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What exactly is the joke? ๐ค
https://computer.rip/2023-07-29-Free-Public-WiFi.html
Ok what's the joke in 50 words or fewer?
Back in the day, if you joined an adhoc mesh network - ever - then Win XP would broadcast that network SSID anytime you weren't connected to anything else.
So once, someone somewhere created an ad hoc network named "Free Public Wi-Fi" and people being people, someone else connected to it. After that, every time their laptop had no other viable connection, their machine would offer "Free Public Wi-Fi"... and the machine of anyone else who connected would behave the same way.
Sorry, that's more than fifty words.
Tl;Dr: it was an accidental virus that took advantage of a bug in human psychology. And Windows XP. Eventually, XP was patched.
It followed the spirit of the request gracefully, I appreciate you