Are you going to use a mobile Internet connection?

[Torsten]

Hi,

Have you ever thought about using a mobile Internet connection instead of a fixed one? It occurred to me that although this technology is available in Germany, not many people are actually using it. I think one of the reasons for this is ignorance. On the German T-Mobile website you can find information about their UMTS data transfer plans but it is almost impossible to understand how you sign up for the service let alone close the contract online. You need to go to a T-Mobile shop and ask a person a lot of questions. The problem is that most people simply don't know what questions to ask and how. I've tried to write a little about T-Mobile's online Internet services but I'm afraid it's still far to complicated. Anyway, have you ever thought about replacing your stationary Internet connection by a mobile one?

Thanks,
Torsten
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[Jamie (K)]

I don't consider using a wireless Internet connection for about four reasons: (1) The price is about the same as having a second cellphone account. (2) If you walk into the store of almost any US wireless provider and sneeze or merely breathe, you have to sign another two-year contract. (3) At home, I don't need to move my computer around. I'm addicted to the Internet enough without playing with it while I'm on the toilet or in the laundry room. (4) When I'm outside the house, practically everywhere I go is some kind of hot spot. The colleges where I teach are hot spots, from the parking lot, to the bathroom, to the gym, all the way to the roofs of the buildings. My church is a hot spot (a neo-Gothic church built in the 1870s that has wireless Internet in all the buildings and even in the yard). Wendy's is a hot spot. Everything's a hot spot. Why bother?

I have a friend who has set his whole house up as a wireless network. He, his wife, and his kids all access the same DSL connection remotely, from anywhere in the house. I think they've got at least six computers -- a desktop in the kitchen and in each kid's bedroom, and laptops lying anywhere someone happens to have used them.

[Torsten]

Hi Jamie,

How much do you pay for your WLAN usage and how many hours per month do you spend using hotspots? You see, the difference between the US and Germany is that in any medium sized city you seem to have very good WLAN coverage while we in Germany don't. Also, here the prices for WLAN access are still pretty steep because of a lack of real competition. The only WLAN provider is T-Mobile so of course they call the shots when it comes to pricing. That's the reason I'm trying to raise some interest in this type of service. I'm convinced that a few years from now quite a lot of people in Germany and other parts of Europe are going to access the Internet through a mobile connection. It's funny but when you compare T-Mobile UMTS products in the UK and Germany you will see that we are lagging about 3 years behind. That's pretty funny given the fact that although T-Mobile is a German company they provide better plans and rates abroad than here in Germany...
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[Jamie (K)]

T-Mobile probably provides better rates in the UK because they have hotter competition there. In the US, people living in cities where one cable TV operator has a monopoly pay at least double what people pay where two or more companies are competing. A couple I know who live about 25 minutes away, in a different suburb, pay for cable TV and high speed Internet together the same rate I pay for just cable TV from the same company. That's what competition does.

I actually don't know what WLAN access normally costs, because everywhere I use it, it's free. It costs nothing at the colleges, nothing at church, and I've never booted up at a Caribou Coffee, Starbucks or Wendy's. I seem to remember hearing that at one Starbucks the access was about $2.45, but I don't remember the time unit. In any case, each hotspot you go to has a different provider. Sometimes it's T-Mobile, sometimes AT&T, sometimes Verison or Sprint.

[Torsten]

Hi Jamie, you sometimes also teach at companies, don't you? Or do you invite your students to your home? I'm asking because I often travel to companies where there is no HotSpot (I'm sure that many German medium sized companies aren't even aware of WLAN technology). I often spend a few days a week in a different town and that's where a UMTS laptop will come in handy big time. Also, I could show my students how to use Skype, google information and even introduce them to the folks here on the forum...
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[Englishuser]

Hi Torsten,

This is slightly off-topic but do you know if many of your clients use English-Test.net?

EU

[Jamie (K)]

Most of the companies I go to are engineering companies that need to protect their intellectual property. For this reason, many of them don't allow laptops, camera phones or even flash drives to be brought into their buildings. I've never tried to bring a laptop into any of them, even the ones that allow it. And if I need a connection after the lesson, Borders, Barnes & Noble or Starbucks is usually right down the street. All my students are good at finding online resources, and some of them find resources I'd never have imagined in a million years could exist.