Why Wi-Fi?

Posted in Tubeworker's blog on ,

Virgin Media are bringing WiFi to 80 Tube stations in time for the Olympics. It'll work on the platforms but not the trains, so it seems a lot of hype for nothing. Maybe TfL hope this will help take your mind off overcrowded platforms if your train is severely delayed?

Virgin apparently won a competetive tender for this project. But it's a bit cryptic who is actually paying for it. Tfl say LU staff will fit the equipment, but the cost would be 'covered by the commercial contract'. We hope that means Virgin are coughing up ALL the money for this.

Although the service will be free during the Olympics, it will be available only to Virgin customers or on a pay-as-you-go basis afterwards. The revenue from that, not to mention advertising, will be worth a pretty penny to Richard Branson.

It all seems part of an encroachment of corporate interests delivering public services. Coincidentally, Richard Branson is poised to profit from the Government's imminent plans to break up the NHS. He is already running some NHS services through 'Virgin Health', formerly 'Assura Medical', the part of his empire that plunders public money to proft from sickness. Pay for extra-fast WiFi service updates or pay to jump the queue for a hospital bed....it's all the same logic to Branson: the logic of the market.

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