Of course the Japanese have vending machines with free Wi-Fi

Asahi, if you don’t know your foreign beers, is pretty much the Japanese equivalent of Budweiser: a huge macrobrewery that has a big chunk of the market. Although their beer is a little better. Yes, we know that’s not saying much.

Anyway, they’ve realized “We’re a Japanese company! We have to do something that’s simultaneously neat and kind of weird!” So, in the land of vending machines (seriously, the Japanese love them for some reason), they’ve introduced something novel: a vending machine that’s also a Wi-Fi hotspot.

Why are they doing this? Mostly for advertising. The Japanese, as a country, are pretty tech savvy and very, very connected. So a vending machine offering free Wi-Fi for fifty meters is actually a good way to lure customers: come for the Internet access, which lasts half an hour and only requires you look at an ad, and stay for the soft drinks Asahi brews.

The ultimate plan is to cover Japan in these things: Asahi wants 10,000 of them on the street in the next five years, which is a fair chunk of its 250,000 vending machines. So soon, when you’re lost in Japan, you can stop near a vending machine, get a cold drink, and access Google Maps.

No word on when this technological marvel may come to the US, but we’re hoping it’s soon: we need some way to get on the Internet in the break room.

Japan Gets Wi-Fi Dispensers [TechCrunch]

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