With the growing dependence of youngsters on internet and its social networks, you tube, movies, music, etc, should internet be paid or free. I ask this not as a big investment from the hostel but as a business opportunity in the hostel
15 years
Hi Alexandra,
Is this a system you own, or is it something that the company installs and you only get a percentage of the money collected?
Hi Marc,
this is a web based system. There are different ways of contract I assume, but usally you pay a percentage of the turnover.
15 years
I always avoid companies that give you the equipment for free and take a percentage. You make much more money by getting your own equipment. Internet Cafe software is incredibly cheap and a one-time fee. Vending machines, laundry machines etc are always better to own yourself. But internet especially, there's huge profit there.
15 years
Great info.
Can anyone offer any information on how much quota to allow for per guest when working out how much will be downloaded per day over wifi?
Unfortunately, Australia lags behind in cheap unlimited download plans. And that's not changing anytime soon.
We have a paid wifi system right now, but for guests from europe and the USA free wifi is like running water - a basic human necessity. I'd much prefer to offer it for free.
15 years
Here in Japan it's like a torrential storm! 100MB Fiber to your home (Up/Down) for around $50 AUSD a month! :D
Yep Australia is a bit of a backwater for internet connections. One thing you don't want is people torrenting down movies and other stuff for long period of times. I would suggest that you may want to firewall off those sort of services and allow the usual applications like web, ssl, msn, skype etc.
If anyone is pulling more than 200MB a day they are seriously abusing the system. I would say around 50MB a day should suffice the most normal user. Have a look the universities in OZ and see what they do.
Here's an example from USQ: http://www.usq.edu.au/ict/students/computerlabs/internet.htm
15 years
Thanks Phillip,
200MB would be a nice long chat on Skype, as well as all email, facebook etc as well as a few youtube vids. I think thats reasonable.
My concern is poor free wifi would be worse than having reliable paid so I want to get it right.
Have to convince the boss too!
15 years
Paid by you, free for your guests!
I almost expect from a hostel to have access to internet for free and it annoys me hugely if I stay in a hotel (for work) and despite the high room rate, you still have to pay 5Euros or so to get internet access.
You will have internet connection anyway and IMHO it does not really cost you extra.
15 years
It's a much different situation in parts of the world outside North East Asia, Europe and North America. Even in Australia and NZ the amount of Gb of downloads per month is extremely limited on normal packages. I believe this is because Telecom in australia has a monopoly on the internet traffic leaving the country. If you offer free internet in these circumstances and people start downloading heaps, it will soon become very expensive. Personally I think internet should probably be free these days in hostels, but if you have limited bandwidth/ downloads, you should limit it to internet only, and block torrents and even youtube if neccessary. This can be done pretty easily by using opendns. You're better off with a system that works than one that tries to please heavy downloaders.
15 years
Spot on Scotch Argus.
I've crunched the numbers, as to how we'll replace the money from the lost wifi revenue.
The costs of setting up the hardware seems fairly minimal, so this week I'm going to put together a proof of concept system to show the boss.
We try and encourage a general atmosphere of sharing and respect for other guests at the hostel, so I think if we remind wifi users that we don't have the bandwidth or IT budget of their university at home we should be ok.
Even though it's all been done before, if I get it up and running, I'll add as much information to the wiki as possible.
15 years
I'm not sure if this is what you are looking for, but have you seen the Zone CD? (From the Internet Access page.)
I haven't used it but it's apparently able to limit bandwidth per user.
The basic CD is free, and there are paid options going up to $140/year if you need more features.
15 years
Zone CD is what I'm trying first.
Picking up an old pc, and a wap today to try it out
I'm fairly handy with computers but networking has never been my thing so it could be interesting.
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