Earthlink puts municipal WiFi business up for sale

It looks like Earthlink was talking about plenty more than just Helio and revenue figures during its recent earnings call, with CNET News.com now reporting that the company also dropped word that it's selling off its much-hyped and significantly-scaled-back municipal WiFi business. Of course, that news hardly comes as a bombshell given the company's recent rumblings on the matter, to say nothing of its drawn out, ill-fated attempts to spread its WiFi signals throughout San Francisco. Earthlink apparently hasn't found any takers just yet, however, and there's no word about how much their asking for it, but we wouldn't let that stop you from putting in an offer -- just be ready to put up with plenty of competition.

[Jordan @ Feb 8th 2008 5:57PM]

I offer three fitty.

[Nathan @ Feb 8th 2008 6:21PM]

Now why'd you go and do that for? They're just gonna ask you for anotha tree-fitty woman!

"Oh lord, I was just trying to get them to go away! Lord oh lord! Don't even know why I gave em the money, I don't even want no municipal wifi!"

[sinai @ Feb 8th 2008 6:13PM]

"their" becomes "they're"

people pay you to write for them?

[skulldriveshaft @ Feb 8th 2008 6:43PM]

What is the best way for Municipal WiFi to be run anyways?

I think it takes remote installs by volunteers to work properly, otherwise the overhead just eats up all the funding.

Where's the tech heads on this site? Speak up.

[The_Steven @ Feb 9th 2008 12:16AM]

Yet another reason I'm glad I don't live in Philly!

...and...

+10 points to sTEVEN for the Galloping Gertie reference.

[r @ Feb 9th 2008 12:35AM]

Do you think MAYBE as a JOURNALIST, Melanson could learn to use the ENGLISH language correctly???

See below:

Earthlink apparently hasn't found any takers just yet, however, and there's no word about how much their asking for it.......

YOU THINK MAYBE YOU COULD USE THE WORD "THEY'RE" AS IN "THEY'RE ASKING FOR IT"? As in, "they are" asking for it.

It's ludicrous that people have jobs as so-called journalists and yet they cannot use the language correctly.

Hire a proofreader!

[trevor @ Feb 9th 2008 11:36PM]

How about you start using caps and punctuation correctly, then we'll call it squaresies.

[BeniRose @ Feb 10th 2008 2:36AM]

Is this just for Muni-WiFi in San Francisco or is it all of their Wifi cities. They have one here in philly, but it's expensive (somewhere like 20 bucks a month) and it's balls slow. If they made it like 5 dollars a month, and treated it as a service to be an addition to your internet at home, rather than as an actual ISP, they'd be doing a lot better. Especially with all the iPhone users who don't want to have to deal with EDGE speeds.

[m1c @ Feb 10th 2008 6:12AM]

See what happens when the IT department tries to handle a wireless network !

[Charles C Stirk Jr @ Feb 10th 2008 10:45PM]

Earthlink totally mismanaged municipal WiFi in Philly ...slow speeds , weak signal strength Horrid customer serves, Double charging , inability to cancel .....

Laughing bit is that much of the city is covered via residential open WiFi conections ...

In the under served areas I will second the .......

"I think it takes remote installs by volunteers to work properly, otherwise the overhead just eats up all the funding."

Municipal WiFi is one of those things that is so easy to do at the Grassroots level ... but as soon as municipality tries to monetize / pass off to the telecom issues start to appear