This landed in our snail mail box today:

It’s a glossy flyer touting the MetroFi wi-fi network—the one that, as Scott reported below, two Personal Telco Project members found works only about half the time. That doesn’t seem good enough to turn on the rest of the network:

According to the bid the city granted to the company, MetroFi has to show at least 90 percent coverage in the test area—but only outdoors—to continue on with the rest of the city.

The Mercury’s office is technically in the test area—so if this flyer only went to test area people, it’s weird we didn’t get it months ago, when the test began. (Despite being in that area, we’ve yet to be able to connect from the office, and I’m not willing to shell out $100+ to buy a wi-fi modem to test it.)

But anyway, as Scott reported, MetroFi’s awaiting their test results, so they can flip the switch on the rest of the “access nodes.” Since the test report is due very soon—early-mid April—my bet is this flyer went out beyond the test area to let phase two people know about the wi-fi (I’ve got a call in to find out).

I just hope it didn’t go out too widely, or MetroFi’s going to have a bunch of cranky people on their hands. The back of the flyer says:

(Click here to see the entire back of the flyer.)

Yep, that says “try it today!” and “you’ll be surfing the Internet for free in no time!”

Sure, after you pay for the modem and/or wait for the rest of the network to go live.