>
> This is all part of my snowbird fantasy:
>
> OK, if you dispense with the satelite idea, and depend on Wifi hot spots,
> that might not be so bad.  Flying J truck stops, KOA campgrounds, many
> other truck stops, and all airports have Wifi hotspots.  Oh, and decent
> coffeehouses. The list is growing every day, and soon you may be able to
> get a Wifi conneciton most anywhere you park.
>
> I haven't ever tried to use Wifi hotspots. I have been told that they are
> problematic, because there are a Tower of Babel of different providers,
> and if you aren't signed up with the right provider, you don't get on the
> net.  Is that the case?  Or do you just sign on and surf?
>


   Well, claiming "All airports have wifi hotspots" is more than
a little optimistic.... heck, there's only a small part of
O'Hare, for example, where you can get wifi access.

   Personally, I've found that using the 1xRTT service through
my Verizon cell phone works perfectly fine when out of
range of a wifi node.  100kbps speeds, totally free
on weekends and at night.  You can get an unlimited data plan
for about $80/month, and coverage, unless you're
stuck out in the middle of nowhere is extremely good.  And
you can fall back on their 14.4K data service, if
necessary.  ;-)  1xRTT comes as a standard part of
all of their national plans, though, oddly, they don't
seem to mention it anywhere obvious when you sign up...

   The biggest problem is that I can't have both the data
cable for the phone and its power supply plugged in at the
same time, so I'm limited to about 3 hours of high-speed
surfing before I have to recharge.  :-)

- Rich

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