Will Free Wi-Fi Become the Norm?

Larry Magid of CBS News and the San Jose Mercury News had an interesting post on CBS News this week about the future role of Wi-Fi.  Of course, if would be a nice holiday present to all if it widely became free in public places.  It was stimulated in part by McDonald's announcement of free Wi-Fi starting in January.

I also note that AT&T Mobility CEO Ralph de la Vega has said that it will try to ease the load on its network overburdened by the success of iPhone, and perhaps somewhat underbuilt/underprovisioned, and to offload the carrier's cellular traffic to Wi-Fi hotspots and femtocells.

So as we approach the 25th anniversary next year of the Docket 81-413 rulemaking that brought forth Wi-Fi (and Bluetooth) over the opposition of most mainstream players at the time, who knows how big its long term role may be?

UPDATE

 Wired: Ford is making its cars into mobile Wi-Fi hot spots.