US WiFi market racing ahead

With the recent addition of Deep Blue Wireless, to the ranks of US companies trying their hand at provisioning WiFi networks, this business model is really about to get tested. Along with Sputnik and Joltage, Deep Blue is offering it's centralized billing and authentication software to people interested in setting up WiFi Hotspots. The business model is based on revenue sharing. I set up a Hotspot using Deep Blue software, and anyone with a Deep Blue account can log-on and pay for wireless access using any Deep Blue Hotspot. My win: A piece of the revenue generated by my Hotspot, which incidentally is owned and paid for by me. The main difference between the 3 companies, apart from what regions they focus on, is the status of the actual software and authentication solution. Sputnik sticks it's head out of the crowd by using an Open-Source software solution, based on NoCatAuth, an Authentication solution developed by a Sonoma County, California, wireless community network called NoCat.
The question of course remains whether this is a viable business model. However, the technology is cheap and fairly well-known, and there is in fact little reason why someone with a HotSpot in a public placed shouldn't sign up for such a service. After all, software such as Sputnik's still guarantees the network owner, priority access, so in essence here's an option to make some potential revenue out of your excess bandwidth.

Most importantly it seems that WiFi has reached a sort of critical mass in the US, in which more new WiFi companies pop up every week. The question remains if Europe is going to follow, and when.