Disconnected!!

I am an IT guy. I am connected, hear me roar!!  I am fortunate enough to have my father here in Vancouver and he just happens to be staying in a Hotel just a block from my work.  I decided that I would stay down a couple of days relieve myself of driving the sea to sky highway.  So I packed some clothes and my MacBook and prepared to enjoy my visit.

After a great dinner and some chats, I decided to open up the notebook and surf a little, update Twitter and Facebook, chat with my girlfriend etc etc.  I was disappointed to find out that the Hotel (ehem…  The Marriot) charges $15 per day for this service!!  15$!!  What a money grab.  I am not paying for the room but I am sure they can afford a few hundred dollar data bill for the rates they are charging there.  Give me a break.  Since I was on the 30^th floor, I was too high and far away from the residential buildings to probe for open Access Points.  And since I live in Canada my iPhone is on the Edge Network which is basically dialup and since Rogers has deplorable data packages using that device would probably cost me more than $15 for the evening anyway.

Oh, the curse of being a connected IT guy.  I know you are saying “Suck it up!  Pay the $15!”  You are probably right but I just couldn’t justify it.  Whatever happened to the Open AP for the People movement?  Don’t talk to me about security either.  You have to balance your level of security with what you are trying to protect.  I am not a Bank, or CSIS.  If you want to use some of my bandwidth, then by all means have some.  Anyway, security is another topic. 

Thanks for listening to my rant…