5 ms·

Forgive my lack of a source, but I read a while back that hotel wifi is often so bad because they signed short-sighted contracts in the past that locked them in

by aggie 12y ago

Forgive my lack of a source, but I read a while back that hotel wifi is often so bad because they signed short-sighted contracts in the past that locked them in to these terrible data rates for many years. And now they pass that terrible deal on to their guests. Edit: well I found the 'source' - turns out it was a Hacker News comment, so take it for what it's worth. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8082519 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8082519

seanp2k2 12y ago
I find it hard to believe that lobbying the FCC is cheaper than paying lawyers to engineer their way out of those contracts. With the crazy fees mentioned in the article for wifi access (seriously, $1000 per device?), it's not hard to see that their "protecting users" line of arguing is BS when there is such a clear profit motive. Also, I totally don't get their strategy here, since it's not like there aren't other hotels which are nicer / cheaper / better-suited to conventions than Marriott. Really hope that they lose a lot of business for trying to pull such a stupid, petty trick to increase profits. In combination with their push to "remind you to tip their maids" so they can pay them less, I'm really excited to watch them burn.
deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
TeMPOraL 12y ago
This was brought up in a recent HN thread (that you just found). The way it feels to me, forgive the profanity - it's assholes that got screwed by other assholes. Signing up for such "short-sighted contracts" is stupid, but offering those in the field of fast-changing technology (and not upgrading them when the technology changes to the point of the contract being ridiculous) feels... evil.
DanBC 12y ago
The other reason it's so bad is that they run hotels, they're not network engineers. Few people know how to set up wifi so it doesn't suck. Most hotels don't ever have the IETF to stay. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3771876 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3771876 https://www.networkworld.com/news/2012/032812-ietf-makeover-257762.html https://www.networkworld.com/news/2012/032812-ietf-makeover-...
- memracom 12y ago
  But as you point out, the IETF and NANOG have openly documented how to set up hotel wifi that doesn't suck. It doesn't take any technical experience whatever to hire a WiFi firm and instruct them to set up a system the same way that the IETF did it.
- teddyh 12y ago
  See also ‘The “WiFi At Conferences” Problem’ by Joel Spolsky: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2009/10/08.html http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2009/10/08.html […] When you try to ask complicated questions and explain that your conference has a lot of techies, they say, yes, we understand, we have A-number-1 internet access, no problem very good. When you say, “Yeah, but have you configured your DHCP server so that it has more than the default 254 IP addresses available to hand out,” they have no idea what on earth you’re talking about, and of course it turns out that they had some vendor, a company you’ve never heard of, provide their internet access. And half the time, that vendor installed a DSL line from the local telco and hooked it up to a LinkSys WRT54g they got at Costco, then installed some kind of crappola welcome-screen software just to make it even worse, and then disappeared. […]
- jessriedel 12y ago
  Hotel managers aren't plumbers either, yet they seem to handle running water in their rooms without much of a issue. The problem isn't that they are hotel managers per se, the problem is that hotel managers tend to be older and so unable/ unwilling/unaware to adapt to new technology. I'd bet dollars to donuts that the quality of wifi has a strong correlation to hotel manager age for hotels that aren't part of chains. Chain hotels, on the other hand, can fix this problem through the normal franchise methods: Determine best practices for the entire chain, and then provide standard instructions and help for each franchise.
  - Spooky23 12y ago
    Don't oversell their plumbing ability. I stayed at a pretty expensive hotel (unfortunately built in the 1970's when the world became stupid with respect to construction) where the toilet exploded. I heard this gurgling noise, went to check it out... and there was old faithful! The maintenance guy told me when the place was full, if people flushed simultaneously, "bad" things would happen. Wifi is a similar thing. Best practice for Wifi is "it depends". You need to hire somebody with a clue and do surveys. Hotels have been traditionally build around sound and fireproofing, and the methods used to achieve both make Wifi difficult in some places. At cookie cutter, modularly built hotels (ie. Hampton Inns, etc) Wifi is very uniform in quality.
pyre 12y ago
While the veracity of the claim is untested, it doesn't seem so out there that many hotels that were at least partially forward-thinking may have not predicted the need for a better / faster network in the future...
tw04 12y ago
Pardon me if I'm skeptical that a multibillion dollar company the size of Hilton Hotels can't strong arm a local ISP into caving on a contract. The cost of a lawsuit alone would cause whoever said ISP is to shit their pants and give them whatever they want.

