BT wants in on the Fon

Good news for the Spanish open wifi maverick Fon today. BT has not only confirmed itself as an investor in the company, but it’s also done an about face and is letting its own users sign up to the service. It’s a good deal for BT broadband users – they get access to 190,000 new wifi access points worldwide. But it’s not bad for the Foneros too – they get access to 2,000 BT Openzone hotspots, which are likely to be placed in cities and airports – places where you don’t generally get Fon subscribers – as well as how ever many BT subs sign up for the deal.

It’ll be interesting to see how many BT users go for it. But it would also be interesting to find out how BT’s going to make money off it. Fon users that resell their wifi access share revenues with the company, but Fon doesn’t say how many of the 300,000 + remaining subs that are not open wifi subscribers are selling their wares and how many are just roaming end users. Will there be enough Fon to go around?