Back in 2006, when Wi-Fi was all the rage, we saw many startups paint a future in which we’d be able to hop from one hot spot to another seamlessly, sharing the bandwidth for free when we could and buying it when we had to. Well, the future turned out to be entirely different.

Whisher, a Wi-Fi company that launched with much fanfare at DEMO in January 2007, sold itself to WiFi.com, a hot-spot services company, sometime earlier this year, according to founder and Chief Technology Officer Mike Puchol. The sale came close on the heels of the firing of CEO Ferran Moreno in October 2008. Now while for most companies, such a sale would signal the end of the story, with Whisher it was the start of a new one. As part of its preparation to merge operations with WiFi.com, Whisher launched an internal audit that turned up certain irregularities, which in turn led to a full-blown investigative audit. What it discovered wasn’t good. From a company statement sent to us by Puchol:

“Whisher announces that after a thorough investigation, on April 23rd 2009, it filed a criminal lawsuit against its founder and former CEO Ferran Moreno Blanca, for the alleged offenses of embezzlement, disloyal administration, and falseness in mercantile documents. The lawsuit is also filed against Jesús Roy Solanas for his alleged intervention in the offenses. Whisher confirms that no other party connected with the company was involved in the case, and that the lawsuit has been accepted by the Spanish courts in Barcelona. Ferran Moreno will declare before the courts as defendant on July 1st.”

Wow, what an interesting turn of events for Ferran, who got into an argument with Martin Varsavsky, founder of FON and his former boss, around the time Whisher was launched. Ferran, who was a longtime employee of the Swiss phone company, Swisscom, had championed the idea to his employers, who ended up seed funding the project. But somewhere along the line things got murky, and fake invoices were submitted, first to Swisscom and then to Whisher, Puchol alleges in his email.

I bet we haven’t heard the last of this saga.

It looks like the Sprint and Cogent networks are back talking to each other — at least temporarily. After the two companies severed networks on Oct. 30, there has been wide spread criticism of the severing of the networks. According to some sources, the disconnection between two networks caused problems for universities and many U.S. government agencies that are customers of Sprint. In an update on its web site, Sprint announced that it was reconnecting the networks as an interim solution.

Sprint initiated a temporary reconnection to the Cogent network on Sunday, November 2nd so that customers would have temporary access while longer-term alternate and permanent access options are explored. We emphasize that this reconnection is temporary only, as the core issues in this dispute have not changed. Cogent was notified in advance of the November 2nd reconnection; therefore, any access disruptions occurring during this temporary period are the sole result of a negative reaction instigated by Cogent against the customers of both parties.

Earlier this week when I spoke to Dave Schaffer, CEO of Cogent Communications, he pointed out that Sprint was a tiny fraction of the traffic coming to Cogent network, and the dispute was affecting customers who are single-homed to only the Sprint network, especially those trying to access the Internet from Sprint’s mobile devices.

Updated: Whisher has sent this special offer to our readers. They are giving away WiFi Out credit to GigaOM readers, and you can get the details here. The deal allows you to get free WiFi at Starbucks, Hilton Hotels, International airports and other locations.

Whisher, which provides access to Wi-Fi hotspots around the world in exchange for access on users’ own home or business networks, has unveiled a client that allows access to its hotspots on Nokia Symbian (N81, N82 or E61) phones. The move is a smart extension of Whisher’s service offering; Nokia has been including Wi-Fi chipsets in many of its smartphones and has built a strong market share.

To integrate the client (and further lock users into using the Whisher service), the company has introduced a feature called Automatic Connection. When enabled, Automatic Connection scans all Wi-Fi networks within range and connects to the one with the strongest connection. (It’s unclear at this point whether the client would prefer a Whisher network over an open-access network if the two network strengths are equal.)

If you’d like to try the Whisher Wi-Fi sharing system and the associated Symbian client, there are two steps. First, visit Whisher’s web site and download the software appropriate for your home networking set-up (the company has both Windows and Mac clients). Once it’s installed, you’ll be “sharing” on the Whisher network of global Wi-Fi hotspots. Then point your mobile browser to http://nokia.whisher.com and install the Symbian application. After the app is installed, available Whisher hotspots will have a designated “W” icon attached, as pictured on the right.

To see whether the Whisher service has hotspots in the areas you frequent, be sure to view its global map.

The Wisher Wi-Fi network isn’t as far-reaching as the Fon network, but moves like this Nokia agreement — which capitalizes on the E Series and N Series wireless networking capabilities — are proof the company is working to stay competitive. What Wi-Fi roaming service do you use? Would you recommend it?

If you thought eBay taking a hefty writedown for its mistake — I mean Skype was shocking — then Sprint’s Nextel deal writedown is going to leave you awed. Sprint Nextel reported a $29.5 billion loss, scratched its dividend and lost 683,000 customers. The company wrote down $29.7 billion of the $36 billion it paid for Nextel in 2005.

Taking that out of the equation, the company made some money, but things aren’t all that great for Sprint. Bloomberg reports that it is the fifth-largest loss among S&P 500 companies since 1990. In other words, there have been four other disasters bigger than this.

Anyway, there is more bad news in the offering, and new CEO Dan Hesse didn’t sugarcoat anything. With 1.2 million subscribers expected to switch away from Sprint, Hesse admitted that things are going to be tough.

“The fourth-quarter financial results reflect the challenges facing our wireless business… more difficult than what I had expected to encounter…will take time to produce improved operating performance. Our near-term subscriber and financial results will continue to be pressured.” [The Washington Post]

Hesse said Sprint will be the new brand, and they will launch the QChat in the second quarter.

That said, I wonder if Sprint can be saved? Take our poll and have your say.

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I’ve been watching the mobile industry commit hara-kari over the past few days. US Cellular is the latest to join this mad dash to the bottom. Their new $99 unlimited calling plans make me wonder if they have actually thought through this move and its long-term implications.

A friend of mine, a veteran of the long-distance wars who’s worked with the phone companies, both the wired and the wireless kind, described the big three mobile carriers — Verizon, AT&T, and T-Mobile — as dumb, dumber and dumbest.

These moves remind him of the crazy 1990s, when Sprint, MCI and AT&T fought over long-distance minutes by offering lower prices and thus slowly destroying their ability to make money to support their bloated infrastructure. It’s pretty much the same situation here — but the pain is going to be felt much sooner.

Here is why: I am one of the high-end customers of AT&T, locked into a 2-year contract for my iPhone. I’ve been paying $99 a month (plus about $40 for data and messaging) for 2,000 rollover minutes, free weekends and evenings.

It’s never been tough for me to go over the 2,000 minute-limit, since my mobile is my primary phone. Result: I end up paying between $25 to $150 in overages, depending on the amount time I spend on the phone. I am the perfect customer, the kind that makes up for the ones at the bottom of the pile who either don’t spend enough money or didn’t care to get big buckets of minutes.

But now I am going to get an unlimited plan. And that is the big question: Why would you as a company limit the amount of money spent by some of your best (and I mean high-spending) customers? I suspect most of the people who are going to sign up for these $99-a-month plans are going to be folks like me — existing customers who are looking to bring their  wireless bills under control.

These are particularly attractive options for small biz, startups and web workers. Now your communication costs are pre-determined, which is a good way to budget. I am asking the GigaTEAM to switch to a $99 plan (on offer from whatever mobile operator they use) and also putting the PBX-land line option on hold…forever.