Still in its infancy, web-based advertising is a potentially significant revenue and service opportunity for community wireless
broadband networks. Yankee Group's preliminary estimate is that a city with the population size and demographics of Boston or
Seattle could realize as much as $7 million annually from advertising revenue once the network is fully built out. The broader
online advertising marketplace is growing rapidly and reached $16.9 billion in 2006. Even so, most internet service providers
(ISPs) do not directly share in this revenue. Instead, they rely on monthly subscription fees. Is community wireless a separate
market with unique subscribers, or just an extension of the broadband market?
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