Is It Hot In Here?
by Gary Woods

If you spend a lot of traveling around with your Laptop or Wi-Fi equipped PDA it would be good to check into Hot Spot Providers. Hot Spots are places where you can check your email and cruise the Internet.

The most famous provider is T-Mobile with thousands of locations nationwide in places like Starbucks, Borders, Kinko's, airports and many airline clubs. T-Mobile has almost 5000 locations. Unlimited national use costs $29.99 per month if you sign up for a year. Month to month it's $39.99 and there's a day pass for $9.99.

If you spend a lot of time out of the country iPass is a virtual network operator aimed at providing access to mobile enterprise users. It claims about 20,000 Internet access points in 24 countries. iPass also weaves together hundreds of access providers in over 150 countries into a single scalable virtual network that provides end-to-end security, centrally managed policy enforcement and a nice user interface.

Another service is Boingo Wi-Fi service which has over 6000 Hot Spot locations under contract and over 3300 live in 18 countries, over 700 cities and almost all US States. The Boingo Wi-Fi network includes full or partial coverage in many US airports, with service in the lobbies of hundreds of hotels such as the Four Seasons, Hilton, Marriott and Wyndham. Boingo service usually costs $39.95 per month, but special offers are as low as $21.95 per month with no contract.

If you have any suggestions or questions for me please drop me a note at garyandlaury@santabarbaraproperties.com or see my column on the Internet at http://www.santabarbaraproperties.com or call me at (805) 729-0910