Wi-Fi for Austin

Last week, I had the pleasure of meeting Cory Doctorow as he flew into Austin for the SXSW Interactive conference. Among his luggage, Cory lugged in a duffel bag full of wireless access points. He furtively scampered around the convention center, lighting up hotspots, so that SXSW attendees could have wireless Internet access.

This is a civic embarrassment. Why do we need a guest from San Francisco coming in to light up our convention center? Sure, the SXSW coordinators could have rented wireless access for some obscene price. A year ago, the convention center employees were yelling at SXSW attendees to unplug their laptops from wall power. It appears they have mercifully gotten the clue about that stupid policy. Hopefully by the time SXSW rolls around next year, they will do the same for wireless Internet.

SXSW Interactive is over, Cory has gone home, and the convention center is dark again. For goodness sake, this city is supposed to be a frickin' high-tech mecca. People should be able to walk into the convention center and just get signal. Instead, they find themselves searching for a window so radio waves from some nearby access point leak in.

The volunteers of the Austin Wireless group are doing a good job promoting wireless access in Austin. That's not enough. The City needs to step up to the plate and exercise some leadership. I hope last night's presentation may start a dialog that leads to that.