by aggie 12y ago

seanp2k2 12y ago

I find it hard to believe that lobbying the FCC is cheaper than paying lawyers to engineer their way out of those contracts. With the crazy fees mentioned in the article for wifi access (seriously, $1000 per device?), it's not hard to see that their "protecting users" line of arguing is BS when there is such a clear profit motive. Also, I totally don't get their strategy here, since it's not like there aren't other hotels which are nicer / cheaper / better-suited to conventions than Marriott. Really hope that they lose a lot of business for trying to pull such a stupid, petty trick to increase profits. In combination with their push to "remind you to tip their maids" so they can pay them less, I'm really excited to watch them burn.

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

TeMPOraL 12y ago

This was brought up in a recent HN thread (that you just found). The way it feels to me, forgive the profanity - it's assholes that got screwed by other assholes. Signing up for such "short-sighted contracts" is stupid, but offering those in the field of fast-changing technology (and not upgrading them when the technology changes to the point of the contract being ridiculous) feels... evil.

DanBC 12y ago

The other reason it's so bad is that they run hotels, they're not network engineers. Few people know how to set up wifi so it doesn't suck. Most hotels don't ever have the IETF to stay. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3771876 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3771876 https://www.networkworld.com/news/2012/032812-ietf-makeover-257762.html https://www.networkworld.com/news/2012/032812-ietf-makeover-...

memracom 12y ago
But as you point out, the IETF and NANOG have openly documented how to set up hotel wifi that doesn't suck. It doesn't take any technical experience whatever to hire a WiFi firm and instruct them to set up a system the same way that the IETF did it.
teddyh 12y ago
See also ‘The “WiFi At Conferences” Problem’ by Joel Spolsky: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2009/10/08.html http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2009/10/08.html […] When you try to ask complicated questions and explain that your conference has a lot of techies, they say, yes, we understand, we have A-number-1 internet access, no problem very good. When you say, “Yeah, but have you configured your DHCP server so that it has more than the default 254 IP addresses available to hand out,” they have no idea what on earth you’re talking about, and of course it turns out that they had some vendor, a company you’ve never heard of, provide their internet access. And half the time, that vendor installed a DSL line from the local telco and hooked it up to a LinkSys WRT54g they got at Costco, then installed some kind of crappola welcome-screen software just to make it even worse, and then disappeared. […]
jessriedel 12y ago
Hotel managers aren't plumbers either, yet they seem to handle running water in their rooms without much of a issue. The problem isn't that they are hotel managers per se, the problem is that hotel managers tend to be older and so unable/ unwilling/unaware to adapt to new technology. I'd bet dollars to donuts that the quality of wifi has a strong correlation to hotel manager age for hotels that aren't part of chains. Chain hotels, on the other hand, can fix this problem through the normal franchise methods: Determine best practices for the entire chain, and then provide standard instructions and help for each franchise.
- Spooky23 12y ago
  Don't oversell their plumbing ability. I stayed at a pretty expensive hotel (unfortunately built in the 1970's when the world became stupid with respect to construction) where the toilet exploded. I heard this gurgling noise, went to check it out... and there was old faithful! The maintenance guy told me when the place was full, if people flushed simultaneously, "bad" things would happen. Wifi is a similar thing. Best practice for Wifi is "it depends". You need to hire somebody with a clue and do surveys. Hotels have been traditionally build around sound and fireproofing, and the methods used to achieve both make Wifi difficult in some places. At cookie cutter, modularly built hotels (ie. Hampton Inns, etc) Wifi is very uniform in quality.

pyre 12y ago

While the veracity of the claim is untested, it doesn't seem so out there that many hotels that were at least partially forward-thinking may have not predicted the need for a better / faster network in the future...

tw04 12y ago

Pardon me if I'm skeptical that a multibillion dollar company the size of Hilton Hotels can't strong arm a local ISP into caving on a contract. The cost of a lawsuit alone would cause whoever said ISP is to shit their pants and give them whatever they want.