Virgin Media is said to be considering making the possible service free to its mobile and home broadband customers but any member of the public could either pay a subscription or PAYG fee or the service could even be subsidised by a local council.

Hmm, or a cynical person could suggest that this announcement coincides nicely with the current BT advert campaign - you know, the one with the Apple users hallucinating… ;) So maybe this is nothing more than a bit of “me too” by VM?

Now, whilst it doesn't effect me, (my VM service is quite good - no complaints), may I tentatively suggest that if VM have some spare money that they want to invest in their network, that they look at putting it to beefing up their current environment? From comments made here it would definitely appear that widening the backbone, especially in the cities, would attract more approval from the current VM customers.

Oh, and personally, I can't see any council being willing to waste precious pennies on WiFi folderol, especially at this time when they're talking about having to close libraries, fire dustmen and teachers, turn off street lights, etc …