ANTenna Blog -- Mobile

Denver International Airport is one of the busiest in United States. And now that DIA has moved to free, ad-supported wireless service, its airwaves may be as bustling as its airspace.

According to the Denver Post, the airport is already hosting 10 times as many users (up to 8,000 per day) as it did when it charged $7.95 a day -- with only limited advertising of the new offer. According to the IDG News Service, "Denver may be the first U.S. airport to deploy a public Wi-Fi network with IEEE 802.11n Draft 2.0 capability."

No surprise that the new deal -- which makes DIA the first of the nation's largest airports to take wireless free (smaller airports like Phoenix and Las Vegas use a similar model) -- is popular. Everybody likes free.

But in this case, free is a even better deal for smaller companies than it is for large enterprises. That's because giant corporations often have enough road warriors to make it worth cutting a deal with Wi-Fi providers in places their employees often travel.
Smaller companies, however, have to not only pay full freight, but also have to deal with the hassles of billing from multiple hot spots.

Let's hope that Denver's test starts a trend. Just be careful, these ad-supported hot spots can't possibly be very secure...