fontastic.org - FON and free WiFi blog » 2006

FON $5 router & Bills launched June 26, 2006

A whole lot of new stuff on the newly designed FON.com website: now, you can get a Linksys Milk your WiFi! router for only $5 and as of today Foneros can earn money if they decide to become a Bill. It works like this: you become a Fonero by either flashing your router with FON firmware or by purchasing a FON router (for 5 bucks you might just want to go ahead and order one :-). Now, at some point during registration you will be asked to either become a Linus or a Bill. A Linus can roam for free but gets no money from paying Aliens, a Bill gets half of the income of one's hotspot but can not roam for free. Bills receive earned money in $30 increments via PayPal. If you happen to live close to high-frequency places and/ or become a Super Bill (offering multiple access points), you might be able to make a living out of it.

FON Downloader next in pipeline June 13, 2006

Ok, the new Fonera router is on it's way and about 20.000 units should hit the market in September. The router is manufactured by China-based Accton and features the latest Fon software incl. double SSID (Fon & personal) amongst other. But Martin Varsavsky has the next revolution on his shortlist already. The next generation or upscale Fonera router will feature more build in memory to run Linux-based "downloading" software such as Limewire or Azureus enabling the router to download music, movies and other media without being connected to a computer. You can also upload your own portal to the router. Now, when you log on to it (or your friends, family and other foneros) one will have a customized portal (even access controlled areas should be possible). You could "tell" your Fonera Downloader from a remote place to get you a movie you want, say while you have limited bandwidth connection to the internet and then stream it from there when you reach a WiFi AP. Or you just connect an external hard-drive to the router, store all your music there and you could access your archive anywhere in the world. This sounds really great! Web 2.0 that makes sense and offers a real value for a change.

No related posts

Linksys FON router for only $1! June 7, 2006

Unbelievable: Linksys WRT54 for only $1 via the Fon online shop. But hurry, only valid until tomorrow, June 8th! Does not include tax and shipping, of course, and you need to sign up with FON within a month. But who wouldn't anyways

According to Aving, Belkin is next in line to come up with a Skype phone that works in wireless hotspots and does not require a computer. The phone looks pretty similar to the Netgear Skype phone, which is unfortunately quite expensive ($249 at Amazon). We agree with Gizmodo and also hope Belkin will make this cheaper than the Netgear phone.