customers to resell their bandwidth. The company collapsed earlier this year when it failed to sign up enough customers. Still, copycats appear to be in the wings and broadband providers now have a choice: recognize a new class of customer and tinker with their terms of service to include things like revenue sharing to accommodate them--or sue them into oblivion. |
With the increasing popularity of Wireless networks and increasing number of customers using broadband, it does not take much for a user to accidentally share their broadband connection over a wireless network! Some customers may not think of outside users when developing their Wireless LAN and thus think it would be simple to have an 'password free' Wireless LAN. With this type of Wireless LAN, anyone within coverage of an access-point can join the LAN without most owners noticing. If cunsumers are willing to share their purchased music over a network, then why not share their broadband connection? Some may figure that if they are not using it while away from the PC, then make use of it by sharing it with the neighbours. 🙂
Other consumers such as students may intentionally share their LAN with other students to cut down on their broadband costs. For example, one student subscribes to broadband, sets up a Wi-Fi network and the other students access it and pay a portion of the subscription cost. With a Wi-Fi LAN, they may even share music and take part in multiplayer games.
If the ISPs have to worry about its customers illegally sharing files, they may find themselves later losing subscribers due to broadband sharing.
Source: CNet News
