I am amazed at the attitude in this thread.
The motivation behind this is obviously that the ISPs don't want several neighbors to only have to pay for one connection. Over here the attitude is if you want a private network, you turn on a password. If you just want it to be there for everyone to use, you leave it open, because it is convenient for everyone. The idea is that soon enough it won't matter where you are, there will always be a wifi connection available.
I don't think any ISPs here charge by the amount of data you transfer. It is all unlimited, so maybe that is what the difference is.
Again I will post my Big Brother posters from the UK, since no one responded:
The motivation behind this is obviously that the ISPs don't want several neighbors to only have to pay for one connection. Over here the attitude is if you want a private network, you turn on a password. If you just want it to be there for everyone to use, you leave it open, because it is convenient for everyone. The idea is that soon enough it won't matter where you are, there will always be a wifi connection available.
I don't think any ISPs here charge by the amount of data you transfer. It is all unlimited, so maybe that is what the difference is.
Again I will post my Big Brother posters from the UK, since no one responded: