What do we want – free Wi-Fi. When do we want it – now.

If you happen to live in New York City, the concrete jungle where dreams are made of, it’s looking like you might get your wish in the not too distant future. Building has already begun with regards to a free Wi-Fi network, covering the entire city with as many as 7 500 Internet-providing kiosks dubbed Links.

But wait there’s more, because it’s not just your insatiable lust to surf the net for free that will be addressed. More from Fortune:

Each location is equipped with a nearly 10-foot-tall monolith, equipped with USB ports for charging phones, a built-in touchscreen tablet running Android for making video calls, and two large screens for displaying advertisements.

Each Link will also put out a strong 400-foot Wi-Fi signal with a top speed of 1 Gbps, depending on network congestion.

Of course Google is on board, providing much of the initial cash injection, although revenue will eventually be generated by the Links themselves:

According to New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, the city isn’t contributing a taxpayer cent to the construction and operation of Links. Instead, Intersection plans to generate about $500 million over the next 12 years from Links, primarily from digital mini-billboards placed on both sides of a Link kiosk.

It is anticipated that it could take as long as eight years to complete all 7 500 Links, although the project is committed to building at least 500 over the next 15 months.

[imagecredit:mybroadband]

All of this begs the question of where exactly we, the City of Cape Town, are in comparison. First off we’re not talking about buying your low fat latte and then leaching off that spot’s internet all day, we’re talking ‘doesn’t cost you a cent’ kind of free.

As of November last year it seems we might be doing OK if this from News24 is to believed:

The Western Cape Provincial government is rolling out a Wi-Fi programme intended to grant internet access to mainly poorer communities and Khayelitsha and Mitchell’s Plain have already benefited.

“In the next three years, every ward will have at least one [Wi-Fi] hotspot,” MEC Alan Winde promised in June this year [2015].

[André Stelzner, chief information officer of the City of Cape Town], speaking at the Accelerate Cape Town’s forum on Digital Cape Town: Creating a Smart City on Friday, said that Cape Town has about 170 Wi-Fi hotspots and plans to construct another 120 by the end of the year.

In Khayelitsha and Mitchell’s Plain, residents have access to 3GB of data per day, well above the standard 100MB in other areas.

About 30 000 residents currently access the City of Cape Town’s Wi-Fi network, while in Gauteng, 165 000 unique users per month access 633 public hotspots in the City of Tshwane.

Obviously that’s still some way off what New York intends to roll out, but perhaps we’re headed in the right direction. We may need to show patience, and I doubt we’ll have phone charging kiosks dotted around the city any time soon, but at the very least internet access seems to be headed to those who need it most.

[sources:fortune,news24]