Using a Palm to connect to the Internet and get e-mail is intriguing. Typically, Palm’s have accessed the Internet using cellular phone networks. The Palm Treo line, for example, is a combination cell phone and Palm handheld. And the people that carry these seem to like them. However, I’m not wild about always carrying a Palm just to carry a phone. Enter the Palm T|X., an affordable Palm with built-in WiFi, or wireless networking support. Now, I can get on the Internet at any public and many private wireless access points. At Panera Bakery, Iowa interstate rest areas or at home, I get laptop-like connectivity from a $300 handheld.

A Crisis of Availability

As I started playing with the WiFi features of the T|X, two issues came to light. The first is a crisis of availability. Not a lack of availability, but a dearth. The T|X, like most WiFi devices, lets users scan for availability access points, showing the name of the access point, and whether it is secure or insecure—essentially if anyone can access it or if it requires a password. It’s amazing as I’m out and around how many insecure wireless access points I encounter. I believe it’s wrong to use these open connections if they don’t belong to you. In my mind, that is akin to hooking my garden hose to your water faucet. There are people who don’t respect this and “borrow” Internet connections they find.

If you have a wireless access point in your home or business, lock it down. Not sure how? Check out the product’s manual, call a friend or drop me a line at the address below.

A Crisis of Etiquette

Starbucks leads the world in providing public WiFi access. Their WiFi is available for everyone to use for a fee. Panera offers it for free. And Des Moines firm I Spot has “unwired” rest areas along Iowa’s interstate highways. Italic author Umberto Eco proposed use of the Web in public “Multimedia Arcades”, encouraging people to help each other and to foster social interaction. He would have been appalled to see how public wireless connections have created islands of users in seas of people.

Wireless access in public spaces has created another excuse to forgo our manners. During a recent visit to a restaurant that features free WiFi, I did a little trendspotting. I saw students studying alone, occupying entire booths. I saw a couple, each with their own laptop, haggling with each other over the family bills.

Maybe it was the “free” part that created some unintended consequences for this place, I wondered, as I stood looking for a table. This joint had encouraged people to park at a table to work or study, without regard to others around them or to the lunch rush. Since there was no wait staff trying to earn a living from tips, there didn’t seem a push to “turn” tables very quickly. So, there I stood with my soup and salad, watching Dick and Jane argue about how much they paid for their dry cleaning.

Had the couple bothered to read the Terms of Agreement that popped up on their laptops when they used the establishments wireless Internet, they would have found the item that asked patrons to limit their use during peak meal traffic. Of course, there wasn’t a manager running around enforcing the policy.

Given the track record with cell phone manners, I’m less than optimistic about the future of wireless manners. Maybe I’ll be surprised.