Well, we have been tuned to Google's plans for
municipal WiFi for quite some time (they set the news race when the dark fiber purchases became
public). What are their plans? A nationwide or, gasp, global WiFi network? Don't put it past them. This is a company
that somehow keenly senses which direction the world is
going and then plans to be in a perfect position to capitalize on it when it gets there. Using the Sony PSP's built-in WiFi would be a rather intriguing start to this. There are over 5 million of these handheld beauties in the U.S. now - it would be a shame to just let their WiFi capabilities sit around waiting for group gaming. Use that hidden gem to connect your PSP to the net (and to Google) wherever WiFi is available, and bring that easy connectivity to the mainstream PSP user. If that user is already doing that, point them to the all-Google property and subsidize their access in exchange for "Google-izing" their WiFi access.
When we start to see portable gaming consoles like the PSP - and maybe even a WiFi iPod to get those iTunes tracks and videos anywhere there is WiFi - and mainstream smartphones starting to appear en-masse with WiFi, look out network bandwidth administrators - it's going to be a bumpy ride.
